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+Project Gutenberg's The Tempting of Tavernake, by E. Phillips Oppenheim
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Tempting of Tavernake
+
+Author: E. Phillips Oppenheim
+
+Release Date: February, 2004  [EBook #5091]
+Posting Date: June 12, 2009
+Last Updated: March 9, 2018
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TEMPTING OF TAVERNAKE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Polly Stratton
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE TEMPTING OF TAVERNAKE
+
+
+By E. Phillips Oppenheim
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK ONE
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I. DESPAIR AND INTEREST
+
+They stood upon the roof of a London boarding-house in the neighborhood
+of Russell Square--one of those grim shelters, the refuge of
+Transatlantic curiosity and British penury. The girl--she represented
+the former race was leaning against the frail palisading, with gloomy
+expression and eyes set as though in fixed contemplation of the
+uninspiring panorama. The young man--unmistakably, uncompromisingly
+English--stood with his back to the chimney a few feet away, watching
+his companion. The silence between them was as yet unbroken, had lasted,
+indeed, since she had stolen away from the shabby drawing-room below,
+where a florid lady with a raucous voice had been shouting a music-hall
+ditty. Close upon her heels, but without speech of any sort, he had
+followed. They were almost strangers, except for the occasional word or
+two of greeting which the etiquette of the establishment demanded. Yet
+she had accepted his espionage without any protest of word or look. He
+had followed her with a very definite object. Had she surmised it,
+he wondered? She had not turned her head or vouchsafed even a single
+question or remark to him since he had pushed his way through the
+trap-door almost at her heels and stepped out on to the leads. Yet it
+seemed to him that she must guess.
+
+Below them, what seemed to be the phantasm of a painted city, a
+wilderness of housetops, of smoke-wreathed spires and chimneys,
+stretched away to a murky, blood-red horizon. Even as they stood there,
+a deeper color stained the sky, an angry sun began to sink into the
+piled up masses of thick, vaporous clouds. The girl watched with an air
+of sullen yet absorbed interest. Her companion's eyes were still fixed
+wholly and critically upon her. Who was she, he wondered? Why had she
+left her own country to come to a city where she seemed to have no
+friends, no manner of interest? In that caravansary of the world's
+stricken ones she had been an almost unnoticed figure, silent,
+indisposed for conversation, not in any obvious manner attractive. Her
+clothes, notwithstanding their air of having come from a first-class
+dressmaker, were shabby and out of fashion, their extreme neatness
+in itself pathetic. She was thin, yet not without a certain buoyant
+lightness of movement always at variance with her tired eyes, her
+ceaseless air of dejection. And withal she was a rebel. It was written
+in her attitude, it was evident in her lowering, militant expression,
+the smouldering fire in her eyes proclaimed it. Her long, rather narrow
+face was gripped between her hands; her elbows rested upon the brick
+parapet. She gazed at that world of blood-red mists, of unshapely,
+grotesque buildings, of strange, tawdry colors; she listened to the
+medley of sounds--crude, shrill, insistent, something like the groaning
+of a world stripped naked--and she had all the time the air of one who
+hates the thing she looks upon.
+
+Tavernake, whose curiosity concerning his companion remained unappeased,
+decided that the moment for speech had arrived. He took a step forward
+upon the soft, pulpy leads. Even then he hesitated before he finally
+committed himself. About his appearance little was remarkable save the
+general air of determination which gave character to his undistinguished
+features. He was something above the medium height, broad-set, and with
+rather more thick black hair than he knew how to arrange advantageously.
+He wore a shirt which was somewhat frayed, and an indifferent tie; his
+boots were heavy and clumsy; he wore also a suit of ready-made clothes
+with the air of one who knew that they were ready-made and was satisfied
+with them. People of a nervous or sensitive disposition would, without
+doubt, have found him irritating but for a certain nameless gift--an
+almost Napoleonic concentration upon the things of the passing moment,
+which was in itself impressive and which somehow disarmed criticism.
+
+“About that bracelet!” he said at last.
+
+She moved her head and looked at him. A young man of less assurance
+would have turned and fled. Not so Tavernake. Once sure of his ground
+he was immovable. There was murder in her eyes but he was not even
+disturbed.
+
+“I saw you take it from the little table by the piano, you know,”
+ he continued. “It was rather a rash thing to do. Mrs. Fitzgerald was
+looking for it before I reached the stairs. I expect she has called the
+police in by now.”
+
+Slowly her hand stole into the depths of her pocket and emerged.
+Something flashed for a moment high over her head. The young man caught
+her wrist just in time, caught it in a veritable grip of iron. Then,
+indeed, the evil fires flashed from her eyes, her teeth gleamed white,
+her bosom rose and fell in a storm of angry, unuttered sobs. She was
+dry-eyed and still speechless, but for all that she was a tigress. A
+strangely-cut silhouette they formed there upon the housetops, with a
+background of empty sky, their feet sinking in the warm leads.
+
+“I think I had better take it,” he said. “Let go.”
+
+Her fingers yielded the bracelet--a tawdry, ill-designed affair of
+rubies and diamonds. He looked at it disapprovingly.
+
+“That's an ugly thing to go to prison for,” he remarked, slipping it
+into his pocket. “It was a stupid thing to do, anyhow, you know. You
+couldn't have got away with it--unless,” he added, looking over
+the parapet as though struck with a sudden idea, “unless you had a
+confederate below.”
+
+He heard the rush of her skirts and he was only just in time. Nothing,
+in fact, but a considerable amount of presence of mind and the full
+exercise of a strength which was continually providing surprises for his
+acquaintances, was sufficient to save her. Their struggles upon the
+very edge of the roof dislodged a brick from the palisading, which went
+hurtling down into the street. They both paused to watch it, his arms
+still gripping her and one foot pressed against an iron rod. It was
+immediately after they had seen it pitch harmlessly into the road that
+a new sensation came to this phlegmatic young man. For the first time in
+his life, he realized that it was possible to feel a certain pleasurable
+emotion in the close grasp of a being of the opposite sex. Consequently,
+although she had now ceased to struggle, he kept his arms locked around
+her, looking into her face with an interest intense enough, but more
+analytical than emotional, as though seeking to discover the meaning of
+this curious throbbing of his pulses. She herself, as though exhausted,
+remained quite passive, shivering a little in his grasp and breathing
+like a hunted animal whose last hour has come. Their eyes met; then she
+tore herself away.
+
+“You are a hateful person,” she said deliberately, “a hateful,
+interfering person. I detest you.”
+
+“I think that we will go down now,” he replied.
+
+He raised the trap-door and glanced at her significantly. She held her
+skirts closely together and passed through it without looking at him.
+She stepped lightly down the ladder and without hesitation descended
+also a flight of uncarpeted attic stairs. Here, however, upon the
+landing, she awaited him with obvious reluctance.
+
+“Are you going to send for the police?” she asked without looking at
+him.
+
+“No,” he answered.
+
+“Why not?”
+
+“If I had meant to give you away I should have told Mrs. Fitzgerald at
+once that I had seen you take her bracelet, instead of following you out
+on to the roof.”
+
+“Do you mind telling me what you do propose to do, then?” she continued
+still without looking at him, still without the slightest note of appeal
+in her tone.
+
+He withdrew the bracelet from his pocket and balanced it upon his
+finger.
+
+“I am going to say that I took it for a joke,” he declared.
+
+She hesitated.
+
+“Mrs. Fitzgerald's sense of humor is not elastic,” she warned him.
+
+“She will be very angry, of course,” he assented, “but she will not
+believe that I meant to steal it.”
+
+The girl moved slowly a few steps away.
+
+“I suppose that I ought to thank you,” she said, still with averted
+face and sullen manner. “You have really been very decent. I am much
+obliged.”
+
+“Are you not coming down?” he asked.
+
+“Not at present,” she answered. “I am going to my room.”
+
+He looked around the landing on which they stood, at the miserable,
+uncarpeted floor, the ill-painted doors on which the long-forgotten
+varnish stood out in blisters, the jumble of dilapidated hot-water cans,
+a mop, and a medley of brooms and rags all thrown down together in a
+corner.
+
+“But these are the servants' quarters, surely,” he remarked.
+
+“They are good enough for me; my room is here,” she told him, turning
+the handle of one of the doors and disappearing. The prompt turning of
+the key sounded, he thought, a little ungracious.
+
+With the bracelet in his hand, Tavernake descended three more flights
+of stairs and entered the drawing-room of the private hotel conducted
+by Mrs. Raithby Lawrence, whose husband, one learned from her frequent
+reiteration of the fact, had once occupied a distinguished post in the
+Merchant Service of his country. The disturbance following upon the
+disappearance of the bracelet was evidently at its height. There were
+at least a dozen people in the room, most of whom were standing up. The
+central figure of them all was Mrs. Fitzgerald, large and florid, whose
+yellow hair with its varied shades frankly admitted its indebtedness to
+peroxide; a lady of the dashing type, who had once made her mark in the
+music-halls, but was now happily married to a commercial traveler who
+was seldom visible. Mrs. Fitzgerald was talking.
+
+“In respectable boarding-houses, Mrs. Lawrence,” she declared with
+great emphasis, “thefts may sometimes take place, I will admit, in the
+servants' quarters, and with all their temptations, poor things, it's
+not so much to be wondered at. But no such thing as this has ever
+happened to me before--to have jewelry taken almost from my person in
+the drawing-room of what should be a well-conducted establishment. Not a
+servant in the room, remember, from the moment I took it off until I got
+up from the piano and found it missing. It's your guests you've got to
+look after, Mrs. Lawrence, sorry to say it though I am.”
+
+Mrs. Lawrence managed here, through sheer loss of breath on the part of
+her assailant, to interpose a tearful protest.
+
+“I am quite sure,” she protested feebly, “that there is not a person
+in this house who would dream of stealing anything, however valuable it
+was. I am most particular always about references.”
+
+“Valuable, indeed!” Mrs. Fitzgerald continued with increased volubility.
+“I'd have you understand that I am not one of those who wear trumpery
+jewelry. Thirty-five guineas that bracelet cost me if it cost a penny,
+and if my husband were only at home I could show you the receipt.”
+
+Then there came an interruption of almost tragical interest. Mrs.
+Fitzgerald, her mouth still open, her stream of eloquence suddenly
+arrested, stood with her artificially darkened eyes riveted upon the
+stolid, self-composed figure in the doorway. Every one else was gazing
+in the same direction. Tavernake was holding the bracelet in the palm of
+his hand.
+
+“Thirty-five guineas!” he repeated. “If I had known that it was worth as
+much as that, I do not think that I should have dared to touch it.”
+
+“You--you took it!” Mrs. Fitzgerald gasped.
+
+“I am afraid,” he admitted, “that it was rather a clumsy joke. I
+apologize, Mrs. Fitzgerald. I hope you did not really imagine that it
+had been stolen.”
+
+One was conscious of the little thrill of emotion which marked the
+termination of the episode. Most of the people not directly concerned
+were disappointed; they were being robbed of their excitement, their
+hopes of a tragical denouement were frustrated. Mrs. Lawrence's worn
+face plainly showed her relief. The lady with the yellow hair, on the
+other hand, who had now succeeded in working herself up into a towering
+rage, snatched the bracelet from the young man's fingers and with a
+purple flush in her cheeks was obviously struggling with an intense
+desire to box his ears.
+
+“That's not good enough for a tale!” she exclaimed harshly. “I tell you
+I don't believe a word of it. Took it for a joke, indeed! I only wish my
+husband were here; he'd know what to do.”
+
+“Your husband couldn't do much more than get your bracelet back, ma'am,”
+ Mrs. Lawrence replied with acerbity. “Such a fuss and calling every one
+thieves, too! I'd be ashamed to be so suspicious.”
+
+Mrs. Fitzgerald glared haughtily at her hostess.
+
+“It's all very well for those that don't possess any jewelry and don't
+know the value of it, to talk,” she declared, with her eyes fixed upon
+a black jet ornament which hung from the other woman's neck. “What I say
+is this, and you may just as well hear it from me now as later. I don't
+believe this cock-and-bull story of Mr. Tavernake's. Them as took my
+bracelet from that table meant keeping it, only they hadn't the courage.
+And I'm not referring to you, Mr. Tavernake,” the lady continued
+vigorously, “because I don't believe you took it, for all your talk
+about a joke. And whom you may be shielding it wouldn't take me two
+guesses to name, and your motive must be clear to every one. The common
+hussy!”
+
+“You are exciting yourself unnecessarily, Mrs. Fitzgerald,” Tavernake
+remarked. “Let me assure you that it was I who took your bracelet from
+that table.”
+
+Mrs. Fitzgerald regarded him scornfully.
+
+“Do you expect me to believe a tale like that?” she demanded.
+
+“Why not?” Tavernake replied. “It is the truth. I am sorry that you have
+been so upset--”
+
+“It is not the truth!”
+
+More sensation! Another unexpected entrance! Once more interest in the
+affair was revived. After all, the lookers-on felt that they were not to
+be robbed of their tragedy. An old lady with yellow cheeks and jet black
+eyes leaned forward with her hand to her ear, anxious not to miss a
+syllable of what was coming. Tavernake bit his lip; it was the girl from
+the roof who had entered the room.
+
+“I have no doubt,” she continued in a cool, clear tone, “that Mrs.
+Fitzgerald's first guess would have been correct. I took the bracelet.
+I did not take it for a joke, I did not take it because I admire it--I
+think it is hideously ugly. I took it because I had no money.”
+
+She paused and looked around at them all, quietly, yet with something in
+her face from which they all shrank. She stood where the light fell full
+upon her shabby black gown and dejected-looking hat. The hollows in her
+pale cheeks, and the faint rims under her eyes, were clearly manifest;
+but notwithstanding her fragile appearance, she held herself with
+composure and even dignity. Twenty--thirty seconds must have passed
+whilst she stood there, slowly finishing the buttoning of her gloves.
+No one attempted to break the silence. She dominated them all--they felt
+that she had something more to say. Even Mrs. Fitzgerald felt a weight
+upon her tongue.
+
+“It was a clumsy attempt,” she went on. “I should have had no idea where
+to raise money upon the thing, but I apologize to you, nevertheless,
+Mrs. Fitzgerald, for the anxiety which my removal of your valuable
+property must have caused you,” she added, turning to the owner of the
+bracelet, whose cheeks were once more hot with anger at the contempt in
+the girl's tone. “I suppose I ought to thank you, Mr. Tavernake, also,
+for your well-meant effort to preserve my character. In future, that
+shall be my sole charge. Has any one anything more to say to me before I
+go?”
+
+Somehow or other, no one had. Mrs. Fitzgerald was irritated and fuming,
+but she contented herself with a snort. Her speech was ready enough as
+a rule, but there was a look in this girl's eyes from which she was glad
+enough to turn away. Mrs. Lawrence made a weak attempt at a farewell.
+
+“I am sure,” she began, “we are all sorry for what's occurred and that
+you must go--not that perhaps it isn't better, under the circumstances,”
+ she added hastily. “As regards--”
+
+“There is nothing owing to you,” the girl interrupted calmly. “You may
+congratulate yourself upon that, for if there were you would not get it.
+Nor have I stolen anything else.”
+
+“About your luggage?” Mrs. Lawrence asked.
+
+“When I need it, I will send for it,” the girl replied.
+
+She turned her back upon them and before they realized it she was gone.
+She had, indeed, something of the grand manner. She had come to plead
+guilty to a theft and she had left them all feeling a little like
+snubbed children. Mrs. Fitzgerald, as soon as the spell of the girl's
+presence was removed, was one of the first to recover herself. She felt
+herself beginning to grow hot with renewed indignation.
+
+“A thief!” she exclaimed looking around the room. “Just an ordinary
+self-convicted thief! That's what I call her, and nothing else. And here
+we all stood like a lot of ninnies. Why, if I'd done my duty I'd have
+locked the door and sent for a policeman.”
+
+“Too late now, anyway,” Mrs. Lawrence declared. “She's gone for good,
+and no mistake. Walked right out of the house. I heard her slam the
+front door.”
+
+“And a good job, too,” Mrs. Fitzgerald armed. “We don't want any of her
+sort here--not those who've got things of value about them. I bet she
+didn't leave America for nothing.”
+
+A little gray-haired lady, who had not as yet spoken, and who very
+seldom took part in any discussion at all, looked up from her knitting.
+She was desperately poor but she had charitable instincts.
+
+“I wonder what made her want to steal,” she remarked quietly.
+
+“A born thief,” Mrs. Fitzgerald declared with conviction,--“a real bad
+lot. One of your sly-looking ones, I call her.”
+
+The little lady sighed.
+
+“When I was better off,” she continued, “I used to help at a soup
+kitchen in Poplar. I have never forgotten a certain look we used to see
+occasionally in the faces of some of the men and women. I found out what
+it meant--it was hunger. Once or twice lately I have passed the girl who
+has just gone out, upon the stairs, and she almost frightened me. She
+had just the same look in her eyes. I noticed it yesterday--it was just
+before dinner, too--but she never came down.”
+
+“She paid so much for her room and extra for meals,” Mrs. Lawrence said
+thoughtfully. “She never would have a meal unless she paid for it at the
+time. To tell you the truth, I was feeling a bit uneasy about her. She
+hasn't been in the dining-room for two days, and from what they tell
+me there's no signs of her having eaten anything in her room. As for
+getting anything out, why should she? It would be cheaper for her here
+than anywhere, if she'd got any money at all.”
+
+There was an uncomfortable silence. The little old lady with the
+knitting looked down the street into the sultry darkness which had
+swallowed up the girl.
+
+“I wonder whether Mr. Tavernake knows anything about her,” some one
+suggested.
+
+But Tavernake was not in the room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II. A TETE-A-TETE SUPPER
+
+Tavernake caught her up in New Oxford Street and fell at once into step
+with her. He wasted no time whatever upon preliminaries.
+
+“I should be glad,” he said, “if you would tell me your name.”
+
+Her first glance at him was fierce enough to have terrified a different
+sort of man. Upon Tavernake it had absolutely no effect.
+
+“You need not unless you like, of course,” he went on, “but I wish
+to talk to you for a few moments and I thought that it would be more
+convenient if I addressed you by name. I do not remember to have heard
+it mentioned at Blenheim House, and Mrs. Lawrence, as you know, does not
+introduce her guests.”
+
+By this time they had walked a score or so of paces together. The girl,
+after her first furious glance, had taken absolutely no notice of him
+except to quicken her pace a little. Tavernake remained by her side,
+however, showing not the slightest sense of embarrassment or annoyance.
+He seemed perfectly content to wait and he had not in the least the
+appearance of a man who could be easily shaken off. From a fit of
+furious anger she passed suddenly and without warning to a state of half
+hysterical amusement.
+
+“You are a foolish, absurd person,” she declared. “Please go away. I do
+not wish you to walk with me.”
+
+Tavernake remained imperturbable. She remembered suddenly his
+intervention on her behalf.
+
+“If you insist upon knowing,” she said, “my name at Blenheim House was
+Beatrice Burnay. I am much obliged to you for what you did for me there,
+but that is finished. I do not wish to have any conversation with you,
+and I absolutely object to your company. Please leave me at once.”
+
+“I am sorry,” he answered, “but that is not possible.”
+
+“Not possible?” she repeated, wonderingly.
+
+He shook his head.
+
+“You have no money, you have eaten no dinner, and I do not believe that
+you have any idea where you are going,” he declared, deliberately.
+
+Her face was once more dark with anger.
+
+“Even if that were the truth,” she insisted, “tell me what concern it is
+of yours? Your reminding me of these facts is simply an impertinence.”
+
+“I am sorry that you look upon it in that light,” he remarked, still
+without the least sign of discomposure. “We will, if you do not mind,
+waive the discussion for the moment. Do you prefer a small restaurant or
+a corner in a big one? There is music at Frascati's but there are not so
+many people in the smaller ones.”
+
+She turned half around upon the pavement and looked at him steadfastly.
+His personality was at last beginning to interest her. His square jaw
+and measured speech were indices of a character at least unusual. She
+recognized certain invincible qualities under an exterior absolutely
+commonplace.
+
+“Are you as persistent about everything in life?” she asked him.
+
+“Why not?” he replied. “I try always to be consistent.”
+
+“What is your name?”
+
+“Leonard Tavernake,” he answered, promptly.
+
+“Are you well off--I mean moderately well off?”
+
+“I have a quite sufficient income.”
+
+“Have you any one dependent upon you?”
+
+“Not a soul,” he declared. “I am my own master in every sense of the
+word.”
+
+She laughed in an odd sort of way.
+
+“Then you shall pay for your persistence,” she said,--“I mean that I may
+as well rob you of a sovereign as the restaurant people.”
+
+“You must tell me now where you would like to go to,” he insisted. “It
+is getting late.”
+
+“I do not like these foreign places,” she replied. “I should prefer to
+go to the grill-room of a good restaurant.”
+
+“We will take a taxicab,” he announced. “You have no objection?”
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+“If you have the money and don't mind spending it,” she said, “I will
+admit that I have had all the walking I want. Besides, the toe of my
+boot is worn through and I find it painful. Yesterday I tramped ten
+miles trying to find a man who was getting up a concert party for the
+provinces.”
+
+“And did you find him?” he asked, hailing a cab.
+
+“Yes, I found him,” she answered, indifferently. “We went through the
+usual programme. He heard me sing, tried to kiss me and promised to let
+me know. Nobody ever refuses anything in my profession, you see. They
+promise to let you know.”
+
+“Are you a singer, then, or an actress?”
+
+“I am neither,” she told him. “I said 'my profession' because it is the
+only one to which I have ever tried to belong. I have never succeeded in
+obtaining an engagement in this country. I do not suppose that even if I
+had persevered I should ever have had one.”
+
+“You have given up the idea, then,” he remarked.
+
+“I have given it up,” she admitted, a little curtly. “Please do not
+think, because I am allowing you to be my companion for a short time,
+that you may ask me questions. How fast these taxies go!”
+
+They drew up at their destination--a well-known restaurant in Regent
+Street. He paid the cabman and they descended a flight of stairs into
+the grill-room.
+
+“I hope that this place will suit you,” he said. “I have not much
+experience of restaurants.”
+
+She looked around and nodded.
+
+“Yes,” she replied, “I think that it will do.”
+
+She was very shabbily dressed, and he, although his appearance was by no
+means ordinary, was certainly not of the type which inspires
+immediate respect in even the grill-room of a fashionable restaurant.
+Nevertheless, they received prompt and almost officious service.
+Tavernake, as he watched his companion's air, her manner of seating
+herself and accepting the attentions of the head waiter, felt that
+nameless impulse which was responsible for his having followed her
+from Blenheim House and which he could only call curiosity, becoming
+stronger. An exceedingly matter-of-fact person, he was also by instinct
+and habit observant. He never doubted but that she belonged to a class
+of society from which the guests at the boarding-house where they had
+both lived were seldom recruited, and of which he himself knew little.
+He was not in the least a snob, this young man, but he found the fact
+interesting. Life with him was already very much the same as a ledger
+account--a matter of debits and credits, and he had never failed to
+include among the latter that curious gift of breeding for which he
+himself, denied it by heritage, had somehow substituted a complete and
+exceedingly rare naturalness.
+
+“I should like,” she announced, laying down the carte, “a fried sole,
+some cutlets, an ice, and black coffee.”
+
+The waiter bowed.
+
+“And for Monsieur?”
+
+Tavernake glanced at his watch; it was already ten o'clock.
+
+“I will take the same,” he declared.
+
+“And to drink?”
+
+She seemed indifferent.
+
+“Any light wine,” she answered, carelessly, “white or red.”
+
+Tavernake took up the wine list and ordered sauterne. They were left
+alone in their corner for a few minutes, almost the only occupants of
+the place.
+
+“You are sure that you can afford this?” she asked, looking at him
+critically. “It may cost you a sovereign or thirty shillings.”
+
+He studied the prices on the menu.
+
+“I can afford it quite well and I have plenty of money with me,” he
+assured her, “but I do not think that it will cost more than eighteen
+shillings. While we are waiting for the sole, shall we talk? I can tell
+you, if you choose to hear, why I followed you from the boardinghouse.”
+
+“I don't mind listening to you,” she told him, “or I will talk with
+you about anything you like. There is only one subject which I cannot
+discuss; that subject is myself and my own doings.”
+
+Tavernake was silent for a moment.
+
+“That makes conversation a bit difficult,” he remarked. She leaned back
+in her chair.
+
+“After this evening,” she said, “I go out of your life as completely and
+finally as though I had never existed. I have a fancy to take my poor
+secrets with me. If you wish to talk, tell me about yourself. You have
+gone out of your way to be kind to me. I wonder why. It doesn't seem to
+be your role.”
+
+He smiled slowly. His face was fashioned upon broad lines and the
+relaxing of his lips lightened it wonderfully. He had good teeth,
+clear gray eyes, and coarse black hair which he wore a trifle long; his
+forehead was too massive for good looks.
+
+“No,” he admitted, “I do not think that benevolence is one of my
+characteristics.”
+
+Her dark eyes were turned full upon him; her red lips, redder than ever
+they seemed against the pallor of her cheeks and her deep brown hair,
+curled slightly. There was something almost insolent in her tone.
+
+“You understand, I hope,” she continued, “that you have nothing whatever
+to look for from me in return for this sum which you propose to expend
+for my entertainment?”
+
+“I understand that,” he replied.
+
+“Not even gratitude,” she persisted. “I really do not feel grateful to
+you. You are probably doing this to gratify some selfish interest or
+curiosity. I warn you that I am quite incapable of any of the proper
+sentiments of life.”
+
+“Your gratitude would be of no value to me whatever,” he assured her.
+
+She was still not wholly satisfied. His complete stolidity frustrated
+every effort she made to penetrate beneath the surface.
+
+“If I believed,” she went on, “that you were one of those men--the
+world is full of them, you know--who will help a woman with a reasonable
+appearance so long as it does not seriously interfere with their own
+comfort--”
+
+“Your sex has nothing whatever to do with it,” he interrupted. “As to
+your appearance, I have not even considered it. I could not tell you
+whether you are beautiful or ugly--I am no judge of these matters. What
+I have done, I have done because it pleased me to do it.”
+
+“Do you always do what pleases you?” she asked.
+
+“Nearly always.”
+
+She looked him over again attentively, with an interest obviously
+impersonal, a trifle supercilious.
+
+“I suppose,” she remarked, “you consider yourself one of the strong
+people of the world?”
+
+“I do not know about that,” he answered. “I do not often think about
+myself.”
+
+“I mean,” she explained, “that you are one of those people who struggle
+hard to get just what they want in life.”
+
+His jaw suddenly tightened and she saw the likeness to Napoleon.
+
+“I do more than struggle,” he affirmed, “I succeed. If I make up my mind
+to do a thing, I do it; if I make up my mind to get a thing, I get it.
+It means hard work sometimes, but that is all.”
+
+For the first time, a really natural interest shone out of her eyes.
+The half sulky contempt with which she had received his advances passed
+away. She became at that moment a human being, self-forgetting, the
+heritage of her charms--for she really had a curious but very poignant
+attractiveness--suddenly evident. It was only a momentary lapse and it
+was entirely wasted. Not even one of the waiters happened to be looking
+that way, and Tavernake was thinking wholly of himself.
+
+“It is a good deal to say--that,” she remarked, reflectively.
+
+“It is a good deal but it is not too much,” he declared. “Every man who
+takes life seriously should say it.”
+
+Then she laughed--actually laughed--and he had a vision of flashing
+white teeth, of a mouth breaking into pleasant curves, of dark mirth-lit
+eyes, lustreless no longer, provocative, inspiring. A vague impression
+as of something pleasant warmed his blood. It was a rare thing for him
+to be so stirred, but even then it was not sufficient to disturb the
+focus of his thoughts.
+
+“Tell me,” she demanded, “what do you do? What is your profession or
+work?”
+
+“I am with a firm of auctioneers and estate agents,” he answered
+readily,--“Messrs. Dowling, Spence & Company the name is. Our offices
+are in Waterloo Place.”
+
+“You find it interesting?”
+
+“Of course,” he answered. “Interesting? Why not? I work at it.”
+
+“Are you a partner?”
+
+“No,” he admitted. “Six years ago I was a carpenter; then I became an
+errand boy in Mr. Dowling's office I had to learn the business, you see.
+To-day I am a sort of manager. In eighteen months' time--perhaps before
+that if they do not offer me a partnership--I shall start for myself.”
+
+Once more the subtlest of smiles flickered at the corners of her lips.
+
+“Do they know yet?” she asked, with faint irony.
+
+“Not yet,” he replied, with absolute seriousness. “They might tell me
+to go, and I have a few things to learn yet. I would rather make
+experiments for some one else than for myself. I can use the results
+later; they will help me to make money.”
+
+She laughed softly and wiped the tears out of her eyes. They were really
+very beautiful eyes notwithstanding the dark rims encircling them.
+
+“If only I had met you before!” she murmured.
+
+“Why?” he asked.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“Don't ask me,” she begged. “It would not be good for your conceit, if
+you have any, to tell you.”
+
+“I have no conceit and I am not inquisitive,” he said, “but I do not see
+why you laughed.”
+
+Their period of waiting came to an end at this point. The fish was
+brought and their conversation became disjointed. In the silence which
+followed, the old shadow crept over her face. Once only it lifted. It
+was while they were waiting for the cutlets. She leaned towards him, her
+elbows upon the tablecloth, her face supported by her fingers.
+
+“I think that it is time we left these generalities,” she insisted, “and
+you told me something rather more personal, something which I am very
+anxious to know. Tell me exactly why so self-centered a person as
+yourself should interest himself in a fellow-creature at all. It seems
+odd to me.”
+
+“It is odd,” he admitted, frankly. “I will try to explain it to you but
+it will sound very bald, and I do not think that you will understand. I
+watched you a few nights ago out on the roof at Blenheim House. You were
+looking across the house-tops and you didn't seem to be seeing anything
+at all really, and yet all the time I knew that you were seeing things I
+couldn't, you were understanding and appreciating something which I knew
+nothing of, and it worried me. I tried to talk to you that evening, but
+you were rude.”
+
+“You really are a curious person,” she remarked. “Are you always
+worried, then, if you find that some one else is seeing things or
+understanding things which are outside your comprehension?”
+
+“Always,” he replied promptly.
+
+“You are too far-reaching,” she affirmed. “You want to gather everything
+into your life. You cannot. You will only be unhappy if you try. No man
+can do it. You must learn your limitations or suffer all your days.”
+
+“Limitations!” He repeated the words with measureless scorn. “If I learn
+them at all,” he declared, with unexpected force, “it will be with scars
+and bruises, for nothing else will content me.”
+
+“We are, I should say, almost the same age,” she remarked slowly.
+
+“I am twenty-five,” he told her.
+
+“I am twenty-two,” she said. “It seems strange that two people whose
+ideas of life are as far apart as the Poles should have come together
+like this even for a moment. I do not understand it at all. Did you
+expect that I should tell you just what I saw in the clouds that night?”
+
+“No,” he answered, “not exactly. I have spoken of my first interest in
+you only. There are other things. I told a lie about the bracelet and I
+followed you out of the boarding-house and I brought you here, for some
+other for quite a different reason.”
+
+“Tell me what it was,” she demanded.
+
+“I do not know it myself,” he declared solemnly. “I really and honestly
+do not know it. It is because I hoped that it might come to me while
+we were together, that I am here with you at this moment. I do not like
+impulses which I do not understand.”
+
+She laughed at him a little scornfully.
+
+“After all,” she said, “although it may not have dawned upon you yet,
+it is probably the same wretched reason. You are a man and you have the
+poison somewhere in your blood. I am really not bad-looking, you know.”
+
+He looked at her critically. She was a little over-slim, perhaps, but
+she was certainly wonderfully graceful. Even the poise of her head, the
+manner in which she leaned back in her chair, had its individuality. Her
+features, too, were good, though her mouth had grown a trifle hard. For
+the first time the dead pallor of her cheeks was relieved by a touch of
+color. Even Tavernake realized that there were great possibilities about
+her. Nevertheless, he shook his head.
+
+“I do not agree with you in the least,” he asserted firmly. “Your looks
+have nothing to do with it. I am sure that it is not that.”
+
+“Let me cross-examine you,” she suggested. “Think carefully now. Does it
+give you no pleasure at all to be sitting here alone with me?”
+
+He answered her deliberately; it was obvious that he was speaking the
+truth.
+
+“I am not conscious that it does,” he declared. “The only feeling I am
+aware of at the present moment in connection with you, is the curiosity
+of which I have already spoken.”
+
+She leaned a little towards him, extending her very shapely fingers.
+Once more the smile at her lips transformed her face.
+
+“Look at my hand,” she said. “Tell me--wouldn't you like to hold it just
+for a minute, if I gave it you?”
+
+Her eyes challenged his, softly and yet imperiously. His whole
+attention, however, seemed to be absorbed by her finger-nails. It seemed
+strange to him that a girl in her straits should have devoted so much
+care to her hands.
+
+“No,” he answered deliberately, “I have no wish to hold your hand. Why
+should I?”
+
+“Look at me,” she insisted.
+
+He did so without embarrassment or hesitation,--it was more than ever
+apparent that he was entirely truthful. She leaned back in her chair,
+laughing softly to herself.
+
+“Oh, my friend Mr. Leonard Tavernake,” she exclaimed, “if you were not
+so crudely, so adorably, so miraculously truthful, what a prig,
+prig, prig, you would be! The cutlets at last, thank goodness! Your
+cross-examination is over. I pronounce you 'Not Guilty!”'
+
+During the progress of the rest of the meal, they talked very little. At
+its conclusion, Tavernake discharged the bill, having carefully checked
+each item and tipped the waiter the exact amount which the man had the
+right to expect. They ascended the stairs together to the street, the
+girl lingering a few steps behind. On the pavement her fingers touched
+his arm.
+
+“I wonder, would you mind driving me down to the Embankment?” she asked
+almost humbly. “It was so close down there and I want some air.”
+
+This was an extravagance which he had scarcely contemplated, but he did
+not hesitate. He called a taxicab and seated himself by her side. Her
+manner seemed to have grown quieter and more subdued, her tone was no
+longer semi-belligerent.
+
+“I will not keep you much longer,” she promised. “I suppose I am not so
+strong as I used to be. I have had scarcely anything to eat for two
+days and conversation has become an unknown luxury. I think--it seems
+absurd--but I think that I am feeling a little faint.”
+
+“The air will soon revive you,” he said. “As to our conversation, I
+am disappointed. I think that you are very foolish not to tell me more
+about yourself.”
+
+She closed her eyes, ignoring his remark. They turned presently into a
+narrower thoroughfare. She leaned towards him.
+
+“You have been very good to me,” she admitted almost timidly, “and I am
+afraid that I have not been very gracious. We shall not see one another
+again after this evening. I wonder--would you care to kiss me?”
+
+He opened his lips and closed them again. He sat quite still, his eyes
+fixed upon the road ahead, until he had strangled something absolutely
+absurd, something unrecognizable.
+
+“I would rather not,” he decided quietly. “I know you mean to be kind
+but that sort of thing--well, I don't think I understand it. Besides,”
+ he added with a sudden naive relief, as he clutched at a fugitive but
+plausible thought, “if I did you would not believe the things which I
+have been telling you.”
+
+He had a curious idea that she was disappointed as she turned her head
+away, but she said nothing. Arrived at the Embankment, the cab came
+slowly to a standstill. The girl descended. There was something new in
+her manner; she looked away from him when she spoke.
+
+“You had better leave me here,” she said. “I am going to sit upon that
+seat.”
+
+Then came those few seconds' hesitation which were to count for a
+great deal in his life. The impulse which bade him stay with her was
+unaccountable but it conquered.
+
+“If you do not object,” he remarked with some stiffness, “I should like
+to sit here with you for a little time. There is certainly a breeze.”
+
+She made no comment but walked on. He paid the man and followed her to
+the empty seat. Opposite, some illuminated advertisements blazed their
+unsightly message across the murky sky. Between the two curving rows
+of yellow lights the river flowed--black, turgid, hopeless. Even here,
+though they had escaped from its absolute thrall, the far-away roar of
+the city beat upon their ears. She listened to it for a moment and then
+pressed her hands to the side of her head.
+
+“Oh, how I hate it!” she moaned. “The voices, always the voices,
+calling, threatening, beating you away! Take my hands, Leonard
+Tavernake,--hold me.”
+
+He did as she bade him, clumsily, as yet without comprehension.
+
+“You are not well,” he muttered.
+
+Her eyes opened and a flash of her old manner returned. She smiled at
+him, feebly but derisively.
+
+“You foolish boy!” she cried. “Can't you see that I am dying? Hold my
+hands tightly and watch--watch! Here is one more thing you can see--that
+you cannot understand.”
+
+He saw the empty phial slip from her sleeve and fall on to the pavement.
+With a cry he sprang up and, carrying her in his arms, rushed out into
+the road.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III. AN UNPLEASANT MEETING
+
+It was a quarter past eleven and the theatres were disgorging their
+usual nightly crowds. The most human thoroughfare in any of the world's
+great cities was at its best and brightest. Everywhere commissionaires
+were blowing their whistles, the streets were thronged with
+slowly-moving vehicles, the pavements were stirring with life. The
+little crowd which had gathered in front of the chemist's shop was swept
+away. After all, none of them knew exactly what they had been waiting
+for. There was a rumor that a woman had fainted or had met with an
+accident. Certainly she had been carried into the shop and into the
+inner room, the door of which was still closed. A few passers-by had
+gathered together and stared and waited for a few minutes, but had
+finally lost interest and melted away. A human thoroughfare, this,
+indeed, one of the pulses of the great city beating time night and
+day to the tragedies of life. The chemist's assistant, with impassive
+features, was serving a couple of casual customers from behind the
+counter. Only a few yards away, beyond the closed door, the chemist
+himself and a hastily summoned doctor fought with Death for the body of
+the girl who lay upon the floor, faint moans coming every now and then
+from her blue lips.
+
+Tavernake, whose forced inaction during that terrible struggle had
+become a burden to him, slipped softly from the room as soon as the
+doctor had whispered that the acute crisis was over, and passed
+through the shop out into the street, a solemn, dazed figure among the
+light-hearted crowd. Even in those grim moments, the man's individualism
+spoke up to him. He was puzzled at his own action, He asked himself
+a question--not, indeed, with regret, but with something more than
+curiosity and actual selfprobing--as though, by concentrating his mind
+upon his recent course of action, he would be able to understand the
+motives which had influenced him. Why had he chosen to burden himself
+with the care of this desperate young woman? Supposing she lived, what
+was to become of her? He had acquired a certain definite responsibility
+with regard to her future, for whatever the doctor and his assistant
+might do, it was his own promptitude and presence of mind which had
+given her the first chance of life. Without a doubt, he had behaved
+foolishly. Why not vanish into the crowd and have done with it? What was
+it to him, after all, whether this girl lived or died? He had done his
+duty--more than his duty. Why not disappear now and let her take her
+chance? His common sense spoke to him loudly; such thoughts as these
+beat upon his brain.
+
+Just for once in his life, however, his common sense exercised an
+altogether subordinate position. He knew very well, even while he
+listened to these voices, that he was only counting the minutes until he
+could return. Having absolutely decided that the only reasonable course
+left for him to pursue was to return home and leave the girl to her
+fate, he found himself back inside the shop within a quarter of an hour.
+The chemist had just come out from the inner room, and looked up at his
+entrance.
+
+“She'll do now,” he announced.
+
+Tavernake nodded. He was amazed at his own sense of relief.
+
+“I am glad,” he declared.
+
+The doctor joined them, his black bag in his hand, prepared for
+departure. He addressed himself to Tavernake as the responsible person.
+
+“The young lady will be all right now,” he said, “but she may be rather
+queer for a day or two. Fortunately, she made the usual mistake of
+people who are ignorant of medicine and its effects--she took enough
+poison to kill a whole household. You had better take care of her, young
+man,” he added dryly. “She'll be getting into trouble if she tries this
+sort of thing again.”
+
+“Will she need any special attention during the next few days?”
+ Tavernake asked. “The circumstances under which I brought her here are a
+little unusual, and I am not quite sure--”
+
+“Take her home to bed,” the doctor interrupted, “and you'll find she'll
+sleep it off. She seems to have a splendid constitution, although she
+has let herself run down. If you need any further advice and your own
+medical man is not available, I will come and see her if you send for
+me. Camden, my name is; telephone number 734 Gerrard.”
+
+“I should be glad to know the amount of your fee, if you please,”
+ Tavernake said.
+
+“My fee is two guineas,” the doctor answered.
+
+Tavernake paid him and he went away. Already the shadow of the
+tragedy was passing. The chemist had joined his assistant and was busy
+dispensing drugs behind his counter.
+
+“You can go in to the young lady, if you like,” he remarked to
+Tavernake. “I dare say she'll feel better to have some one with her.”
+
+Tavernake passed slowly into the inner room, closing the door behind
+him. He was scarcely prepared for so piteous a sight. The girl's face
+was white and drawn as she lay upon the couch to which they had lifted
+her. The fighting spirit was dead; she was in a state of absolute and
+complete collapse. She opened her eyes at his coning, but closed them
+again almost immediately--less, it seemed, from any consciousness of his
+presence than from sheer exhaustion.
+
+“I am glad that you are better,” he whispered crossing the room to her
+side.
+
+“Thank you,” she murmured almost inaudibly.
+
+Tavernake stood looking down upon her, and his sense of perplexity
+increased. Stretched on the hard horsehair couch she seemed, indeed,
+pitifully thin and younger than her years. The scowl, which had passed
+from her face, had served in some measure as a disguise.
+
+“We shall have to leave here in a few minutes,” he said, softly. “They
+will want to close the shop.”
+
+“I am so sorry,” she faltered, “to have given you all this trouble. You
+must send me to a hospital or the workhouse--anywhere.”
+
+“You are sure that there are no friends to whom I can send?” he asked.
+
+“There is no one!”
+
+She closed her eyes and Tavernake sat quite still on the end of
+her couch, his elbow upon his knee, his head resting upon his hand.
+Presently, the rush of customers having ceased, the chemist came in.
+
+“I think, if I were you, I should take her home now,” he remarked.
+“She'll probably drop off to sleep very soon and wake up much stronger.
+I have made up a prescription here in case of exhaustion.”
+
+Tavernake stared at the man. Take her home! His sense of humor was faint
+enough but he found himself trying to imagine the faces of Mrs. Lawrence
+or Mrs. Fitzgerald if he should return with her to the boardinghouse at
+such an hour.
+
+“I suppose you know where she lives?” the chemist inquired curiously.
+
+“Of course,” Tavernake assented. “You are quite right. I dare say she is
+strong enough now to walk as far as the pavement.”
+
+He paid the bill for the medicines, and they lifted her from the couch.
+Between them she walked slowly into the outer shop. Then she began to
+drag on their arms and she looked up at the chemist a little piteously.
+
+“May I sit down for a moment?” she begged. “I feel faint.”
+
+They placed her in one of the cane chairs facing the door. The chemist
+mixed her some sal volatile.
+
+“I am sorry,” she murmured, “so sorry. In a few minutes--I shall be
+better.”
+
+Outside, the throng of pedestrians had grown less, but from the great
+restaurant opposite a constant stream of motor-cars and carriages was
+slowly bringing away the supper guests. Tavernake stood at the door,
+watching them idly. The traffic was momentarily blocked and almost
+opposite to him a motor-car, the simple magnificence of which filled him
+with wonder, had come to a standstill. The chauffeur and footman both
+wore livery which was almost white. Inside a swinging vase of flowers
+was suspended from the roof. A man and a woman leaned back in luxurious
+easy-chairs. The man was dark and had the look of a foreigner. The woman
+was very fair. She wore a long ermine cloak and a tiara of pearls.
+
+Tavernake, whose interest in the passing throngs was entirely
+superficial, found himself for some reason curiously attracted by this
+glimpse into a world of luxury of which he knew nothing; attracted, too,
+by the woman's delicate face with its uncommon type of beauty. Their
+eyes met as he stood there, stolid and motionless, framed in the
+doorway. Tavernake continued to stare, unmindful, perhaps unconscious,
+of the rudeness of his action. The woman, after a moment, glanced away
+at the shopwindow. A sudden thought seemed to strike her. She spoke
+through the tube at her side and turned to her companion. Meanwhile, the
+footman, leaning from his place, held out his arm in warning and the
+car was slowly backed to the side of the pavement. The lady felt for a
+moment in a bag of white satin which lay upon the round table in front
+of her, and handed a slip of paper through the open window to the
+servant who had already descended and was standing waiting. He came at
+once towards the shop, passing Tavernake, who remained in the door-way.
+
+“Will you make this up at once, please?” he directed, handing the paper
+across to the chemist.
+
+The chemist took it in his hand and turned away mechanically toward the
+dispensing room. Suddenly he paused, and, looking back, shook his head.
+
+“For whom is this prescription required?” he asked.
+
+“For my mistress,” the man answered. “Her name is there.”
+
+“Where is she?”
+
+“Outside; she is waiting for it.”
+
+“If she really wants this made up to-night,” the chemist declared, “she
+must come in and sign the book.”
+
+The footman looked across the counter, for a moment, a little blankly.
+
+“Am I to tell her that?” he inquired. “It's only a sleeping draught. Her
+regular chemist makes it up all right.”
+
+“That may be,” the man behind the counter replied, “but, you see, I am
+not her regular chemist. You had better go and tell her so.”
+
+The footman departed upon his errand without a glance at the girl who
+was sitting within a few feet of him.
+
+“I am very sorry, madam,” he announced to his mistress, “that the
+chemist declines to make up the prescription unless you sign the book.”
+
+“Very well, then, I will come,” she declared.
+
+The woman, handed from the automobile by her servant, lifted her white
+satin skirts in both hands and stepped lightly across the pavement.
+Tavernake stood on one side to let her pass. She seemed to him to be,
+indeed, a creature of that other world of which he knew nothing. Her
+slow, graceful movements, the shimmer of her skirt, her silk stockings,
+the flashing of the diamond buckles upon her shoes, the faint perfume
+from her clothes, the soft touch of her ermine as she swept by--all
+these things were indeed strange to him. His eyes followed her with rapt
+interest as she approached the counter.
+
+“You wish me to sign for my prescription?” she asked the chemist. “I
+will do so, with pleasure, if it is necessary, only you must not keep me
+waiting long.”
+
+Her voice was very low and very musical; the slight smile which had
+parted her tired lips, was almost pathetic. Even the chemist felt
+himself to be a human being. He turned at once to his shelves and began
+to prepare the drug.
+
+“I am sorry, madam, that it should have been necessary to fetch you in,”
+ he said, apologetically. “My assistant will give you the book if you
+will kindly sign it.”
+
+The assistant dived beneath the counter, reappearing almost immediately
+with a black volume and a pen and ink. The chemist was engrossed upon
+his task; Tavernake's eyes were still riveted upon this woman, who
+seemed to him the most beautiful thing he had ever seen in life. No one
+was watching the girl. The chemist was the first to see her face, and
+that only in a looking glass. He stopped in the act of mixing his drug
+and turned slowly round. His expression was such that they all followed
+his eyes. The girl was sitting up in her chair, with a sudden spot of
+color burning in her cheeks, her fingers gripping the counter as though
+for support, her eyes dilated, unnatural, burning in their white setting
+with an unholy fire. The lady was the last to turn her head, and the
+bottle of eau-de-cologne which she had taken up from the counter,
+slipped with a crash to the floor. All expression seemed to pass from
+her face; the very life seemed drawn from it. Those who were watching
+her saw suddenly an old woman looking at something of which she was
+afraid.
+
+The girl seemed to find an unnatural strength. She dragged herself up
+and turned wildly to Tavernake.
+
+“Take me away,” she cried, in a low voice. “Take me away at once.”
+
+The woman at the counter did not speak. Tavernake stepped quickly
+forward and then hesitated. The girl was on her feet now and she
+clutched at his arms. Her eyes besought him.
+
+“You must take me away, please,” she begged, hoarsely. “I am well
+now--quite well. I can walk.”
+
+Tavernake's lack of imagination stood him in good stead then. He simply
+did what he was told, did it in perfectly mechanical fashion, without
+asking any questions. With the girl leaning heavily upon his arm, he
+stepped into the street and almost immediately into a passing taxicab
+which he had hailed from the threshold of the shop. As he closed the
+door, he glanced behind him. The woman was standing there, half turned
+towards him, still with that strange, stony look upon her lifeless
+face. The chemist was bending across the counter towards her, wondering,
+perhaps, if another incident were to be drawn into his night's work. The
+eau-de-cologne was running in a little stream across the floor.
+
+“Where to, sir?” the taxicab driver asked Tavernake.
+
+“Where to?” Tavernake repeated.
+
+The girl was clinging to his arm.
+
+“Tell him to drive away from here,” she whispered, “to drive anywhere,
+but away from here.”
+
+“Drive straight on,” Tavernake directed, “along Fleet Street and up
+Holborn. I will give you the address later on.”
+
+The man changed his speed and their pace increased. Tavernake sat quite
+still, dumfounded by these amazing happenings. The girl by his side was
+clutching his arm, sobbing a little hysterically, holding him all the
+time as though in terror.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV. BREAKFAST WITH BEATRICE
+
+
+The girl, awakened, perhaps, by the passing of some heavy cart along
+the street below, or by the touch of the sunbeam which lay across
+her pillow, first opened her eyes and then, after a preliminary stare
+around, sat up in bed. The events of the previous night slowly shaped
+themselves in her mind. She remembered everything up to the commencement
+of that drive in the taxicab. Sometime after that she must have fainted.
+And now--what had become of her? Where was she?
+
+She looked around her in ever-increasing surprise. Certainly it was the
+strangest room she had ever been in. The floor was dusty and innocent
+of any carpet; the window was bare and uncurtained. The walls were
+unpapered but covered here and there with strange-looking plans, one of
+them taking up nearly the whole side of the room--a very rough piece
+of work with little dabs of blue paint here and there, and shadings and
+diagrams which were absolutely unintelligible. She herself was lying
+upon a battered iron bedstead, and she was wearing a very coarse
+nightdress. Her own clothes were folded up and lay upon a piece of brown
+paper on the floor by the side of the bed. To all appearance, the room
+was entirely unfurnished, except that in the middle of it was a hideous
+papier mache screen.
+
+After her first bewildered inspection of her surroundings, it was upon
+this screen that her attention was naturally directed. Obviously it
+must be there to conceal something. Very carefully she leaned out of bed
+until she was able to see around the corner of it. Then her heart gave a
+little jump and she was only just able to stifle an exclamation of fear.
+Some one was sitting there--a man--sitting on a battered cane chair,
+bending over a roll of papers which were stretched upon a rude deal
+table. She felt her cheeks grow hot. It must be Tavernake! Where had he
+brought her? What did his presence in the room mean?
+
+The bed creaked heavily as she regained her former position. A voice
+came to her from behind the screen. She knew it at once. It was
+Tavernake's.
+
+“Are you awake?” he asked.
+
+“Yes,” she answered,--“yes, I am awake. Is that Mr. Tavernake? Where am
+I, please?”
+
+“First of all, are you better?” he inquired.
+
+“I am better,” she assured him, sitting up in bed and pulling the
+clothes to her chin. “I am quite well now. Tell me at once where I am
+and what you are doing over there.”
+
+“There is nothing to be terrified about,” Tavernake answered. “To all
+effects and purposes, I am in another room. When I move to the door,
+as I shall do directly, I shall drag the screen with me. I can promise
+you--”
+
+“Please explain everything,” she begged, “quickly. I am
+most--uncomfortable.”
+
+“At half-past twelve this morning,” Tavernake said, “I found myself
+alone in a taxicab with you, without any luggage or any idea where to
+go to. To make matters worse, you fainted. I tried two hotels but they
+refused to take you in; they were probably afraid that you were going
+to be ill. Then I thought of this room. I am employed, as you know, by
+a firm of estate agents. I do a great deal of work on my own account,
+however, which I prefer to do in secret, and unknown to any one. For
+that reason, I hired this room a year ago and I come here most evenings
+to work. Sometimes I stay late, so last month I bought a small bedstead
+and had it fixed up here. There is a woman who comes in to clean the
+room. I went to her house last night and persuaded her to come here.
+She undressed you and put you to bed. I am sorry that my presence
+here distresses you, but it is a large building and quite empty at
+night-time. I thought you might wake up and be frightened, so I borrowed
+this screen from the woman and have been sitting here.”
+
+“What, all night?” she gasped.
+
+“Certainly,” he answered. “The woman could not stop herself and this
+is not a residential building at all. All the lower floors are let for
+offices and warehouses, and there is no one else in the place until
+eight o'clock.”
+
+She put her hands to her head and sat quite still for a moment or two.
+It was really hard to take everything in.
+
+“Aren't you very sleepy?” she asked, irrelevantly.
+
+“Not very,” he replied. “I dozed for an hour, a little time ago. Since
+then I have been looking through some plans which interest me very
+much.”
+
+“Can I get up?” she inquired, timidly.
+
+“If you feel strong enough, please do,” he answered, with manifest
+relief. “I shall move towards the door, dragging the screen in front of
+me. You will find a brush and comb and some hairpins on your clothes. I
+could not think of anything else to get for you, but, if you will dress,
+we will walk to London Bridge Station, which is just across the way,
+and while I order some breakfast you can go into the ladies' room and do
+your hair properly. I did my best to get hold of a looking-glass, but it
+was quite impossible.”
+
+The girl's sense of humor was suddenly awake. She had hard work not to
+scream. He had evidently thought out all these details in painstaking
+fashion, one by one.
+
+“Thank you,” she said. “I will get up immediately, if you will do as you
+say.”
+
+He clutched the screen from the inside and dragged it towards the door.
+On the threshold, he spoke to her once more.
+
+“I shall sit upon the stairs just outside,” he announced.
+
+“I sha'n't be more than five minutes,” she assured him.
+
+She sprang out of bed and dressed quickly. There was nothing beyond
+where the screen had been except a table covered with plans, and a
+particularly hard cane chair which she dragged over for her own use.
+As she dressed, she began to realize how much this matter-of-fact,
+unimpressionable young man had done for her during the last few hours.
+The reflection affected her in a curious manner. She became afflicted
+with a shyness which she had not felt when he was in the room. When at
+last she had finished her toilette and opened the door, she was almost
+tongue-tied. He was sitting on the top step, with his back against the
+landing, and his eyes were closed. He opened them with a little start,
+however, as soon as he heard her approach.
+
+“I am glad you have not been long,” he remarked. “I want to be at my
+office at nine o'clock and I must go and have a bath somewhere. These
+stairs are rather steep. Please walk carefully.”
+
+She followed him in silence down three flights of stone steps. On each
+landing there were names upon the doors--two firms of hop merchants,
+a solicitor, and a commission agent. The ground floor was some sort of
+warehouse, from which came a strong smell of leather.
+
+Tavernake opened the outside door with a small key and they passed into
+the street.
+
+“London Bridge Station is just across the way,” he said. “The
+refreshment room will be open and we can get some breakfast at once.”
+
+“What time is it?” she asked.
+
+“About half-past seven.”
+
+She walked by his side quite meekly, and although there were many things
+which she was longing to say, she remained absolutely without the power
+of speech. Except that he was looking a little crumpled, there was
+nothing whatever in his appearance to indicate that he had been up all
+night. He looked exactly as he had done on the previous day, he
+seemed even quite unconscious that there was anything unusual in their
+relations. As soon as they arrived at the station, he pointed to the
+ladies' waiting-room.
+
+“If you will go in and arrange your hair there,” he said, “I will go and
+order breakfast and have a shave. I will be back here in about twenty
+minutes. You had better take this.”
+
+He offered her a shilling and she accepted it without hesitation. As
+soon as he had gone, however, she looked at the coin in her hand in
+blank wonder. She had accepted it from him with perfect naturalness and
+without even saying “Thank you!” With a queer little laugh, she pushed
+open the swinging doors and made her way into the waiting-room.
+
+In hardly more than a quarter of an hour she emerged, to find Tavernake
+waiting for her. He had retied his tie, bought a fresh collar, had been
+shaved. She, too, had improved her appearance.
+
+“Breakfast is waiting this way,” he announced.
+
+She followed him obediently and they sat down at a small table in the
+station refreshment-room.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake,” she asked, suddenly, “I must ask you something. Has
+anything like this ever happened to you before?”
+
+“Nothing,” he assured her, with some emphasis.
+
+“You seem to take everything so much as a matter of course,” she
+protested.
+
+“Why not?”
+
+“Oh, I don't know,” she replied, a little feebly. “Only--”
+
+She found relief in a sudden and perfectly natural laugh.
+
+“Come,” he said, “that is better. I am glad that you feel like
+laughing.”
+
+“As a matter of fact,” she declared, “I feel much more like crying.
+Don't you know that you were very foolish last night? You ought to have
+left me alone. Why didn't you? You would have saved yourself a great
+deal of trouble.”
+
+He nodded, as though that point of view did, in some degree, commend
+itself to him.
+
+“Yes,” he admitted, “I suppose I should. I do not, even now, understand
+why I interfered. I can only remember that it didn't seem possible not
+to at the time. I suppose one must have impulses,” he added, with a
+little frown.
+
+“The reflection,” she remarked, helping herself to another roll, “seems
+to annoy you.”
+
+“It does,” he confessed. “I do not like to feel impelled to do anything
+the reason for which is not apparent. I like to do just the things which
+seem likely to work out best for myself.”
+
+“How you must hate me!” she murmured.
+
+“No, I do not hate you,” he replied, “but, on the other hand, you have
+certainly been a trouble to me. First of all, I told a falsehood at the
+boarding-house, and I prefer always to tell the truth when I can. Then
+I followed you out of the house, which I disliked doing very much, and
+I seem to have spent a considerable portion of the time since, in your
+company, under somewhat extraordinary circumstances. I do not understand
+why I have done this.”
+
+“I suppose it is because you are a very good-hearted person,” she
+remarked.
+
+“But I am not,” he assured her, calmly. “I am nothing of the sort. I
+have very little sympathy with good-hearted people. I think the world
+goes very much better when every one looks after himself, and the people
+who are not competent to do so go to the wall.”
+
+“It sounds a trifle selfish,” she murmured.
+
+“Perhaps it is. I have an idea that if I could phrase it differently it
+would become philosophy.”
+
+“Perhaps,” she suggested, smiling across the table at him, “you have
+really done all this because you like me.”
+
+“I am quite sure that it is not that,” he declared. “I feel an interest
+in you for which I cannot account, but it does not seem to me to be
+a personal one. Last night,” he continued, “when I was sitting there
+waiting, I tried to puzzle it all out. I came to the conclusion that it
+was because you represent something which I do not understand. I am very
+curious and it always interests me to learn. I believe that must be the
+secret of my interest in you.”
+
+“You are very complimentary,” she told him, mockingly. “I wonder what
+there is in the world which I could teach so superior a person as Mr.
+Tavernake?”
+
+He took her question quite seriously.
+
+“I wonder what there is myself,” he answered. “And yet, in a way, I
+think I know.”
+
+“Your imagination should come to the rescue,” she remarked.
+
+“I have no imagination,” he declared, gloomily.
+
+They were silent for several minutes; she was still studying him.
+
+“I wonder you don't ask me any questions about myself,” she said,
+abruptly.
+
+“There is only one thing,” he answered, “concerning which I am in the
+least curious. Last night in the chemist's shop--”
+
+“Don't!” she begged him, with suddenly whitening face. “Don't speak of
+that!”
+
+“Very well,” he replied, indifferently. “I thought that you were rather
+inviting my questions. You need not be afraid of any more. I really am
+not curious about personal matters; I find that my own life absorbs all
+my interests.”
+
+They had finished breakfast and he paid the bill. She began to put on
+her gloves.
+
+“Whatever happens to me,” she said, “I shall never forget that you have
+been very kind.”
+
+She hesitated for a moment and then she seemed to realize more
+completely how really kind he had been. There had been a certain crude
+delicacy about his actions which she had under-appreciated. She leaned
+towards him. There was nothing left this morning of that disfiguring
+sullenness. Her mouth was soft; her eyes were bright, almost appealing.
+If Tavernake had been a judge of woman's looks, he must certainly have
+found her attractive.
+
+“I am very, very grateful to you,” she continued, holding out her hand.
+“I shall always remember how kind you were. Good-bye!”
+
+“You are not going?” he asked.
+
+She laughed.
+
+“Why, you didn't imagine that you had taken the care of me upon your
+shoulders for the rest of your life?” she demanded.
+
+“No, I didn't imagine that,” he answered. “At the same time, what plans
+have you made? Where are you going?”
+
+“Oh! I shall think of something,” she declared, indifferently.
+
+He caught the gleam in her eyes, the sudden hopelessness which fell like
+a cloud upon her face. He spoke promptly and with decision.
+
+“As a matter of fact,” he remarked, “you do not know yourself. You are
+just going to drift out of this place and very likely find your way to a
+seat on the Embankment again.”
+
+Her lips quivered. She had tried to be brave but it was hard.
+
+“Not necessarily,” she replied. “Something may turn up.”
+
+He leaned a little across the table towards her.
+
+“Listen,” he said, deliberately, “I will make a proposition to you.
+It has come to me during the last few minutes. I am tired of the
+boarding-house and I wish to leave it. The work which I do at night
+is becoming more and more important. I should like to take two rooms
+somewhere. If I take a third, would you care to call yourself what I
+called you to the charwoman last night--my sister? I should expect you
+to look after the meals and my clothes, and help me in certain other
+ways. I cannot give you much of a salary,” he continued, “but you would
+have an opportunity during the daytime of looking out for some work, if
+that is what you want, and you would at least have a roof and plenty to
+eat and drink.”
+
+She looked at him in blank amazement. It was obvious that his
+proposition was entirely honest.
+
+“But, Mr. Tavernake,” she protested, “you forget that I am not really
+your sister.”
+
+“Does that matter?” he asked, without flinching. “I think you understand
+the sort of person I am. You would have nothing to fear from any
+admiration on my part--or anything of that sort,” he added, with some
+show of clumsiness. “Those things do not come in my life. I am ambitious
+to get on, to succeed and become wealthy. Other things I do not even
+think about.”
+
+She was speechless. After a short pause, he went on.
+
+“I am proposing this arrangement as much for my own sake as for yours.
+I am very well read and I know most of what there is to be known in my
+profession. But there are other things concerning which I am ignorant.
+Some of these things I believe you could teach me.”
+
+Still speechless, she sat and looked at him for several moments.
+Outside, the station now was filled with a hurrying throng on their way
+to the day's work. Engines were shrieking, bells ringing, the press of
+footsteps was unceasing. In the dark, ill-ventilated room itself there
+was the rattle of crockery, the yawning of discontented-looking young
+women behind the bar, young women with their hair still in curl-papers,
+as yet unprepared for their weak little assaults upon the good-nature or
+susceptibility of their customers. A queer corner of life it seemed. She
+looked at her companion and realized how fragmentary was her knowledge
+of him. There was nothing to be gathered from his face. He seemed
+to have no expression. He was simply waiting for her reply, with his
+thoughts already half engrossed upon the business of the day.
+
+“Really,” she began, “I--”
+
+He came back from his momentary wandering and looked at her. She
+suddenly altered the manner of her speech. It was a strange proposition,
+perhaps, but this was one of the strangest of men.
+
+“I am quite willing to try it,” she decided. “Will you tell me where I
+can meet you later on?”
+
+“I have an hour and a half for luncheon at one o'clock,” he said. “Meet
+me exactly at the southeast corner of Trafalgar Square. Would you like a
+little money?” he added, rising.
+
+“I have plenty, thank you,” she answered.
+
+He laid half-a-crown upon the table and made an entry in a small
+memorandum book which he drew from his pocket.
+
+“You had better keep this,” he said, “in case you want it. I am going to
+leave you alone here. You can find your way anywhere, I am sure, and
+I am in a hurry. At one o'clock, remember. I hope you will still be
+feeling better.”
+
+He put on his hat and went away without a backward glance. Beatrice sat
+in her chair and watched him out of sight.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V. INTRODUCING Mrs. WENHAM GARDNER
+
+
+A very distinguished client was engaging the attention of Mr. Dowling,
+Senior, of Messrs. Dowling, Spence & Company, auctioneers and estate
+agents, whose offices were situated in Waterloo Place, Pall Mall. Mr.
+Dowling was a fussy little man of between fifty and sixty years, who
+spent most of his time playing golf, and who, although he studiously
+contrived to ignore the fact, had long since lost touch with the details
+of his business. Consequently, in the absence of Mr. Dowling, Junior,
+who had developed a marked partiality for a certain bar in the locality,
+Tavernake was hastily summoned to the rescue from another part of the
+building, by a small boy violently out of breath.
+
+“Never see the governor in such a fuss,” the latter declared,
+confidentially, “She's asking no end of questions and he don't know a
+thing.”
+
+“Who is the lady?” Tavernake asked, on the way downstairs.
+
+“Didn't hear her name,” the boy replied. “She's all right, though, I can
+tell you--a regular slap-up beauty. Such a motor-car, too! Flowers and
+tables and all sorts of things inside. By Jove, won't the governor tear
+his hair if she goes before you get there!”
+
+Tavernake quickened his steps and in a few moments knocked at the door
+of the private office and entered.
+
+His chief welcomed him with a gesture of relief. The distinguished
+client of the firm, whose attention he was endeavoring to engage, had
+glanced toward the newcomer, at his first appearance, with an air of
+somewhat bored unconcern. Her eyes, however, did not immediately leave
+his face. On the contrary, from the moment of his entrance she watched
+him steadfastly. Tavernake, stolid, unruffled, at that time without
+comprehension, approached the desk.
+
+“This is--er--Mr. Tavernake, our manager,” Mr. Dowling announced,
+obsequiously. “In the absence of my son, he is in charge of the letting
+department. I have no doubt that he will be able to suggest something
+suitable. Tavernake,” he continued, “this lady,”--he glanced at a card
+in front of him--“Mrs. Wenham Gardner of New York, is looking for a town
+house, and has been kind enough to favor us with an inquiry.”
+
+Tavernake made no immediate reply. Mr. Dowling was shortsighted, and in
+any case it would never have occurred to him to associate nervousness,
+or any form of emotion, with his responsible manager. The beautiful
+lady leaned back in her chair. Her lips were parted in a slight but
+very curious smile, her fingers supported her cheek, her eyelids were
+contracted as she looked into his face. Tavernake felt that their
+recognition was mutual. Once more he was back again in the tragic
+atmosphere of that chemist's shop, with Beatrice, half fainting, in his
+arms, the beautiful lady turned to stone. It was an odd tableau, that,
+so vividly imprinted upon his memory that it was there before him at
+this very moment. There was mystery in this woman's eyes, mystery and
+something else.
+
+“I don't seem to have come across anything down here
+which--er--particularly attracts Mrs.--Mrs. Wenham Gardner,” Mr. Dowling
+went on, taking up a little sheaf of papers from the desk. “I thought,
+perhaps, that the Bryanston Square house might have suited, but it
+seems that it is too small, far too small. Mrs. Gardner is used to
+entertaining, and has explained to me that she has a great many friends
+always coming and going from the other side of the water. She requires,
+apparently, twelve bedrooms, besides servants' quarters.”
+
+“Your list is scarcely up to date, sir,” Tavernake reminded him. “If the
+rent is of no particular object, there is Grantham House.”
+
+Mr. Dowling's face was suddenly illuminated.
+
+“Grantham House!” he exclaimed. “Precisely! Now I declare that it
+had absolutely slipped my memory for the moment--only for the moment,
+mind--that we have just had placed upon our books one of the most
+desirable mansions in the west end of London. A most valued client,
+too, one whom we are most anxious to oblige. Dear, dear me! It is
+very fortunate--very fortunate indeed that I happened to think of it,
+especially as it seems that no one had had the sense to place it upon
+my list. Tavernake, get the plans at once and show them to--er--to Mrs.
+Gardner.”
+
+Tavernake crossed the room in silence, opened a drawer, and returned
+with a stiff roll of papers, which he spread carefully out in front of
+this unexpected client. She spoke then for the first time since he had
+entered the room. Her voice was low and marvelously sweet. There was
+very little of the American accent about it, but something in the
+intonation, especially toward the end of her sentences, was just a
+trifle un-English.
+
+“Where is this Grantham House?” she inquired.
+
+“Within a stone's throw of Grosvenor Square,” Tavernake answered,
+briskly. “It is really one of the most central spots in the west end. If
+you will allow me!”
+
+For the next few minutes he was very fluent indeed. With pencil in hand,
+he explained the plans, dwelt on the advantages of the location, and
+from the very reserve of his praise created an impression that the house
+he was describing was the one absolutely perfect domicile in the whole
+of London.
+
+“Can I look over the place?” she asked, when he had finished.
+
+“By all means,” Mr. Dowling declared, “by all means. I was on the point
+of suggesting it. It will be by far the most satisfactory proceeding.
+You will not be disappointed, my dear madam, I can assure you.”
+
+“I should like to do so, if I may, without delay,” she said.
+
+“There is no opportunity like the present,” Mr. Dowling replied. “If
+you will permit me,” he added, rising, “it will give me the greatest
+pleasure to escort you personally. My engagements for the rest of the
+day happen to be unimportant. Tavernake, let me have the keys of
+the rooms that are locked up. The caretaker, of course, is there in
+possession.”
+
+The beautiful visitor rose to her feet, and even that slight movement
+was accomplished with a grace unlike anything which Tavernake had ever
+seen before.
+
+“I could not think of troubling you so far, Mr. Dowling,” she protested.
+“It is not in the least necessary for you to come yourself. Your manager
+can, perhaps, spare me a few minutes. He seems to be so thoroughly
+posted in all the details,” she added, apologetically, as she noticed
+the cloud on Mr. Dowling's brow.
+
+“Just as you like, of course,” he declared. “Mr. Tavernake can go, by
+all means. Now I come to think of it, it certainly would be inconvenient
+for me to be away from the office for more than a few minutes. Mr.
+Tavernake has all the details at his fingers' ends, and I only hope,
+Mrs. Gardner, that he will be able to persuade you to take the house.
+Our client,” he added, with a bow, “would, I am sure, be delighted to
+hear that we had secured for him so distinguished a tenant.”
+
+She smiled at him, a delightful mixture of graciousness and
+condescension.
+
+“You are very good,” she answered. “The house sounds rather large for me
+but it depends so much upon circumstances. If you are ready, Mr.--”
+
+“Tavernake,” he told her.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake,” she continued, “my car is waiting outside and we might
+go on at once.”
+
+He bowed and held open the door for her, an office which he performed
+a little awkwardly. Mr. Dowling himself escorted her out on to the
+pavement. Tavernake stopped behind to get his hat, and passing out
+a moment afterwards, would have seated himself in front beside the
+chauffeur but that she held the door of the car open and beckoned to
+him.
+
+“Will you come inside, please?” she insisted. “There are one or two
+questions which I might ask you as we go along. Please direct the
+chauffeur.”
+
+He obeyed without a word; the car glided off. As they swung round the
+first corner, she leaned forward from among the cushions of her seat and
+looked at him. Then Tavernake was conscious of new things. As though by
+inspiration, he knew that her visit to the office of Messrs. Dowling,
+Spence & Company had been no chance one.
+
+She remembered him, remembered him as the companion of Beatrice during
+that strange, brief meeting. It was an incomprehensible world, this,
+into which he had wandered. The woman's face had lost her languid,
+gracious expression. There was something there almost akin to tragedy.
+Her fingers fell upon his arm and her touch was no light one. She was
+gripping him almost fiercely.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake,” she said, “I have a memory for faces which seldom fails
+me. I have seen you before quite lately. You remember where, of course.
+Tell me the truth quickly, please.”
+
+The words seemed to leap from her lips. Beautiful and young though she
+undoubtedly was, her intense seriousness had suddenly aged her face.
+Tavernake was bewildered. He, too, was conscious of a curious emotional
+disturbance.
+
+“The truth? What truth do you mean?” he demanded.
+
+“It was you whom I saw with Beatrice!”
+
+“You saw me one night about three weeks ago,” he admitted slowly. “I
+was in a chemist's shop in the Strand. You were signing his book for a
+sleeping draught, I think.”
+
+She shivered all over.
+
+“Yes, yes!” she cried. “Of course, I remember all about it. The young
+lady who was with you--what was she doing there? Where is she now?”
+
+“The young lady was my sister,” Tavernake answered stiffly.
+
+Mrs. Wenham Gardner looked, for a moment, as though she would have
+struck him.
+
+“You need not lie to me!” she exclaimed. “It is not worth while. Tell
+me where you met her, why you were with her at all in that intimate
+fashion, and where she is now!”
+
+Tavernake realized at once that so far as this woman was concerned, the
+fable of his relationship with Beatrice was hopeless. She knew!
+
+“Madam,” he replied, “I made the acquaintance of the young lady with
+whom I was that evening, at the boarding-house where we both lived.”
+
+“What were you doing in the chemist's shop?” she demanded.
+
+“The young lady had been ill,” he proceeded deliberately, wondering
+how much to tell. “She had been taken very ill indeed. She was just
+recovering when you entered.”
+
+“Where is she now?” the woman asked eagerly. “Is she still at that
+boarding-house of which you spoke?”
+
+“No,” he answered.
+
+Her fingers gripped his arm once more.
+
+“Why do you answer me always in monosyllables? Don't you understand that
+you must tell me everything that you know about her. You must tell me
+where I can find her, at once.”
+
+Tavernake remained silent. The woman's voice had still that note of
+wonderful sweetness, but she had altogether lost her air of complete and
+aristocratic indifference. She was a very altered person now from the
+distinguished client who had first enlisted his services. For some
+reason or other, he knew that she was suffering from a terrible anxiety.
+
+“I am not sure,” he said at last, “whether I can do as you ask.”
+
+“What do you mean?” she exclaimed sharply.
+
+“The young lady,” he continued, “seemed, on the occasion to which you
+have referred, to be particularly anxious to avoid recognition. She
+hurried out of the place without speaking to you, and she has avoided
+the subject ever since. I do not know what her motives may have been,
+but I think that I should like to ask her first before I tell you where
+she is to be found.”
+
+Mrs. Wenham Gardner leaned towards him. It was certainly the first time
+that a woman in her apparent rank of life had looked upon Tavernake in
+such a manner. Her forehead was a little wrinkled, her lips were parted,
+her eyes were pathetically, delightfully eloquent.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake, you must not--you must not refuse me,” she pleaded. “If
+you only knew the importance of it, you would not hesitate for a moment.
+This is no idle curiosity on my part. I have reasons, very serious
+reasons indeed, for wishing to discover that poor girl's whereabouts at
+once. There is a possible danger of which she must be warned. No one can
+do it except myself.”
+
+“Are you her friend or her enemy?” Tavernake asked.
+
+“Why do you ask such a question?” she demanded.
+
+“I am only going by her expression when she saw you come into the
+chemist's shop,” Tavernake persisted doggedly.
+
+“It is a cruel suggestion, that,” the woman cried. “I wish to be her
+friend, I am her friend. If I could only tell you everything, you would
+understand at once what a terrible situation, what a hideous quandary I
+am in.”
+
+Once more Tavernake paused for a few moments. He was never a quick
+thinker and the situation was certainly an embarrassing one for him.
+
+“Madam,” he replied at length, “I beg that you will tell me nothing. The
+young lady of whom you have spoken permits me to call myself her friend,
+and what she has not told me herself I do not wish to learn from others.
+I will tell her of this meeting with you, and if it is her desire, I
+will bring you her address myself within a few hours. I cannot do more
+than that.”
+
+Her face was suddenly cold and hard.
+
+“You mean that you will not!” she exclaimed angrily. “You are obstinate.
+I do not know how you dare to refuse what I ask.”
+
+The car had come to a standstill. He stepped out on to the pavement.
+
+“This is Grantham House, madam,” he announced. “Will you descend?”
+
+He heard her draw a quick breath between her teeth and he caught a
+gleam in her eyes which made him feel vaguely uneasy. She was very angry
+indeed.
+
+“I do not think that it is necessary for me to do so,” she said
+frigidly. “I do not like the look of the house at all. I do not believe
+that it will suit me.”
+
+“At least, now that you are here,” he protested, “you will, if
+you please, go over it. I should like you to see the ballroom. The
+decorations are supposed to be quite exceptional.”
+
+She hesitated for a moment and then, with a slight shrug of the
+shoulders, she yielded. There was a note in his tone not exactly
+insistent, and yet dominant, a note which she obeyed although secretly
+she wondered at herself for doing so. They passed inside the house and
+she followed him from room to room, leaving him to do all the talking.
+She seemed very little interested but every now and then she asked a
+languid question.
+
+“I do not think that it is in the least likely to suit me,” she decided
+at last. “It is all very magnificent, of course, but I consider that the
+rent is exorbitant.”
+
+Tavernake regarded her thoughtfully.
+
+“I believe,” he said, “that our client might be disposed to consider
+some reduction, in the event of your seriously entertaining taking the
+house. If you like, I will see him on the subject. I feel sure that the
+amount I have mentioned could be reduced, if the other conditions were
+satisfactory.”
+
+“There would be no harm in your doing so,” she assented. “How soon can
+you come and let me know?”
+
+“I might be able to ring you up this evening; certainly to-morrow
+morning,” he answered.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“I will not speak upon the telephone,” she declared. “I only allow it in
+my rooms under protest. You must come and tell me what your client says.
+When can you see him?”
+
+“It is doubtful whether I shall be able to find him this evening,” he
+replied. “It would probably be to-morrow morning.”
+
+“You might go and try at once,” she suggested.
+
+He was a little surprised.
+
+“You are really interested in the matter, then?” he inquired.
+
+“Yes, yes,” she told him, “of course I am interested. I want you to come
+and see me directly you have heard. It is important. Supposing you are
+able to find your client to-night, shall you have seen the young lady
+before then?”
+
+“I am afraid not,” he answered.
+
+“You must try,” she begged, laying her fingers upon his shoulder. “Mr.
+Tavernake, do please try. You can't realize what all this anxiety means
+to me. I am not at all well and I am seriously worried about--about that
+young lady. I tell you that I must have an interview with her. It is not
+for my sake so much as hers. She must be warned.”
+
+“Warned?” Tavernake repeated. “I really don't understand.”
+
+“Of course you don't!” she exclaimed impatiently. “Why should you
+understand? I don't want to offend you, Mr. Tavernake,” she went on
+hurriedly. “I would like to treat you quite frankly. It really isn't
+your place to make difficulties like this. What is this young lady to
+you that you should presume to consider yourself her guardian?”
+
+“She is a boarding-house acquaintance,” Tavernake confessed, “nothing
+more.”
+
+“Then why did you tell me, only a moment ago, that she was your sister?”
+ Mrs. Gardner demanded.
+
+Tavernake threw open the door before which they had been standing.
+
+“This,” he said, “is the famous dancing gallery. Lord Clumber is quite
+willing to allow the pictures to remain, and I may tell you that they
+are insured for over sixty thousand pounds. There is no finer dancing
+room than this in all London.”
+
+Her eyes swept around it carelessly.
+
+“I have no doubt,” she admitted coldly, “that it is very beautiful. I
+prefer to continue our discussion.”
+
+“The dining-room,” he went on, “is almost as large. Lord Clumber tells
+us that he has frequently entertained eighty guests for dinner. The
+system of ventilation in this room is, as you see, entirely modern.”
+
+She took him by the arm and led him to a seat at the further end of the
+apartment.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake,” she said, making an obvious attempt to control her
+temper, “you seem like a very sensible young man, if you will allow me
+to say so, and I want to convince you that it is your duty to answer
+my questions. In the first place--don't be offended, will you?--but I
+cannot possibly see what interest you and that young lady can have
+in one another. You belong, to put it baldly, to altogether different
+social stations, and it is not easy to imagine what you could have in
+common.”
+
+She paused, but Tavernake had nothing to say. His gift of silence
+amounted sometimes almost to genius. She leaned so close to him while
+she waited in vain for his reply, that the ermine about her neck brushed
+his cheek. The perfume of her clothes and hair, the pleading of her deep
+violet-blue eyes, all helped to keep him tongue-tied. Nothing of this
+sort had ever happened to him before. He did not in the least understand
+what it could possibly mean.
+
+“I am speaking to you now, Mr. Tavernake,” she continued earnestly, “for
+your own good. When you tell the young lady, as you have promised to
+this evening, that you have seen me, and that I am very, very anxious to
+find out where she is, she will very likely go down on her knees and beg
+you to give me no information whatever about her. She will do her best
+to make you promise to keep us apart. And yet that is all because she
+does not understand. Believe me, it is better that you should tell me
+the truth. You cannot know her very well, Mr. Tavernake, but she is
+not very wise, that young lady. She is very obstinate, and she has some
+strange ideas. It is not well for her that she should be left in the
+world alone. You must see that for yourself, Mr. Tavernake.”
+
+“She seems a very sensible young lady,” he declared slowly. “I should
+have thought that she would have been old enough to know for herself
+what she wanted and what was best for her.”
+
+The woman at his side wrung her hands with a little gesture of despair.
+
+“Oh, why can't I make you understand!” she exclaimed, the emotion once
+more quivering in her tone. “How can I--how can I possibly make you
+believe me? Listen. Something has happened of which she does not
+know--something terrible. It is absolutely necessary, in her own
+interests as well as mine, that I see her, and that very shortly.”
+
+“I shall tell her exactly what you say,” Tavernake answered apparently
+unmoved. “Perhaps it would be as well now if we went on to view the
+sleeping apartments.”
+
+“Never mind about the sleeping apartments!” she cried quickly. “You must
+do more than tell her. You can't believe that I want to bring harm upon
+any one. Do I look like it? Have I the appearance of a person of evil
+disposition? You can be that young lady's best friend, Mr. Tavernake, if
+you will. Take me to her now, this minute. Believe me, if you do that,
+you will never regret it as long as you live.”
+
+Tavernake studied the pattern of the parquet floor for several moments.
+It was a difficult problem, this. Putting his own extraordinary
+sensations into the background, he was face to face with something which
+he did not comprehend, and he disliked the position intensely. After
+all, delay seemed safest.
+
+“Madam,” he protested, “a few hours more or less can make but little
+difference.”
+
+“That is for me to judge!” she exclaimed. “You say that because you do
+not understand. A few hours may make all the difference in the world.”
+
+He shook his head.
+
+“I will tell you exactly what is in my mind,” he said, deliberately.
+“The young lady was terrified when she saw you that night accidentally
+in the chemist's shop. She almost dragged me away, and although she
+was almost fainting when we reached the taxicab, her greatest and chief
+anxiety was that we should get away before you could follow us. I
+cannot forget this. Until I have received her permission, therefore,
+to disclose her whereabouts, we will, if you please, speak of something
+else.”
+
+He rose to his feet and glancing around was just in time to see the
+change in the face of his companion. That eloquently pleading smile
+had died away from her lips, her teeth were clenched. She looked like a
+woman struggling hard to control some overwhelming passion. Without the
+smile her lips seemed hard, even cruel. There were evil things shining
+out of her eyes. Tavernake felt chilled, almost afraid.
+
+“We will see the rest of the house,” she declared coldly.
+
+They went on from room to room. Tavernake, recovering himself rapidly,
+master of his subject, was fluent and practical. The woman listened,
+with only a terse remark here and there. Once more they stood in the
+hall.
+
+“Is there anything else you would like to see?” he asked.
+
+“Nothing,” she replied, “but there is one thing more I have to say.”
+
+He waited in stolid silence.
+
+“Only a week ago,” she went on, looking him in the face, “I told a man
+who is what you call, I think, an inquiry agent, that I would give
+a hundred pounds if he could discover that young woman for me within
+twenty-four hours.”
+
+Tavernake started, and the smile came back to the lips of Mrs. Wenham
+Gardner. After all, perhaps she had found the way!
+
+“A hundred pounds is a great deal of money,” he said thoughtfully.
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+“Not so very much,” she replied. “About a fortnight's rent of this
+house, Mr. Tavernake.”
+
+“Is the offer still open?” he asked.
+
+She looked into his eyes, and her face had once more the beautiful
+ingenuousness of a child.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake,” she said, “the offer is still open. Get into the car
+with me and drive back to my rooms at the Milan Court, and I will give
+you a cheque for a hundred pounds at once. It will be very easily earned
+and you may just as well take it, for now I know where you are employed,
+I could have you followed day by day until I discover for myself what
+you are so foolishly concealing. Be reasonable, Mr. Tavernake.”
+
+Tavernake stood quite still. His arms were folded, he was looking out of
+the hall window at the smoky vista of roofs and chimneys. From the soles
+of his ready-made boots to his ill-brushed hair, he was a commonplace
+young man. A hundred pounds was to him a vast sum of money. It
+represented a year's strenuous savings, perhaps more. The woman who
+watched him imagined that he was hesitating. Tavernake, however, had no
+such thought in his mind. He stood there instead, wondering what strange
+thing had come to him that the mention of a hundred pounds, delightful
+sum though it was, never tempted him for a single second. What this
+woman had said might be true. She would probably be able to discover the
+address easily enough without his help. Yet no such reflection seemed to
+make the least difference. From the days of his earliest boyhood, from
+the time when he had flung himself into the struggle, money had always
+meant much to him, money not for its own sake but as the key to those
+things which he coveted in life. Yet at that moment something stronger
+seemed to have asserted itself.
+
+“You will come?” she whispered, passing her arm through his. “We will be
+there in less than five minutes, and I will write you the cheque before
+you tell me anything.”
+
+He moved towards the door indeed, but he drew a little away from her.
+
+“Madam,” he said, “I am sorry to seem so obstinate, but I thought I had
+made you understand some time ago. I do not feel at liberty to tell you
+anything without that young lady's permission.”
+
+“You refuse?” she cried, incredulously. “You refuse a hundred pounds?”
+
+He opened the door of the car. He seemed scarcely to have heard her.
+
+“At about eleven o'clock to-morrow morning,” he announced, “I shall have
+the pleasure of calling upon you. I trust that you will have decided to
+take the house.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
+
+
+Tavernake sat a few hours later at his evening meal in the tiny
+sitting-room of an apartment house in Chelsea. He wore a black tie, and
+although he had not yet aspired to a dinner coat, the details of his
+person and toilet showed signs of a new attention. Opposite to him was
+Beatrice.
+
+“Tell me,” she asked, as soon as the small maid-servant who brought in
+their first dish had disappeared, “what have you been doing all day?
+Have you been letting houses or surveying land or book-keeping, or have
+you been out to Marston Rise?”
+
+It was her customary question, this. She really took an interest in his
+work.
+
+“I have been attending a rich American client,” he announced, “a
+compatriot of your own. I went with her to Grantham House in her own
+motor-car. I believe she thinks of taking it.”
+
+“American!” Beatrice remarked. “What was her name?”
+
+Tavernake looked up from his plate across the little table, across the
+bowl of simple flowers which was its sole decoration.
+
+“She called herself Mrs. Wenham Garner!”
+
+Away like a flash went the new-found peace in the girl's face. She
+caught at her breath, her fingers gripped the table in front of her.
+Once more she was as he had known her first--pale, with great terrified
+eyes shining out of a haggard face.
+
+“She has been to you,” Beatrice gasped, “for a house? You are sure?”
+
+“I am quite sure,” Tavernake declared, calmly.
+
+“You recognized her?”
+
+He assented gravely.
+
+“It was the woman who stood in the chemist's shop that night, signing
+her name in a book,” he said.
+
+He did not apologize in any way for the shock he had given her. He
+had done it deliberately. From that very first morning, when they had
+breakfasted together at London Bridge, he had felt that he deserved
+her confidence, and in a sense it was a grievance with him that she had
+withheld it.
+
+“Did she recognize you?”
+
+“Yes,” he admitted. “I was sent for into the office and found her there
+with the chief. I felt sure that she recognized me from the first, and
+when she agreed to look at Grantham House, she insisted upon it that I
+should accompany her. While we were in the motor-car, she asked me about
+you. She wished for your address.”
+
+“Did you give it to her?” the girl cried, breathlessly.
+
+“No; I said that I must consult you first.”
+
+She drew a little sigh of relief. Nevertheless, she was looking white
+and shaken.
+
+“Did she say what she wanted me for?”
+
+“She was very mysterious,” Tavernake answered. “She spoke of some danger
+of which you knew nothing. Before I came away, she offered me a hundred
+pounds to let her know where you were.”
+
+Beatrice laughed softly.
+
+“That is just like Elizabeth,” she declared. “You must have made her
+very angry. When she wants anything, she wants it very badly indeed, and
+she will never believe that every person has not his price. Money means
+everything to her. If she had it, she would buy, buy, buy all the time.”
+
+“On the face of it,” Tavernake remarked, soberly, “her offer seemed
+rather an absurd one. If she is in earnest, if she is really so anxious
+to discover your whereabouts, she will certainly be able to do so
+without my help.”
+
+“I am not so sure,” Beatrice replied. “London is a great hiding place.”
+
+“A private detective,” he began,--
+
+Beatrice shook her head.
+
+“I do not think,” she said, “that Elizabeth will care to employ a
+private detective. Tell me, have you to see her upon this business
+again?”
+
+“I am going to her flat at the Milan Court to-morrow morning at eleven
+o'clock.”
+
+Beatrice leaned back in her chair. Presently she recommenced her dinner.
+She had the air of one to whom a respite has been granted. Tavernake, in
+a way, began to resent this continued silence of hers. He had certainly
+hoped that she would at least have gone so far as to explain her anxiety
+to keep her whereabouts secret.
+
+“You must remember,” he went on, after a short pause, “that I am in
+a somewhat peculiar position with regard to you, Beatrice. I know so
+little that I do not even know how to answer in your interests such
+questions as Mrs. Wenham Gardner asked me. I am not complaining, but is
+this state of absolute ignorance necessary?”
+
+A new thought seemed to come to Beatrice. She looked at her companion
+curiously.
+
+“Tell me,” she asked, “what did you think of Mrs. Wenham Gardner?”
+
+Tavernake answered deliberately, and after a moment's reflection.
+
+“I thought her,” he said, “one of the most beautiful women I have ever
+seen in my life. That is not saying very much, perhaps, but to me it
+meant a good deal. She was exceedingly gracious and her interest in you
+seemed quite real and even affectionate. I do not understand why you
+should wish to hide from such a woman.”
+
+“You found her attractive?” Beatrice persisted.
+
+“I found her very attractive indeed,” Tavernake admitted, without
+hesitation. “She had an air with her. She was quite different from all
+the women I have ever met at the boarding-house or anywhere else. She
+has a face which reminded me somehow of the Madonnas you took me to see
+in the National Gallery the other day.”
+
+Beatrice shivered slightly. For some reason, his remark seemed to have
+distressed her.
+
+“I am very, very sorry,” she declared, “that Elizabeth ever came to
+your office. I want you to promise me, Leonard, that you will be careful
+whenever you are with her.”
+
+Tavernake laughed.
+
+“Careful!” he repeated. “She isn't likely to be even civil to me
+tomorrow when I tell her that I have seen you and I refuse to give her
+your address. Careful, indeed! What has a poor clerk in a house-agent's
+office to fear from such a personage?”
+
+The servant had reappeared with their second and last course. For a few
+moments they spoke of casual subjects. Afterwards, however, Tavernake
+asked a question.
+
+“By the way,” he said, “we are hoping to let Grantham House to Mrs.
+Wenham Gardner. I suppose she must be very wealthy?”
+
+Beatrice looked at him curiously.
+
+“Why do you come to me for information?” she demanded. “I suppose that
+she brought you references?”
+
+“We haven't quite got to that stage yet,” he answered. “Somehow or
+other, from her manner of talking and general appearance, I do not think
+that either Mr. Dowling or I doubted her financial position.”
+
+“I should never have thought you so credulous a person,” remarked
+Beatrice, with a smile.
+
+Tavernake was genuinely disturbed. His business instincts were aroused.
+
+“Do you really mean that this Mrs. Wenham Gardner is not a person of
+substance?” he inquired.
+
+Beatrice shrugged her shoulders.
+
+“She is the wife of a man who had the reputation of being very wealthy,”
+ she replied. “She has no money of her own, I am sure.”
+
+“She still lives with her husband, I suppose?” Tavernake asked.
+
+Beatrice closed her eyes.
+
+“I know very little about her,” she declared. “Last time I heard, he had
+disappeared, gone away, or something of the sort.”
+
+“And she has no money,” Tavernake persisted, “except what she gets from
+him? No settlement, even, or anything of that sort?”
+
+“Nothing at all,” Beatrice answered.
+
+“This is very bad news,” Tavernake remarked, thinking gloomily of his
+wasted day. “It will be a great disappointment to Mr. Dowling. Why, her
+motor-car was magnificent, and she talked as though money were no object
+at all. I suppose you are quite sure of what you are saying?”
+
+Beatrice shrugged her shoulders.
+
+“I ought to know,” she answered, grimly, “for she is my sister.”
+
+Tavernake remained quite motionless for a minute, without speech; it was
+his way of showing surprise. When he was sure that he had grasped the
+import of her words, he spoke again.
+
+“Your sister!” he repeated. “There is a likeness, of course. You are
+dark and she is fair, but there is a likeness. That would account,” he
+continued, “for her anxiety to find you.”
+
+“It also accounts,” Beatrice replied, with a little break of the lips,
+“for my anxiety that she should not find me. Leonard,” she added,
+touching his hand for a moment with hers, “I wish that I could tell you
+everything, but there are things behind, things so terrible, that even
+to you, my dear brother, I could not speak of them.”
+
+Tavernake rose to his feet and lit a cigarette--a new habit with him,
+while Beatrice busied herself with a small coffee-making machine. He sat
+in an easy-chair and smoked slowly. He was still wearing his ready-made
+clothes, but his collar was of the fashionable shape, his tie well
+chosen and neatly adjusted. He seemed somehow to have developed.
+
+“Beatrice,” he asked, “what am I to tell your sister to-morrow?”
+
+She shivered as she set his coffee-cup down by his side.
+
+“Tell her, if you will, that I am well and not in want,” she answered.
+“Tell her, too, that I refuse to send my address. Tell her that the one
+aim of my life is to keep the knowledge of my whereabouts a secret from
+her.”
+
+Tavernake relapsed into silence. He was thinking. Mysteries had no
+attraction for him--he loathed them. Against this one especially he felt
+a distinct grudge. Nevertheless, some instinct forbade his questioning
+the girl.
+
+“Apart from more personal matters, then,” he asked after some time, “you
+would not advise me to enter into any business negotiations with this
+lady?”
+
+“You must not think of it,” Beatrice replied, firmly. “So far as money
+is concerned, Elizabeth has no conscience whatever. The things she wants
+in life she will have somehow, but it is all the time at other people's
+expense. Some day she will have to pay for it.”
+
+Tavernake sighed.
+
+“It is very unfortunate,” he declared. “The commission on the letting of
+Grantham House would have been worth having.”
+
+“After all, it is only your firm's loss,” she reminded him.
+
+“It does not appeal to me like that,” he continued. “So long as I am
+manager for Dowling & Spence, I feel these things personally. However,
+that does not matter. I am afraid it is a disagreeable subject for you,
+and we will not talk about it any longer.”
+
+She lit a cigarette with a little gesture of relief. She came once more
+to his side.
+
+“Leonard,” she said, “I know that I am treating you badly in telling
+you nothing, but it is simply because I do not want to descend to half
+truths. I should like to tell you all or nothing. At present I cannot
+tell you all.”
+
+“Very well,” he replied, “I am quite content to leave it with you to do
+as you think best.”
+
+“Leonard,” she continued, “of course you think me unreasonable. I can't
+help it. There are things between my sister and myself the knowledge of
+which is a constant nightmare to me. During the last few months of my
+life it has grown to be a perfect terror. It sent me into hiding at
+Blenheim House, it reconciled me even to the decision I came to that
+night on the Embankment. I had decided that sooner than go back, sooner
+than ask help from her or any one connected with her, I would do what I
+tried to do the time when you saved my life.”
+
+Tavernake looked at her wonderingly. She was, indeed, under the spell
+of some deep emotion. Her memory seemed to have carried her back into
+another world, somewhere far away from this dingy little sitting-room
+which they two were sharing together, back into a world where life
+and death were matters of small moment, where the great passions were
+unchained, and men and women moved among the naked things of life.
+Almost he felt the thrill of it. It was something new to him, the touch
+of a magic finger upon his eyelids. Then the moment passed and he was
+himself again, matter-of-fact, prosaic.
+
+“Let us dismiss the subject finally,” he said. “I must see your sister
+on business to-morrow, but it shall be for the last time.”
+
+“I think,” she murmured, “that you will be wise.”
+
+He crossed the room and returned with a newspaper.
+
+“I saw your music in the hall as I came in,” he remarked. “Are you
+singing to-night?”
+
+The question was entirely in his ordinary tone. It brought her back to
+the world of every-day things as nothing else could have done.
+
+“Yes; isn't it luck?” she told him. “Three in one week. I only heard an
+hour ago.”
+
+“A city dinner?” he inquired.
+
+“Something of the sort,” she replied. “I am to be at the Whitehall Rooms
+at ten o'clock. If you are tired, Leonard, please let me go alone. I
+really do not mind. I can get a 'bus to the door, there and back again.”
+
+“I am not tired,” he declared. “To tell you the truth, I scarcely know
+what it is to be tired. I shall go with you, of course.”
+
+She looked at him with a momentary admiration of his powerful frame, his
+strong, forceful face.
+
+“It seems too bad,” she remarked, “after a long day's work to drag you
+out again.”
+
+He smiled.
+
+“I really like to come,” he assured her. “Besides,” he added, after a
+moment's pause, “I like to hear you sing.”
+
+“I wonder if you mean that?” she asked, looking at him curiously. “I
+have watched you once or twice when I have been singing to you. Do you
+really care for it?”
+
+“Certainly I do. How can you doubt it? I do not,” he continued, slowly,
+“understand music, or anything of that sort, of course, any more than
+I do the pictures you take me to see, and some of the books you talk
+about. There are lots of things I can't get the hang of entirely, but
+they all leave a sort of pleasure behind. One feels it even if one only
+half appreciates.”
+
+She came over to his chair.
+
+“I am glad,” she said, a little wistfully, “that there is one thing I do
+which you like.”
+
+He looked at her reprovingly.
+
+“My dear Beatrice,” he said, “I often wish I could make you understand
+how extraordinarily helpful and useful to me you have been.”
+
+“Tell me in what way?” she begged.
+
+“You have given me,” he assured her, “an insight into many things in
+life which I had found most perplexing. You see, you have traveled and
+I haven't. You have mixed with all classes of people, and I have gone
+steadily on in one groove. You have told me many things which I shall
+find very useful indeed later on.”
+
+“Dear me,” she laughed, “you are making me quite conceited!”
+
+“Anyhow,” he replied, “I don't want you to look upon me, Beatrice, in
+any way as a benefactor. I am much more comfortable here than at the
+boarding-house and it is costing no more money, especially since you
+began to get those singing engagements. By the way, hadn't you better go
+and get ready?”
+
+She smothered a sigh as she turned away and went slowly upstairs. To
+all appearance, no person who ever breathed was more ordinary than this
+strong-featured, self-centered young man who had put out his arm and
+snatched her from the Maelstrom. Yet it seemed to her that there
+was something almost unnatural about his unapproachability. She was
+convinced that he was entirely honest, not only with regard to his
+actual relations toward her, but with regard to all his purposes.
+Her sex did not even seem to exist for him. The fact that she was
+good-looking, and with her renewed health daily becoming more so,
+seemed to be of no account to him whatever. He showed interest in her
+appearance sometimes, but it was interest of an entirely impersonal
+sort. He simply expressed himself as satisfied or dissatisfied, as a
+matter of taste. It came to her at that moment that she had never seen
+him really relax. Only when he sat opposite to that great map which hung
+now in the further room, and wandered about from section to section
+with a pencil in one hand and a piece of rubber in another, did he show
+anything which in any way approached enthusiasm, and even then it was
+always the unmistakable enthusiasm born of dead things. Suddenly she
+laughed at herself in the little mirror, laughed softly but heartily.
+This was the guardian whom Fate had sent for her! If Elizabeth had only
+understood!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII. Mr. PRITCHARD OF NEW YORK
+
+
+Later in the evening, Beatrice and Tavernake traveled together in a
+motor omnibus from their rooms at Chelsea to Northumberland Avenue.
+Tavernake was getting quite used to the programme by now. They sat in a
+dimly-lit waiting-room until the time came for Beatrice to sing. Every
+now and then an excitable little person who was the secretary to some
+institution or other would run in and offer them refreshments, and tell
+them in what order they were to appear. To-night there was no departure
+from the ordinary course of things, except that there was slightly more
+stir. The dinner was a larger one than usual. It came to Beatrice's turn
+very soon after their arrival, and Tavernake, squeezing his way a few
+steps into the dining-room, stood with the waiters against the wall.
+He looked with curious eyes upon a scene with which he had no manner of
+sympathy.
+
+A hundred or so of men had dined together in the cause of some charity.
+The odor of their dinner, mingled with the more aromatic perfume of the
+tobacco smoke which was already ascending in little blue clouds from the
+various tables, hung about the over-heated room, seeming, indeed, the
+fitting atmosphere for the long rows of guests. The majority of them
+were in a state of expansiveness. Their faces were redder than when they
+had sat down; a certain stiffness had departed from their shirt-fronts
+and their manners; their faces were flushed, their eyes watery. There
+were a few exceptions--paler-faced men who sat there with the air of
+endeavoring to bring themselves into accord with surroundings in which
+they had no real concern. Two of these looked up with interest at the
+first note of Beatrice's song. The one was sitting within a few places
+of the chairman, and he was too far away for his little start to be
+noticed by either Tavernake or Beatrice. The nearer one, however,
+Tavernake happened to be watching, and he saw the change in his
+expression. The man was, in his way, ugly. His face was certainly not a
+good one, although he did not appear to share the immediate weaknesses
+of his neighbors. To every note of the song he listened intently. When
+it was over, he rose and came toward Tavernake.
+
+“I beg your pardon,” he said, “but did I not see you come in with the
+young lady who has just been singing?”
+
+“You may have,” Tavernake answered. “I certainly did come with her.”
+
+“May I ask if you are related to her?”
+
+Tavernake had got over his hesitation in replying to such questions, by
+now. He answered promptly.
+
+“I am her brother,” he declared.
+
+The man produced a card.
+
+“Please introduce me to her,” he begged, laconically.
+
+“Why should I?” Tavernake asked. “I have no reason to suppose that she
+desires to know you.”
+
+The man stared at him for a moment, and then laughed.
+
+“Well,” he said, “you had better show your sister my card. She is, I
+presume, a professional, as she is singing here. My desire to make her
+acquaintance is purely actuated by business motives.”
+
+Tavernake moved away toward the waiting-room.
+
+The man, who according to his card was Mr. Sidney Grier, would have
+followed him in, but Tavernake stopped him.
+
+“If you will wait here,” he suggested, “I will see whether my sister
+desires to meet you.”
+
+Once more Mr. Sidney Grier looked surprised, but after a second glance
+at Tavernake he accepted his suggestion and remained outside. Tavernake
+took the card to Beatrice.
+
+“Beatrice,” he announced, “there is a man outside who has heard you sing
+and who wants to be introduced.”
+
+She took the card and her eyes opened wide.
+
+“Do you know who he is?” Tavernake asked.
+
+“Of course,” she answered. “He is a great producer of musical comedies.
+Let me think.”
+
+She stood with the card in her hand. Some one else was singing now--an
+ordinary modern ballad of love and roses, rapture and despair. They
+heard the rising and falling of the woman's voice; the clatter of the
+dinner had ceased. Beatrice stood still thinking, her fingers clinching
+the card of Mr. Sidney Grier.
+
+“You must bring him in,” she said to Tavernake finally.
+
+Tavernake went outside.
+
+“My sister will see you,” he remarked, with the air of one who brings
+good news.
+
+Mr. Sidney Grier grunted. He was not used to being kept waiting, even
+for a second. Tavernake ushered him into the retiring room, and the
+other two musicians who were there stared at him as at a god.
+
+“This is the gentleman whose card you have, Beatrice,” Tavernake
+announced. “Mr. Sidney Grier--Miss Tavernake!”
+
+The man smiled.
+
+“Your brother seems to be suspicious of me,” he declared. “I found it
+quite difficult to persuade him that you might find it interesting to
+talk to me for a few minutes.”
+
+“He does not quite understand,” Beatrice answered. “He has not much
+experience of musical affairs or the stage, and your name would not have
+any significance for him.”
+
+Tavernake went outside and listened idly to the song which was
+proceeding. It was a class of music which secretly he preferred to the
+stranger and more haunting notes of Beatrice's melodies. Apparently
+the audience was of his opinion, for they received it with a vociferous
+encore, to which the young lady generously replied with a music-hall
+song about “A French lady from over the water.” Towards the close of
+the applause which marked the conclusion of this effort, Tavernake felt
+himself touched lightly upon the arm. He turned round. By his side was
+standing the other dinner guest who had shown some interest in
+Beatrice. He was a man apparently of about forty years of age, tall and
+broad-shouldered, with black moustache, and dark, piercing eyes. Unlike
+most of the guests, he wore a short dinner-coat and black tie, from
+which, and his slight accent, Tavernake concluded that he was probably
+an American.
+
+“Say, you'll forgive my speaking to you,” he said, touching Tavernake
+on the arm. “My name is Pritchard. I saw you come in with the young
+lady who was singing a few minutes ago, and if you won't consider it a
+liberty, I'll be very glad indeed if you'll answer me one question.”
+
+Tavernake stiffened insensibly.
+
+“It depends upon the question,” he replied, shortly.
+
+“Well, it's about the young lady, and that's a fact,” Mr. Pritchard
+admitted. “I see that her name upon the programme is given as Miss
+Tavernake. I was seated at the other end of the room but she seemed to
+me remarkably like a young lady from the other side of the Atlantic,
+whom I am very anxious to meet.”
+
+“Perhaps you will kindly put your question in plain words,” Tavernake
+said.
+
+“Why, that's easy,” Mr. Pritchard declared. “Is Miss Tavernake really
+her name, or an assumed one? I expect it's the same over here as in my
+country--a singer very often sings under another name than her own, you
+know,” he added, noting Tavernake's gathering frown.
+
+“The young lady in question is my sister, and I do not care to discuss
+her with strangers,” Tavernake announced.
+
+Mr. Pritchard nodded pleasantly.
+
+“Why, of course, that ends the matter,” he remarked. “Sorry to have
+troubled you, anyway.”
+
+He strolled off back to his seat and Tavernake returned thoughtfully to
+the dressing-room. He found Beatrice alone and waiting for him.
+
+“You've got rid of that fellow, then?” he inquired.
+
+Beatrice assented.
+
+“Yes; he didn't stay very long,” she replied.
+
+“Who was he?” Tavernake asked, curiously.
+
+“From a musical comedy point of view,” she said, “he was the most
+important person in London. He is the emperor of stage-land. He can make
+the fortune of any girl in London who is reasonably good-looking and who
+can sing and dance ever so little.”
+
+“What did he want with you?” Tavernake demanded, suspiciously.
+
+“He asked me whether I would like to go upon the stage. What do you
+think about it, Leonard?”
+
+Tavernake, for some reason or other, was displeased.
+
+“Would you earn much more money than by singing at these dinners?” he
+asked.
+
+“Very, very much more,” she assured him.
+
+“And you would like the life?”
+
+She laughed softly.
+
+“Why not? It isn't so bad. I was on the stage in New York for some time
+under much worse conditions.”
+
+He remained silent for a few minutes. They had made their way into the
+street now and were waiting for an omnibus.
+
+“What did you tell him?” he asked, abruptly.
+
+She was looking down toward the Embankment, her eyes filled once more
+with the things which he could not understand.
+
+“I have told him nothing yet,” she murmured.
+
+“You would like to accept?”
+
+She nodded.
+
+“I am not sure,” she replied. “If only--I dared!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII. WOMAN'S WILES
+
+
+At eleven o'clock the next morning, Tavernake presented himself at the
+Milan Court and inquired for Mrs. Wenham Gardner. He was sent at once to
+her apartments in charge of a page. She was lying upon a sofa piled up
+with cushions, wrapped in a wonderful blue garment which seemed somehow
+to deepen the color of her eyes. By her side was a small table on which
+was some chocolate, a bowl of roses, and a roll of newspapers. She held
+out her hand toward Tavernake, but did not rise. There was something
+almost spiritual about her pallor, the delicate outline of her figure,
+so imperfectly concealed by the thin silk dressing-gown, the faint,
+tired smile with which she welcomed him.
+
+“You will forgive my receiving you like this, Mr. Tavernake?” she
+begged. “To-day I have a headache. I have been anxious for your coming.
+You must sit by my side, please, and tell me at once whether you have
+seen Beatrice.”
+
+Tavernake did exactly as he was bidden. The chair toward which she had
+pointed was quite close to the sofa, but there was no other unoccupied
+in the room. She raised herself a little on the couch and turned towards
+him. Her eyes were fixed anxiously upon his, her forehead slightly
+wrinkled, her voice tremulous with eagerness.
+
+“You have seen her?”
+
+“I have,” he admitted, looking steadily into the lining of his hat.
+
+“She has been cruel,” Elizabeth declared. “I can tell it from your face.
+You have bad news for me.”
+
+“I do not know,” Tavernake replied, “whether she has been cruel or not.
+She refuses to allow me to tell you her address. She begged me, indeed,
+to keep away from you altogether.”
+
+“Why? Did she tell you why?”
+
+“She says that you are her sister, that you have no money of your own
+and that your husband has left you,” Tavernake answered, deliberately.
+
+“Is that all?”
+
+“No, it is not all,” he continued. “As to the rest, she told me nothing
+definite. It is quite clear, however, that she is very anxious to keep
+away from you.”
+
+“But her reason?” Elizabeth persisted. “Did she give you no reason?”
+
+Tavernake looked her in the face.
+
+“She gave me no reason,” he said.
+
+“Do you believe that she is justified in treating me like this?”
+ Elizabeth asked, playing nervously with a pendant which hung from her
+smooth, bare neck.
+
+“Of course I do,” he replied. “I am quite sure that she would not
+feel as she does unless you had been guilty of something very terrible
+indeed.”
+
+The woman on the couch winced as though some one had struck her. A more
+susceptible man than Tavernake must have felt a little remorseful at the
+tears which dimmed for a moment her beautiful eyes. Tavernake, however,
+although he felt a moment's uneasiness, although he felt himself
+assailed all the time by a curious new emotion which he utterly failed
+to understand, was nevertheless still immune. The things which were to
+happen to him had not yet, arrived.
+
+“Of course,” he continued, “I was very much disappointed to hear this,
+because I had hoped that we might have been able to let Grantham House
+to you. We cannot consider the matter at all now unless you pay for
+everything in advance.”
+
+She uncovered her eyes and looked at him. People so direct of speech as
+this had come very seldom into her life. She was conscious of a thrill
+of interest. The study of men was a passion with her. Here was indeed a
+new type!
+
+“So you think that I am an adventuress,” she murmured.
+
+He reflected for a moment.
+
+“I suppose,” he admitted, “that it comes to that. I should not have
+returned at all if I had not promised. If there is any message which you
+wish me to give your sister, I will take it, but I cannot tell you her
+address.”
+
+She laid her hand suddenly upon his, and raising herself a little on the
+couch, leaned towards him. Her eyes and her lips both pleaded with him.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake,” she said slowly, “Beatrice is such a dear, obstinate
+creature, but she does not quite appreciate my position. Do me a favor,
+please. If you have promised not to give me her address let me at least
+know some way or some place in which I could come across her. I am sure
+she will be glad afterwards, and I--I shall be very grateful.”
+
+Tavernake felt that he was enveloped by something which he did not
+understand, but his lack of experience was so great that he did not even
+wonder at his insensibility.
+
+“I shall keep my word to your sister,” he announced, “in the spirit as
+well as the letter. It is quite useless to ask me to do otherwise.”
+
+Elizabeth was at first amazed, then angry, how angry she scarcely knew
+even herself. She had been a spoilt child, she had grown into a spoilt
+woman. Men, at least, had been ready enough to do her bidding all
+her life. Her beauty was of that peculiar kind, half seductive, half
+pathetic, wholly irresistible. And now there had come this strange,
+almost impossible person, against the armor of whose indifference she
+had spent herself in vain. Her eyes filled with tears once more as she
+looked at him, and Tavernake became uneasy. He glanced at the clock and
+again toward the door.
+
+“I think, if you will excuse me,” he began,--
+
+“Mr. Tavernake,” she interrupted, “you are very unkind to me, very
+unkind indeed.”
+
+“I cannot help it,” he answered.
+
+“If you knew everything,” she continued, “you would not be so obstinate.
+If Beatrice herself were here, if I could whisper something in her ear,
+she would be only too thankful that I had found her out. Beatrice has
+always misunderstood me, Mr. Tavernake. It is a little hard upon me, for
+we are both so far away from home, from our friends.”
+
+“You can send her any message you like by me,” Tavernake declared.
+“If you like, I will wait while you write a letter. If you really have
+anything to say to her which might change her opinion, you can write it,
+can't you?”
+
+She looked down at her hands--very beautiful and well-kept hands--and
+sighed. This young man, with his unusual imperturbability and hateful
+common sense, was getting on her nerves.
+
+“It is so hard to write things, Mr. Tavernake,” she said, “but, of
+course, it is something to know that if the worst happens I can send her
+a letter. I shall think about that for a short time. Meanwhile, there
+is so much about her I would love to have you tell me. She has no money,
+has she? How does she support herself?”
+
+“She sings occasionally at concerts,” Tavernake replied after a moment's
+pause. “I suppose there is no harm in telling you that.”
+
+Elizabeth leaned towards him. She was very loth indeed to acknowledge
+defeat. Once more her voice was deliciously soft, her forehead
+delicately wrinkled, her blue eyes filled with alluring light.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake,” she murmured, “do you know that you are not in the
+least kind to me? Beatrice and I are sisters, after all. Even she has
+admitted that. She left me most unkindly at a critical time in my
+life; she misunderstood things; if I were to see her, I could explain
+everything. I feel it very much that she is living apart from me in this
+city where we are both strangers. I am anxious about her, Mr. Tavernake.
+Does she want money? If so, will you take her some from me? Can't you
+suggest any way in which I could help her? Do be my friend, please, and
+advise me.”
+
+Life was certainly opening out for Tavernake. The atmosphere by which he
+was surrounded, which she was deliberately creating around him, was the
+atmosphere of an unknown world. It was a position, this, entirely novel
+to him. Nevertheless, he did his best to cope with it intelligently. He
+reflected carefully before he made any reply, he refused absolutely to
+listen to the strange voices singing in his ears, and he delivered his
+decision with his usual air of finality.
+
+“I am afraid,” he said, “that since Beatrice refuses even to let you
+know her whereabouts, she would not wish to accept anything from you.
+It seems a pity,” he went on, the instincts of the money-saver stirring
+within him; “she is certainly none too well off.”
+
+The lady on the couch sighed.
+
+“Beatrice has at least a friend,” she murmured. “It is a great deal
+to have a friend. It is more than I have. We are both so far from home
+here. Often I am sorry that we ever left America. England is not a
+hospitable country, Mr. Tavernake.”
+
+Again this painfully literal young man spoke out what was in his mind.
+
+“There was a gentleman in the motor-car with you the other night,” he
+reminded her.
+
+She bit her lip.
+
+“He was just an acquaintance,” she answered, “a man whom I used to know
+in New York, passing through London. He called on me and asked me to go
+to the theatre and supper. Why not? I have had a terrible time during
+the last few months, Mr. Tavernake, and I am very lonely--lonelier than
+ever since my sister deserted me.”
+
+Tavernake began to feel, ridiculous though it seemed, that in some
+subtle and inexplicable fashion he was in danger. At any rate, he was
+hopelessly bewildered. He did not understand why this very beautiful
+lady should look at him as though they were old friends, why her eyes
+should appeal to him so often for sympathy, why her fingers, which a
+moment ago were resting lightly upon his hand, and which she had drawn
+away with reluctance, should have burned him like pin-pricks of fire.
+The woman who wishes to allure may be as subtle as possible in her
+methods, but a sense of her purpose, however vague it may be, is
+generally communicated to her would be victim. Tavernake was becoming
+distinctly uneasy. He had no vanity. He knew from the first that this
+beautiful creature belonged to a world far removed from any of which he
+had any knowledge. The only solution of the situation which presented
+itself to him was that she might be thinking of borrowing money from
+him!
+
+“There was never a time in my life,” she continued softly, “when I felt
+that I needed a friend more. I am afraid that my sister has prejudiced
+you against me, Mr. Tavernake. Beatrice is very young, and the young are
+not always sympathetic, you know. They do not make allowances, they do
+not understand.”
+
+“Why did you tell Mr. Dowling things which were not true?” he asked
+bluntly.
+
+She sighed, and looked down at the handkerchief with which she had been
+toying.
+
+“It was a very silly piece of conceit,” she admitted, “but, you see, I
+had to tell him something.”
+
+“Why did you come to the office at all?” he continued.
+
+“Do you really want to know that?” she whispered softly.
+
+“Well,--”
+
+“I will tell you,” she went on suddenly. “It sounds foolish, in a way,
+and yet it wasn't really, because, you see,”--she smiled at him--“I was
+anxious about Beatrice. I saw you come out of the office that morning,
+and I recognized you at once. I knew that it was you who had been with
+Beatrice. I made an excuse about the house to come and see whether I
+could find you out.”
+
+Tavernake, in whom the vanity was not yet born, missed wholly the
+significance of her smile, her trifling hesitation.
+
+“All that,” he declared, “is no reason why you should have told Mr.
+Dowling that your husband was a millionaire and had given you carte
+blanche about taking a house.”
+
+“Did I mention--my husband?”
+
+“Distinctly,” he assured her.
+
+For the first time she had faltered in her speech. Tavernake felt that
+she herself was shaken by some emotion. Her eyes for a moment were
+strangely-lit; something had come into her face which he did not
+understand. Then it passed. The delightful smile, half deprecating,
+half appealing, once more parted her lips; the gleam of horror no longer
+shone in her blue eyes.
+
+“I am always so foolish about money,” she declared, “so ignorant that
+I never know how I stand, but really I think that I have plenty, and a
+hundred or two more or less for rent didn't seem to matter much.”
+
+It was a point of view, this, which Tavernake utterly failed to
+comprehend. He looked at her in surprise.
+
+“I suppose,” he protested, “you know how much a year you have to live
+on?”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“It seems to vary all the time,” she sighed. “There are so many
+complications.”
+
+He looked at her in amazement.
+
+“After all,” he admitted, “you don't look as though you had much of a
+head for figures.”
+
+“If only I had some one to help me!” she murmured.
+
+Tavernake moved uneasily in his chair. His sense of danger was growing.
+
+“If you will excuse me now,” he said, “I think that I must be getting
+back. I am an employee at Dowling, Spence & Company's, you know, and my
+time is not quite my own. I only came because I promised to.”
+
+“Mr. Tavernake,” she begged, looking at him full out of those wonderful
+blue eyes, “please do me a great favor.”
+
+“What is it?” he asked with clumsy ungraciousness.
+
+“Come and see me, every now and then, and let me know how my sister is.
+Perhaps you may be able to suggest some way in which I can help her.”
+
+Tavernake considered the question for a moment. He was angry with
+himself for the unaccountable sense of pleasure which her suggestion had
+given him.
+
+“I am not quite sure,” he said, “whether I had better come. Beatrice
+seemed quite anxious that I should not talk about her to you at all. She
+did not like my coming to-day.”
+
+“You seem to know a great deal about my sister,” Elizabeth declared
+reflectively. “You call her by her Christian name and you appear to see
+her frequently. Perhaps, even, you are fond of her.”
+
+Tavernake met his questioner's inquiring gaze blankly. He was almost
+indignant.
+
+“Fond of her!” he exclaimed. “I have never been fond of any one in my
+life, or anything--except my work,” he added.
+
+She looked at him a little bewildered at first.
+
+“Oh, you strange person!” she cried, her lips breaking into a delightful
+smile. “Don't you know that you haven't begun to live at all yet? You
+don't even know anything about life, and at the back of it all you have
+capacity. Yes,” she went on, “I think that you have the capacity for
+living.”
+
+Her hand fell upon his with a little gesture which was half a caress. He
+looked around him as though seeking for escape. He was on his feet now
+and he clutched at his hat.
+
+“I must go,” he insisted almost roughly.
+
+“Am I keeping you?” she asked innocently. “Well, you shall go as soon as
+you please, only you must promise me one thing. You must come back, say
+within a week, and let me know how my sister is. I am not half so brutal
+as you think. I really am anxious about her. Please!”
+
+“I will promise that,” he answered.
+
+“Wait one moment, then,” she begged, turning to the letters by her side.
+“There is just something I want to ask you. Don't be impatient--it is
+entirely a matter of business.”
+
+All the time he was acutely conscious of that restless desire to get out
+of the room. The woman's white arms, from which the sleeves of her blue
+gown had fallen back, were stretched towards him as she lazily turned
+over her pile of correspondence. They were very beautiful arms and
+Tavernake, although he had had no experience, was dimly aware of the
+fact. Her eyes, too, seemed always to be trying to reach some part of
+him which was dead, or as yet unborn. He could feel her striving to get
+there, beating against the walls of his indifference. Why should a woman
+wear blue stockings because she had a blue gown, he wondered idly. She
+was not like Beatrice, this alluring, beautiful woman, who lay there
+talking to him in a manner whose meaning came to him only in strange,
+bewildering flashes. He could be with Beatrice and feel the truth of
+what he had once told her--that her sex was a thing which need not even
+be taken into account between them. With this woman it was different; he
+felt that she wished it to be different.
+
+“Perhaps you had better tell me about that matter of business next time
+I am here,” he suggested, with an abruptness which was almost brusque.
+“I must go now. I do not know why I have stayed so long.”
+
+She held out her fingers.
+
+“You are a very sudden person,” she declared, smiling at his
+discomfiture. “If you must go!”
+
+He scarcely touched her hand, anxious only to get away. And then the
+door opened and a man of somewhat remarkable appearance entered the room
+with the air of a privileged person. He was oddly dressed, with little
+regard to the fashion of the moment. His black coat was cut after
+the mode of a past generation, his collar was of the type affected by
+Gladstone and his fellow-statesmen, his black bow was arranged with
+studied negligence and he showed more frilled white shirt-front than
+is usual in the daytime. His silk hat was glossy but broad-brimmed; his
+masses of gray hair, brushed back from a high, broad forehead, gave
+him almost a patriarchal aspect. His features were large and fairly
+well-shaped, but his mouth was weak and his cheeks lacked the color of
+a healthy life. Tavernake stared at him open-mouthed. He, for his part,
+looked at Tavernake as he might have looked at some strange wild animal.
+
+“A thousand apologies, dear Elizabeth!” he exclaimed. “I knocked, but I
+imagine that you did not hear me. Knowing your habits, it did not occur
+to me that you might be engaged at this hour of the morning.”
+
+“It is a young man from the house agent's,” she announced indifferently,
+“come to see me about a flat.”
+
+“In that case,” he suggested amiably, “I am, perhaps, not in the way.”
+
+Elizabeth turned her head slightly and looked at him; he backed
+precipitately toward the door.
+
+“In a few minutes,” he said. “I will return in a few minutes.”
+
+Tavernake attempted to follow his example.
+
+“There is no occasion for your friend to leave,” he protested. “If you
+have any instructions for us, a note to the office will always bring
+some one here to see you.”
+
+She sat up on the couch and smiled at him. His obvious embarrassment
+amused her. It was a new sort of game, this, altogether.
+
+“Come, Mr. Tavernake,” she said, “three minutes more won't matter, will
+it? I will not keep you longer than that, I promise.”
+
+He came reluctantly a few steps back.
+
+“I am sorry,” he explained, “but we really are busy this morning.”
+
+“This is business,” she declared, still smiling at him pleasantly. “My
+sister has filled you with suspicions about me. Some of them may be
+justifiable, some are not. I am not so rich as I should like some people
+to believe. It is so much easier to live well, you know, when people
+believe that you are rolling in money. Still, I am by no means a pauper.
+I cannot afford to take Grantham House, but neither can I afford to go
+on living here. I have decided to make a change, to try and economize,
+to try and live within my means. Now will you bring me a list of small
+houses or flats, something at not more than say two or three hundred
+a year? It shall be strictly a business proceeding. I will pay you for
+your time, if that is necessary, and your commission in advance. There,
+you can't refuse my offer on those terms, can you?”
+
+Tavernake remained silent. He was conscious that his lack of response
+seemed both sullen and awkward, but he was for the moment tongue-tied.
+His habit of inopportune self-analysis had once more asserted itself. He
+could not understand the curious nature of his mistrust of this woman,
+nor could he understand the pleasure which her suggestion gave him. He
+wanted to refuse, and yet he was glad to be able to tell himself that
+he was, after all, but an employee of his firm and not in a position to
+decline business on their behalf.
+
+She leaned a little towards him; her tone was almost beseeching.
+
+“You are not going to be unkind? You will not refuse me?” she pleaded.
+
+“I will bring you a list,” he answered heavily, “on the terms you
+suggest.”
+
+“To-morrow morning?” she begged.
+
+“As soon as I am able,” he promised.
+
+Then he escaped. Outside in the corridor, the man who had interrupted
+his interview was walking backwards and forwards. Tavernake passed him
+without responding to his bland greeting. He forgot all about the lift
+and descended five flights of stairs....
+
+A few minutes later, he presented himself at the office and reported
+that Mrs. Wenham Gardner had decided unfavorably about Grantham House,
+and that she was not disposed, indeed, to take premises of anything like
+such a rental. Mr. Dowling was disappointed, and inclined to think that
+his employee had mismanaged the affair.
+
+“I wish that I had gone myself,” he declared. “She obviously wished me
+to, but it happened to be inconvenient. By-the-bye, Tavernake, close the
+door, will you? There is another matter concerning which I should like
+to speak to you.”
+
+Tavernake did as he was bidden at once, without any disquietude. His
+own services to the firm were of such a nature that he had no misgiving
+whatever as to his employer's desire for a private interview.
+
+“It is about the Marston Rise estate,” Mr. Dowling explained, arranging
+his pince nez. “I believe that the time is coming when some sort of
+overtures should be made. You know what has been in my mind for a very
+considerable time.”
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+“Yes,” he admitted, “I know quite well.”
+
+“I did hear a rumor,” Mr. Dowling continued, “that some one had bought
+one small plot on the outskirts of the estate. I dare say it is not
+true, and in any case it is not worth while troubling about, but it
+shows that the public is beginning to nibble. I am of opinion that the
+time is almost--yes, almost ripe for a move.”
+
+“Do you wish me to do anything in the matter, sir?” Tavernake asked.
+
+“In the first place,” Mr. Dowling declared, “I should like you to try to
+find out whether any of the plots have really been sold, and, if so, to
+whom, and what would be their price. Can you do this during the week?”
+
+“I think so,” Tavernake answered.
+
+“Say Monday morning,” Mr. Dowling suggested, taking down his hat. “I
+shall be playing golf to-morrow and Friday, and of course Saturday.
+Monday morning you might let me have a report.”
+
+Tavernake went back to his office. After all, then, things were to come
+to a crisis a little earlier than he had thought. He knew quite well
+that that report, if he made it honestly, and no other idea was likely
+to occur to him, would effectually sever his connection with Messrs.
+Dowling, Spence & Company.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX. THE PLOT THICKENS
+
+
+The man whom Tavernake had left walking up and down the corridor lost
+no time in presenting himself once more at the apartments of Mrs. Wenham
+Gardner. He entered the suite without ceremony, carefully closing both
+doors behind him. It became obvious then that his deportment on the
+occasion of his previous appearance had been in the nature of a bluff.
+The air with which he looked across the room at the woman who watched
+him was furtive; the hand which laid his hat upon the table was shaking;
+there was a gleam almost of terror in his eyes. The woman remained
+impassive, inscrutable, simply watching him. After a moment or two,
+however, she spoke--a single monosyllable.
+
+“Well?”
+
+The man broke down.
+
+“Elizabeth,” he exclaimed, “you are too--too ghastly! I can't stand it.
+You are unnatural.”
+
+She stretched herself upon the couch and turned towards him.
+
+“Unnatural, am I?” she remarked. “And what are you?”
+
+He sank into a chair. He had become very flabby indeed.
+
+“What you are always calling me, I suppose,” he muttered,--“a coward.
+You have so little consideration, Elizabeth. My health isn't what it
+was.”
+
+His eyes had wandered longingly toward the cupboard at the further end
+of the apartment. The woman upon the couch smiled.
+
+“You may help yourself,” she directed carelessly. “Perhaps then you will
+be able to tell me why you have come in such a state.”
+
+He crossed the room in a few hasty steps, his head and shoulders
+disappeared inside the cupboard. There was the sound of the withdrawal
+of a cork, the fizz of a sodawater syphon. He returned to his place a
+different man.
+
+“You must remember my age, Elizabeth dear,” he said, apologetically.
+“I haven't your nerve--it isn't likely that I should have. When I was
+twenty-five, there was nothing in the world of which I was afraid.”
+
+She looked him over critically.
+
+“Perhaps I am not so absolutely courageous as you think,” she remarked.
+“To tell you the truth, there are a good many things of which I am
+afraid when you come to me in such a state. I am afraid of you, of what
+you will do or say.”
+
+“You need not be,” he assured her hastily. “When I am away from you, I
+am dumb. What I suffer no one knows. I keep it to myself.”
+
+She nodded, a little contemptuously.
+
+“I suppose you do your best,” she declared. “Tell me, now, what is this
+fresh thing which has disturbed you?”
+
+Her visitor stared at her.
+
+“Does there need to be any fresh thing?” he muttered.
+
+“I suppose it is something about Wenham?” she asked.
+
+The man shivered. He opened his lips and closed them again. The woman's
+tone, if possible, grew colder.
+
+“I hope you are not going to tell me that you have disobeyed my orders,”
+ she said.
+
+“No,” he protested, “no! I was there yesterday. I came back by the mail
+from Penzance. I had to motor thirty miles to catch it.”
+
+“Something has happened, of course,” she went on, “something which you
+are afraid to tell 'me. Sit up like a man, my dear father, and let me
+have the truth.”
+
+“Nothing fresh has happened at all,” he assured her. “It is simply that
+the memory of the day I spent at that place and that the sight of him
+has got on my nerves till I can't sleep or think of anything else.”
+
+“What rubbish!” she exclaimed.
+
+“You have only seen the place in fine weather,” he continued, dropping
+his voice a little. “Elizabeth, you have no idea what it is really like.
+Yesterday morning I got out of the train at Bodmin and I motored through
+to the village of Clawes. After that there were five miles to walk.
+There's no road, only a sort of broken track, and for the whole of that
+five miles there isn't even a farm building to be seen and I didn't meet
+a human soul. There was a sort of pall of white-gray mists everywhere
+over the moor, sometimes so dense that I couldn't see my way, and you
+could stop and listen and there wasn't a thing to be heard, not even a
+sheep bell.”
+
+She laughed softly..
+
+“My dear, foolish father,” she murmured, “you don't understand what
+a rest cure is. This is quite all right, quite as it should be. Poor
+Wenham has been seeing too many people all his life--that is why we have
+to keep him quiet for a time. You can skip the scenery. I suppose you
+got to the house at last?”
+
+“Yes, I got there,” continued her father. “You know what a bleak-looking
+place it is, right on the side of a bare hill--a square, gray stone
+place just the color of the hillside. Well, I got there and walked in.
+There was Ted Mathers, half dressed, no collar, with a bottle of whiskey
+on the table, playing some wretched game of cards by himself. Elizabeth,
+what a brute that man is!”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“Go on,” she said. “What about Wenham?”
+
+“He was there in a corner, gazing out of the window. When I came he
+sprang up, but when he saw who it was, he--he tried to hide. He was
+afraid of me.”
+
+“Why?” she asked.
+
+“He said that I--I reminded him of you.”
+
+“Absurd!” she murmured. “Tell me, how did he look?”
+
+“Ill, wretched, paler and thinner than ever, and wilder looking.”
+
+“What did Mathers say about him?” she demanded.
+
+“What could he? He told me that he cried all day and begged to be taken
+back to America.”
+
+“No one goes near the place, I suppose?” she asked.
+
+“Not a soul. A man comes from the village to sell things once a week.
+Mathers knows when to expect him and takes care that Wenham is not
+around. They are out of the world there--no road, no paths, nothing
+to bring even a tourist. I could have imagined such a spot in Arizona,
+Elizabeth, but in England--no!”
+
+“Has he any amusements at all?” she inquired.
+
+The man's hands were shaking; once more his eyes went longingly toward
+the cupboard.
+
+“He has made--a doll,” he said, “carved it out of a piece of wood and
+dressed it in oddments from his ties. Mathers showed it to me as a joke.
+Elizabeth, it was wonderful--horrible!”
+
+“Why?” she asked him.
+
+“It is you,” he continued, moistening his lips with his tongue, “you,
+in a blue gown--your favorite shade. He has even made blue stockings and
+strange little shoes. He has got some hair from somewhere and parted it
+just like yours.”
+
+“It sounds very touching,” she remarked.
+
+The man was shivering again.
+
+“Elizabeth,” he said, “I do not think that he means it kindly. Mathers
+took me up into his room. He has made something there which looks like
+a scaffold. The doll was hanging by a piece of string from the gallows.
+Elizabeth!--my God, but it was like you!” he cried, suddenly dropping
+his head upon his arms.
+
+For a moment, a reflection of the terror which had seized him flashed in
+her own face. It passed quickly away. She laughed mockingly.
+
+“My dear father,” she protested, “you are certainly not yourself this
+morning.”
+
+“I saw you swinging,” he muttered, “swinging by that piece of cord!
+There was a great black pin through your heart. Elizabeth, if he
+should get away sometime! If some one should come over from America
+and discover where he was! If he should find us out! Oh, my God, if he
+should find us out!”
+
+Elizabeth had risen to her feet. She was standing now before the fire,
+her left elbow resting upon the mantelpiece, a trifle of silver gleaming
+in her right hand.
+
+“Father,” she said, “there is no danger in life for those who know no
+fear. Look at me.”
+
+His eyes sought hers, fascinated.
+
+“If he should find me out,” she continued, “it would be no such terrible
+thing, after all. It would be the end.”
+
+Her fingers disclosed the little ornament she was carrying--a tiny
+pistol. She slipped it back into her pocket. The man was wondering how
+such a thing as this came to be his daughter.
+
+“You have courage, Elizabeth,” he whispered.
+
+“I have courage,” she assented, “because I have brains. I never allow
+myself to be in a position where I should be likely to get the worst
+of it. Ever since the day when he turned so suddenly against me, I have
+been careful.”
+
+Her father leaned towards her.
+
+“Elizabeth,” he said, “I never really understood. What was it that came
+over him so suddenly? One day he was your slave, the next I think he
+would have murdered you if he could.”
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+“Honestly,” she replied, “I felt it impossible to keep up the sham any
+longer. I married Wenham Gardner in New York because he was supposed to
+be a millionaire and because it seemed to be the best thing to do, but
+as to living with him, I never meant that. You know how ridiculous his
+behavior was on the boat. He never let me out of his sight, but swore
+that he was going to give up smoking and drinking and lead a new life
+for my sake. I really believe he meant it, too.”
+
+“Wouldn't it have been better, dear,” her father suggested, timidly, “to
+have encouraged him?”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“He was absolutely hopeless,” she declared. “You say that I have no
+nerves; that is because I do not allow myself to suffer. If I had gone
+on living with Wenham, it would have driven me mad. His habits, his
+manner of life, everything disgusted me. Until I came to see so much of
+him, I never understood what the term 'decadent' really can mean. The
+very touch of him grew to be hateful. No woman could live with such a
+man. By the way, he signed the draft, I suppose?”
+
+Her father handed her a slip of paper, which she looked at and locked in
+her drawer.
+
+“Did he make any trouble about it?” she asked.
+
+The professor shivered.
+
+“He refused to sign it,” he said, in a low tone, “swore he would never
+sign it. Mathers sent me out for a few minutes, made me go into another
+room. When I came back, he gave me the draft. I heard him calling out.”
+
+“Mathers certainly earns his money,” she remarked, drily.
+
+He gazed at her with grudging admiration. This was his daughter, his own
+flesh and blood. Back through the years, for a moment, he seemed to see
+her, a child with hair down her back, sitting on his knee, listening
+to his stories, wondering at the little arts and tricks by which he
+had wrested their pennies and sixpennies from a credulous public.
+Phrenologist, hypnotist, conjurer--all these things the great Professor
+Franklin had called himself. Often, from the rude stage where he had
+given his performance, he had terrified to death the women and children
+of his audience. It flashed upon him at that moment that never, even in
+the days of her childhood, had he seen fear in Elizabeth's face.
+
+“You should have been a man, Elizabeth,” he muttered.
+
+She shook her head, smiling as though not ill-pleased at the compliment.
+
+“The power of a man is so limited,” she declared. “A woman has more
+weapons.”
+
+“More weapons indeed,” the professor agreed, as his eyes traveled over
+the slim yet wonderful perfection of her form, lingered for a moment
+at the little knot of lace at her throat, wrestled with the delicate
+sweetness of her features, struggling hard to think from whom among his
+ancestors could have come a creature so physically attractive.
+
+“More weapons, indeed,” he repeated. “Elizabeth, what a gift--what a
+gift!”
+
+“You speak,” she replied, “as though it were an evil one.”
+
+“I was only thinking,” he said, “that it seems a pity. You are so
+wonderful, we might have found an easier and a less dangerous way to
+fortune.”
+
+She smiled.
+
+“The Bohemian blood in me, I suppose,” she remarked. “The crooked ways
+attract, you know, when one has been brought up as I was.”
+
+“Your poor mother had no love for them,” he reminded her.
+
+“Beatrice has inherited everything that belonged to my mother. I am your
+own daughter, father. You ought to be proud of me. But there, I gave you
+another commission. Is it true that Jerry is really here?”
+
+“He arrived in England on Wednesday on the Lusitania. He has been in
+town all the time since.”
+
+A distinct frown darkened her face.
+
+“He must have had my letter, then,” she murmured, half to herself.
+
+“Without a doubt,” her father admitted. “Elizabeth, why do you take
+chances about seeing this man? He was fond of you in New York, I know,
+but then he was fond of his brother, too. He may not believe your story.
+It may be dangerous.”
+
+She smiled.
+
+“I think I can convince Jerry Gardner of anything I choose to tell
+him,” she said. “Besides, it is absolutely necessary that I have some
+information about Wenham's affairs. He must have a great deal more money
+somewhere and I must find out how we are to get at it.”
+
+The professor shook his head.
+
+“I don't like it,” he muttered. “Supposing he finds Beatrice!”
+
+Elizabeth shrugged her shoulders.
+
+“Beatrice is made of silent stuff,” she declared. “I should never be
+afraid of her. All the same, I wish I could find out just where she is.
+It would look better if we were living together.”
+
+The professor shook his head sadly.
+
+“She left us of her own free will,” he said, “and I don't believe,
+Elizabeth, that she would ever come back again. She knew very well what
+she was doing. She knew that our views of life were not hers. She didn't
+know half but she knew enough. You were quite right in what you said
+just now; Beatrice was more like her mother, and her mother was a good
+woman.”
+
+“Really!” Elizabeth remarked, insolently.
+
+“Don't answer like that,” he blustered, striking the table. “She was
+your mother, too.”
+
+The woman's face was inscrutable, hard, and flawless behind the little
+cloud of tobacco smoke. The man began to tremble once more. Every time
+he ventured to assert himself, a single look from her was sufficient to
+quell him.
+
+“Elizabeth,” he muttered, “you haven't a heart, you haven't a soul, you
+haven't a conscience. I wonder--what sort of a woman you are!”
+
+“I am your daughter,” she reminded him, pleasantly.
+
+“I was never quite so bad as that,” he went on, taking a large silk
+handkerchief from his pocket and dabbing his forehead. “I had to live
+and times were hard. I have cheated the public, perhaps. I haven't been
+above playing at cards a little cleverly, or making something where I
+could out of the weaker men. But, Elizabeth, I am afraid of you.”
+
+“Men are generally afraid of the big stakes,” she remarked, flicking the
+ash from her cigarette. “They will cheat and lie for halfpennies, but
+they are bad gamblers when life or death--the big things are in the
+balance. Bah!” she went on. “Father, I want Jerry Gardner to come and
+see me.”
+
+“If you can't make him come, my dear,” the professor said, “I am sure it
+will be of no use my trying.”
+
+“He has had my letter,” she continued, half to herself; “he has had my
+letter and he does not come.”
+
+“There is nothing to be done but wait,” her father decided.
+
+“And meanwhile,” she went on, “supposing he were to discover Beatrice,
+supposing they two were to come together; supposing he were to tell her
+what he knows and she were to tell him what she guessed!”
+
+The professor buried his face in his hands. Elizabeth threw her
+cigarette away with an impatient gesture.
+
+“What an idiot I am!” she declared. “What is the use of wasting time
+like this?”
+
+There was a knock at the door. A trim-looking French maid presented
+herself. She addressed her mistress in voluble French. A coiffeur and a
+manicurist were waiting in the next apartment; it was time that Madame
+habited herself. The professor listened to these announcements with an
+air of half-admiring wonder.
+
+“I suppose I must be going,” he said, rising to his feet. “There is just
+one thing I should like to ask you, Elizabeth, if I may, before I go.”
+
+“Well?”
+
+“Who was the young man whom I met here just now?”
+
+“Why do you ask that?” she demanded.
+
+“I really do not know,” her father replied, thoughtfully, “except that
+his appearance seemed a little singular. In some respects he appeared so
+commonplace. His clothes and bearing, in fact, were so ordinary that
+I was surprised to find him here with you. And, on the other hand, his
+face--you must remember, my dear, that this is entirely a professional
+instinct; I am still interested in faces--”
+
+“Quite so,” she admitted. “Go on. The young man rather puzzles me
+myself. I should like to hear what you make of him. What did you think
+of his face?”
+
+“There was something powerful about it,” he declared, “something dogged,
+splendid, narrow, impossible,--the sort of face which belongs to a man
+who achieves great things because he is too stupid to recognize failure,
+even when it has him in its arms and its fingers are upon his throat.
+That young man has qualities, my dear, I am sure. Mind you, at present
+they are dormant, but he has qualities.”
+
+She led him to the door.
+
+“My dear father,” she said, “sometimes I really respect you. If you
+should come across that young man again, keep your eye upon him. He
+knows one thing at least which I wish he would tell us--he knows where
+Beatrice is.”
+
+Her father looked at her in amazement.
+
+“He knows where Beatrice is and he has not told you?”
+
+She nodded.
+
+“You tried to have him tell you and he refused?” the professor
+persisted.
+
+“Exactly,” she admitted.
+
+Her father put on his hat.
+
+“I knew that young man was something out of the common.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X. THE JOY OF BATTLE
+
+
+They sat on the trunk of a fallen tree, in the topmost corner of the
+field. In the hedge, close at hand, was a commotion of birds. In the elm
+tree, a little further away, a thrush was singing. A soft west wind
+blew in their faces; the air immediately around them was filled with
+sunlight. Yet almost to their feet stretched one of those great arms of
+the city--a suburb, with its miles of villas, its clanging of electric
+cars, its waste plots, its rows of struggling shops. And only a little
+further away still, the body itself--the huge city, throbbing beneath
+its pall of smoke and cloud. The girl, who had been gazing steadily
+downwards for several moments, turned at last to her companion.
+
+“Do you know,” she said, “that this makes me think of the first night
+you spoke to me? You remember it--up on the roof at Blenheim House?”
+
+Tavernake did not answer for a moment. He was looking through a
+queerly-shaped instrument that he had brought with him at half-a-dozen
+stakes that he had laboriously driven into the ground some distance
+away. He was absolutely absorbed in his task.
+
+“The main avenue,” he muttered softly to himself. “Yes, it must be a
+trifle more to the left. Then we get all the offshoots parallel and the
+better houses have their southern aspect. I beg your pardon, Beatrice,
+did you say anything?” he broke off suddenly.
+
+She smiled.
+
+“Nothing worth mentioning. I was just thinking that it reminded me a
+little up here of the first time you and I ever talked together.”
+
+He glanced down at the panorama below, with its odd jumble of hideous
+buildings, softened here and there with wreaths of sunstained smoke, its
+great blots of ugliness irredeemable, insistent.
+
+“It's different, of course,” she went on. “I remember, even now, the
+view from the house-top that night. In a sense, it was finer than this;
+everything was more lurid and yet more chaotic; one simply felt that
+underneath all those mysterious places was some great being, toiling and
+struggling--Life itself, groaning through space with human cogwheels. Up
+here one sees too much. Oh, my dear Leonard,” she continued, “to think
+that you, too, should be one of the devastators!”
+
+He fitted his instrument into its case and replaced it in his pocket.
+
+“Come,” he said, “you mustn't call me hard names. I shall remind you of
+the man whose works you are making me read. You know what he says--'The
+aesthete is, after all, only a dallier. The world lives and progresses
+by reason of its utilitarians.' This hill represents to me most of the
+things that are worth having in life.”
+
+She laughed shortly.
+
+“You will cut down those hedges and drive away the birds to find a fresh
+home; you will plough up the green grass, cut out a street and lay
+down granite stones. Then I see your ugly little houses coming up like
+mushrooms all over the place. You are a vandal, my dear Leonard.”
+
+“I am simply obeying the law,” he answered. “After all, even from your
+own point of view, I do not think that it is so bad. Look closer, and
+you will find that the hedges are blackened here and there with smuts.
+The birds will find a better dwelling place further away. See how the
+smoke from those factory chimneys is sending its smuts across these
+fields. They are no longer country; they are better gathered in.”
+
+She shivered.
+
+“There is something about life,” she said, sadly, “which terrifies me.
+Every force that counts seems to be destructive.”
+
+Up the steep hill behind them came the puffing and groaning of a small
+motor-car. They both turned their heads to watch it come into view.
+It was an insignificant affair of an almost extinct pattern, a single
+cylinder machine with a round tonneau back. The engine was knocking
+badly as the driver brought it to a standstill a few yards away from
+them. Involuntarily Tavernake stiffened as he saw the two men who
+descended from it, and who were already passing through the gate close
+to where they were. One was Mr. Dowling, the other the manager of the
+bank where they kept their account. Mr. Dowling recognized his manager
+with surprise but much cordiality.
+
+“Dear me!” he exclaimed. “Dear me, this is most fortunate! You know Mr.
+Tavernake, of course, Belton? My manager, Mr. Tavernake--Mr. Belton,
+of the London & Westminster Bank. I have brought Mr. Belton up here,
+Tavernake, to have a look round, so that he may know what we mean to do
+with all the money we shall have to come and borrow, eh?”
+
+The bank manager smiled.
+
+“It is a very fine situation,” he remarked.
+
+The eyes of the two men fell upon Beatrice, who had drawn a little to
+one side.
+
+“May we have the pleasure, Tavernake?” Mr. Dowling said, graciously.
+“You are not married, I believe?”
+
+“No, this is my sister,” Tavernake answered, slowly,--“Mr. Belton and
+Mr. Dowling.”
+
+The two men acknowledged the salute with some slight surprise. Beatrice,
+although her clothes were simple, had always the air of belonging to a
+different world.
+
+“Your brother, my dear Miss Tavernake,” Mr. Dowling declared, “is a
+perfect genius at discovering these desirable sites. This one I honestly
+consider to be the find of our lifetime. We have now,” he proceeded,
+turning to Mr. Belton, “certain information that the cars will run to
+whatever point we desire in this vicinity, and the Metropolitan Railway
+has also arranged for an extension of its system. To-morrow I propose,”
+ Mr. Dowling continued, holding the sides of his coat and assuming a
+somewhat pompous manner, “to make an offer for the whole of this site.
+It will involve a very large sum of money indeed, but I am convinced
+that it will be a remunerative speculation.”
+
+Tavernake remained grimly silent. This was scarcely the time or the
+place which he would have selected for an explanation with his employer.
+There were signs, however, that the thing was to be forced upon him.
+
+“I am very pleased indeed to meet you here, Tavernake,” Mr. Dowling went
+on, “pleased both for personal reasons and because it shows, if I may be
+allowed to say so, the interest which you take in the firm's business,
+that you should devote your holiday to coming and--er--surveying the
+scene of our exploits, so to speak. Perhaps now that you are here you
+would be able to explain to Mr. Belton better than I should, just what
+it is that we propose.”
+
+Tavernake hesitated for a moment. Finally, however, he proceeded to make
+clear a very elaborate and carefully thought out building scheme, to
+which both men listened with much attention. When he had finished,
+however, he turned round to Mr. Dowling, facing him squarely.
+
+“You will understand, sir,” he concluded, “that a scheme such as I have
+pointed out could only be carried through if the whole of the property
+were in one person's hands. I may say that the information to which you
+referred a few days ago was perfectly correct. A considerable portion of
+the south side of the hill has already been purchased, besides certain
+other plots which would interfere considerably with any comprehensive
+scheme of building.”
+
+Mr. Dowling's face fell at once; his tone was one of annoyance mingled
+with irritation.
+
+“Come, come,” he declared, “this sounds very bad, Mr. Tavernake, very
+neglectful, very careless as to the interests of the firm. Why did we
+not keep our eye upon it? Why did we not forestall this other purchaser,
+eh? It appears to me that we have been slack, very slack indeed.”
+
+Tavernake took a small book from his pocket.
+
+“You will remember, sir,” he said, “that it was on the eleventh of May
+last year when I first spoke to you of this site.”
+
+“Well, well,” Mr. Dowling exclaimed, sharply, “what of it?”
+
+“You were starting out for a fortnight's golf somewhere,” Tavernake
+continued, “and you promised to look into the affair when you returned.
+I spoke to you again but you declared that you were far too busy to go
+into the matter at all for the present, you didn't care about this side
+of London, you considered that we had enough on hand--in fact, you threw
+cold water upon the idea.”
+
+“I may not have been very enthusiastic at first,” Mr. Dowling admitted,
+grudgingly. “Latterly, however, I have come round to your views.”
+
+“There have been several articles in various newspapers, and a good deal
+of talk,” Tavernake remarked, “which have been more effectual, I think,
+in bringing you round, than my advice. However, what I wish to say to
+you is this, sir, that when I found myself unable to interest you in
+this scheme, I went into it myself to some extent.”
+
+“Went into it yourself?” Mr. Dowling repeated, incredulously. “What do
+you mean, Tavernake? What do you mean, sir?”
+
+“I mean that I have invested my savings in the purchase of several plots
+of land upon this hillside,” Tavernake explained.
+
+“On your own account?” Mr. Dowling demanded. “Your savings, indeed!”
+
+“Certainly,” Tavernake answered. “Why not?”
+
+“But it's the firm's business, sir--the firm's, not yours!”
+
+“The firm had the opportunity,” Tavernake pointed out, “and were not
+inclined to avail themselves of it. If I had not bought the land when I
+did, some one else would have bought the whole of it long ago.”
+
+Mr. Dowling was obviously in a furious temper.
+
+“Do you mean to tell me, sir,” he exclaimed, “that you dared to enter
+into private speculations while still an employee of the firm? It is
+a most unheard-of thing, unwarranted, ridiculous. I shall require you,
+sir, to at once make over the plots of land to us--to the firm, you
+understand. We shall give you your price, of course, although I expect
+you paid much more for it than we should have done. Still, we must give
+you what you paid, and four per cent interest for your money.”
+
+“I am sorry,” Tavernake replied, “but I am afraid that I should require
+better terms than that. In fact,” he continued, “I do not wish to sell.
+I have given a great deal of thought and time to this matter, and I
+intend to carry it out as a personal speculation.”
+
+“Then you will carry it out, sir, from some other place than from
+within the walls of my office,” Mr. Dowling declared, furiously. “You
+understand that, Tavernake?”
+
+“Perfectly,” Tavernake answered. “You wish me to leave you. It is very
+unwise of you to suggest it, but I am quite prepared to go.”
+
+“You will either resell me those plots at cost price, or you shall not
+set foot within the office again,” Mr. Dowling insisted. “It is a gross
+breach of faith, this. I never heard of such a thing in all my life.
+Most unprofessional, impossible behavior!”
+
+Tavernake showed no signs of anger--he simply turned a little away.
+
+“I shall not sell you my land, Mr. Dowling,” he said, “and it will suit
+me very well to leave your employ. You appear,” he continued, “to expect
+some one else to do the whole of the work for you while you reap the
+entire profits. Those days have gone by. My business in the world is to
+make a fortune for myself, and not for you!”
+
+“How dare you, sir!” Mr. Dowling cried. “I never heard such impertinence
+in my life.”
+
+“You haven't done a stroke of work for five years,” Tavernake went on,
+unmoved, “and my efforts have supplied you with a fairly good income. In
+future, those efforts will be directed towards my own advancement.”
+
+Mr. Dowling turned back toward the car.
+
+“Young man,” he said, “you can brazen it out as much as you like, but
+you have been guilty of a gross breach of faith. I shall take care that
+the exact situation is made known in all responsible quarters. You'll
+get no situation with any firm with whom I am acquainted--I can promise
+you that. If you have anything more to say to Dowling, Spence & Company,
+let it be in writing.”
+
+They parted company there and then. Tavernake and Beatrice went down the
+hill in silence.
+
+“Does this bother you at all?” she inquired presently.
+
+“Nothing to speak of,” Tavernake answered. “It had to come. I wasn't
+quite ready but that doesn't matter.”
+
+“What shall you do now?” she asked.
+
+“Borrow enough to buy the whole of the hill,” he replied.
+
+She looked back.
+
+“Won't that mean a great deal of money?”
+
+He nodded.
+
+“It will be a big thing, of course,” he admitted. “Never mind, I dare
+say I shall be able to interest some one in it. In any case, I never
+meant Mr. Dowling to make a fortune out of this.”
+
+They walked on in silence a little further. Then she spoke again, with
+some hesitation.
+
+“I suppose that what you have done is quite fair, Leonard?”
+
+He answered her promptly, without any sign of offence at her question.
+
+“As a matter of fact,” he confessed, “it is an unusual thing for any one
+in the employ of a firm of estate agents to make speculations on their
+own account in land. In this case, however, I consider that I was
+justified. I have opened up three building speculations for the firm, on
+each one of which they have made a great deal of money, and I have not
+even had my salary increased, or any recognition whatever offered me.
+There is a debt, of course, which an employee owes to his employer.
+There is also a debt, however, which the employer owes to his employee.
+In my case I have never been treated with the slightest consideration
+of any sort. What I have done I shall stick to. After all, I am more
+interested in making money for myself than for other people.”
+
+They had reached the corner of the field now, and turning into the lane
+commenced the steep descent. It was Sunday evening, and from all the
+little conventicles and tin churches below, the bells began their
+unmusical summons. From further away in the distance came the more
+melodious chiming from the Cathedral and the city churches. The shriller
+and nearer note, however, prevailed. The whole medley of sound was a
+discord. As they descended, they could see the black-coated throngs
+slowly moving towards the different places of worship. There was
+something uninspiring about it all. She shuddered.
+
+“Leonard,” she said, “I wonder why you are so anxious to get on in the
+world. Why do you want to be rich?”
+
+He was glancing back toward the hill, the light of calculations in his
+eyes. Once more he was measuring out those plots of land, calculating
+rent, deducting interest.
+
+“We all seek different things,” he replied tolerantly,--“some fame,
+some pleasure. Mr. Dowling, for instance, has no other ambition than to
+muddle round the golf links a few strokes better than his partner.”
+
+“And you?” she asked.
+
+“It is success I seek,” he answered. “Women, as a rule, do not
+understand. You, for instance, Beatrice, are too sentimental. I am very
+practical. It is money that I want. I want money because money means
+success.”
+
+“And afterwards?” she whispered.
+
+He was attending to her no longer. They were turning now into the broad
+thoroughfare at the bottom of the lane, at the end of which a tram-car
+was waiting. He scribbled a few, final notes into his pocket-book.
+
+“To-morrow,” he exclaimed, with the joy of battle in his tone,
+“to-morrow the fight begins in earnest!”
+
+Beatrice passed her hand through his arm.
+
+“Not only for you, dear friend, but for me,” she said. “For you? What do
+you mean?” he asked quickly.
+
+“I have been trying to tell you all day,” she continued, “but you have
+been too engrossed. Yesterday afternoon I went to see Mr. Grier at the
+Atlas Theatre. I had my voice tried, and to-morrow night I am going to
+take a small part in the new musical comedy.”
+
+Tavernake stared at her in something like consternation. His ideas as
+to the stage and all that belonged to it were of a primitive order. Mrs.
+Fitzgerald was perhaps as near as possible to his idea of the type. He
+glanced incredulously at Beatrice--slim, quietly dressed, yet with the
+unmistakable, to him mysterious, distinction of breeding.
+
+“You an actress!” he exclaimed.
+
+She laughed softly.
+
+“Dear Leonard,” she said, “this is going to be a part of your education.
+To-morrow night you shall come to the theatre and wait for me at the
+stage-door.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI. A BEWILDERING OFFER
+
+
+Elizabeth stood with her hands behind her back, leaning slightly against
+the writing-table. The professor, with his broad-brimmed hat clinched
+in his fingers, walked restlessly up and down the little room. The
+discussion had not been altogether a pleasant one. Elizabeth was
+composed but serious, her father nervous and excited.
+
+“You are mad, Elizabeth!” he declared. “Is it that you do not
+understand, or will not? I tell you that we must go.”
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+“Where would you drag me to?” she asked. “We certainly can't go back to
+New York.”
+
+He turned fiercely upon her.
+
+“Whose fault is it that we can't?” he demanded. “If it weren't for you
+and your confounded schemes, I could be walking down Broadway next week.
+God's own city it is, too!” he muttered. “I wish we'd never seen those
+two young men.”
+
+“It was a pity, perhaps,” she admitted, “yet we had to do something. We
+were absolutely stonybroke, as they say over here.”
+
+“Anyway, we've got to get out of this,” the professor declared.
+
+“My dear father,” she replied, “I will agree that if a new city or a new
+world could arise from the bottom of the sea, where Professor Franklin
+was unknown, and his beautiful daughter Elizabeth had neyer been heard
+of, it might perhaps be advisable for us to go there.  As it is--”
+
+“There is Rome,” he exclaimed, “or some of the smaller places! We have
+money for a time. We could get another draft, perhaps, from Wenham.”
+
+She shook her head. “We are just as safe here as anywhere on the
+Continent,” she remarked.
+
+Once more he struck the table. Then he threw out his hands above his
+head with the melodramatic instinct which had always been strong in his
+blood.
+
+“Do you think that I am a fool?” he cried. “Do you think I do not know
+that if there were not something moving in your brain you would think
+no more of that clerk, that bourgeois estate agent, than of the door-mat
+beneath your feet? It is what I always complain about. You make use
+of me as a tool. There are always things which I do not understand. He
+comes here, this young man, under a pretext, whether he knows it or not.
+You talk to him for an hour at a time. There should be nothing in
+your life which I do not know of, Elizabeth,” he continued, his voice
+suddenly hoarse as he leaned towards her. “Can't you see that there is
+danger in friendships for you and for me, there is danger in intimacies
+of any sort? I share the danger; I have a right to share the knowledge.
+This young man has no money of his own, I take it. Of what use is he to
+us?”
+
+“You are too hasty, my dear father,” she replied. “Let me assure you
+that there is nothing at all mysterious about Mr. Tavernake. The simple
+truth is that the young man rather attracts me.”
+
+The professor gazed at her incredulously.
+
+“Attracts you! He!”
+
+“You have never perfectly understood me, my dear parent,” she murmured.
+“You have never appreciated that trait in my character, that strange
+preference, if you like, for the absolutely original. Now in all my life
+I never met such a young man as this. He wears the clothes and he has
+the features and speech of just such a person as you have described, but
+there is a difference.”
+
+“A difference, indeed!” the professor interrupted roughly. “What
+difference, I should like to know?”
+
+She shrugged her shoulders lightly.
+
+“He is stolid without being stupid,” she explained. “He is entirely
+self-centered. I smile at him, and he waits patiently until I have
+finished to get on with our business. I have said quite nice things to
+him and he has stared at me without change of expression, absolutely
+without pleasure or emotion of any sort.”
+
+“You are too vain, Elizabeth,” her father declared. “You have been
+spoilt. There are a few people in the world whom even you might fail to
+charm. No doubt this young man is one of them.”
+
+She sighed gently.
+
+“It really does seem,” she admitted, “as though you were right, but we
+shall see. By-the-bye, hadn't you better go? The five minutes are nearly
+up.”
+
+He came over to her side, his hat and gloves in his hand, prepared for
+departure.
+
+“Will you tell me, upon your honor, Elizabeth,” he begged, “that there
+is no other reason for your interest? That you are not engaged in any
+fresh schemes of which I know nothing? Things are bad enough as they
+are. I cannot sleep, I cannot rest, for thinking of our position. If I
+thought that you had any fresh plans on hand--”
+
+She flicked the ash from her cigarette and checked him with a little
+gesture.
+
+“He knows where Beatrice is,” she remarked thoughtfully, “and I can't
+get him to tell me. There is nothing beyond--absolutely nothing.”...
+
+When Tavernake was announced, Elizabeth was still smoking, sitting in
+an easy-chair and looking into the fire. Something in her attitude, the
+droop of her head as it rested upon her fingers, reminded him suddenly
+of Beatrice. He showed no other emotion than a sudden pause in his
+walk across the room. Even that, however, in a person whose machinelike
+attitude towards her provoked her resentment, was noticeable.
+
+“Good morning, my friend!” she said pleasantly. “You have brought me the
+fresh list?”
+
+“Unfortunately, no, madam,” Tavernake answered. “I have called simply
+to announce that I am not able to be of any further assistance to you in
+the matter.”
+
+She looked at him for a moment without remark.
+
+“Are you serious, Mr. Tavernake?” she asked.
+
+“Yes,” he replied. “The fact is I am not in a position to help you. I
+have left the employ of Messrs. Dowling, Spence & Company.”
+
+“Of your own accord?” she inquired quietly.
+
+“No, I was dismissed,” he confessed. “I should have been compelled to
+leave in a very short time, but Mr. Dowling forestalled me.”
+
+“Won't you sit down and tell me about it?” she invited.
+
+He looked her in the eyes, square and unflinching. He was still able to
+do that!
+
+“It could not possibly interest you,” he said.
+
+“And--my sister? You have seen her?”
+
+“I have seen your sister,” Tavernake answered, without hesitation.
+
+“You have a message for me?”
+
+“None,” he declared.
+
+“She refuses--to be reconciled, then?”
+
+“I am afraid she has no friendly feelings towards you.”
+
+“She gave you no reason?”
+
+“No direct reason,” he admitted, “but her attitude is--quite
+uncompromising.”
+
+She rose and swept across the floor towards him. With firm but gentle
+fingers she took his worn bowler hat and mended gloves from his hand.
+Her gesture guided him towards a sofa.
+
+“Beatrice has prejudiced you against me,” she murmured. “It is not fair.
+Please come and sit down--for five minutes,” she pleaded. “I want you
+to tell me why you have quarrelled with that funny little man, Mr.
+Dowling.”
+
+“But, madam,--” he protested.
+
+“If you refuse, I shall think that my sister has been telling you
+stories about me,” she declared, watching him closely.
+
+Tavernake drew a little away from her but seated himself on the sofa
+which she had indicated. He took up as much room as possible, and to his
+relief she did not persist in her first intention, which was obviously
+to seat herself beside him.
+
+“Your sister has told me nothing about you whatsoever,” he said
+deliberately. “At the same time, she asked me not to give you her
+address.”
+
+“We will talk about that presently,” she interrupted. “In the first
+place, tell me why you have left your place.”
+
+“Mr. Dowling discovered,” he told her, in a matter-of-fact tone, “that
+I had been doing some business on my own account. He was quite right to
+disapprove. I have not been back to the office since he found it out.”
+
+“What sort of business?” she asked.
+
+“The business of the firm is to buy property in undeveloped districts
+and sell it for building estate,” he explained. “I have been very
+successful hitherto in finding sites for their operations. A short time
+ago, I discovered one so good that I invested all my own savings in
+buying certain lots, and have an option upon the whole. Mr. Dowling
+found it out and dismissed me.”
+
+“But it seems most unfair,” she declared.
+
+“Not at all,” he answered. “In Mr. Dowling's place I should have done
+the same thing. Every one with his way in life to make must look out for
+himself. Strictly speaking, what I did was wrong. I wish, however, that
+I had done it before. One must think of one's self first.”
+
+“And now?” she inquired. “What are you going to do now?”
+
+“I am going to find a capitalist or float a company to buy the rest of
+the site,” he announced. “After that, we must see about building. There
+is no hurry about that, though. The first thing is to secure the site.”
+
+“How much money does it require?”
+
+“About twelve thousand pounds,” he told her.
+
+“It seems very little,” she murmured.
+
+“The need for money comes afterwards,” he explained. “We want to drain
+and plan and build without mortgages. As soon as we are sure of the
+site, one can think of that. My option only extends for a week or so.”
+
+“Do you really think that it is a good speculation?” she asked.
+
+“I do not think about such matters,” he answered, drily. “I know.”
+
+She leaned back in her chair, watching him for several seconds--admiring
+him, as a matter of fact. The profound conviction of his words was
+almost inspiring. In her presence, and she knew that she was a very
+beautiful woman, he appeared, notwithstanding his absence of any
+knowledge of her sex and his lack of social status, unmoved, wholly
+undisturbed. He sat there in perfect naturalness. It did not seem to him
+even unaccountable that she should be interested in his concerns. He
+was not conceited or aggressive in any way. His complete self-confidence
+lacked any militant impulse. He was--himself, impervious to
+surroundings, however unusual.
+
+“Why should I not be your capitalist?” she inquired slowly.
+
+“Have you as much as twelve thousand pounds that you want to invest?” he
+asked, incredulously.
+
+She rose to her feet and moved across to her desk. He sat quite still,
+watching her without any apparent curiosity. She unlocked a drawer and
+returned to him with a bankbook in her hand.
+
+“Add that up,” she directed, “and tell me how much I have.”
+
+He drew a lead pencil from his pocket and quickly added up the total.
+
+“If you have not given any cheques since this was made up,” he said
+calmly, “you have a credit balance of thirteen thousand, one hundred and
+eighteen pounds, nine shillings and fourpence. It is very foolish of
+you to keep so much money on current account. You are absolutely losing
+about eight pounds a week.”
+
+She smiled.
+
+“It is foolish of me, I suppose,” she admitted, “but I have no one to
+advise me just now. My father knows no more about money than a child,
+and I have just had quite a large amount paid to me in cash. I only wish
+we could get Beatrice to share some of this, Mr. Tavernake.”
+
+He made no remark. To all appearance, he had never heard of her sister.
+She came and sat down by his side again.
+
+“Will you have me for a partner, Mr. Tavernake?” she whispered.
+
+Then, indeed, for a moment, the impassivity of his features relaxed. He
+was frankly amazed.
+
+“You cannot mean this,” he declared. “You know nothing about the
+value of the property, nothing about the affair at all. It is quite
+impossible.”
+
+“I know what you have told me,” she said. “Is not that enough? You are
+sure that it will make money and you have just told me how foolish I am
+to keep so much money in my bank. Very well, then, I give it to you to
+invest. You must pay me quite a good deal of interest.”
+
+“But you know nothing about me,” he protested, “nothing about the
+property.”
+
+“One must trust somebody,” she replied. “Why shouldn't I trust you?”
+
+He was nonplussed. This woman seemed to have an answer for everything.
+Besides, when once he had got over the unexpectedness of the thing, it
+was, of course, a wonderful stroke of fortune for him. Then came a whole
+rush of thoughts, a glow which he thrust back sternly. It would mean
+seeing her often; it would mean coming here to her rooms; it would mean,
+perhaps, that she might come to look upon him as a friend. He set his
+teeth hard. This was folly!
+
+“Have you any idea about terms?” he inquired.
+
+She laughed softly.
+
+“My dear friend,” she said, “why do you ask me such a question? You know
+quite well that I am not competent to discuss terms with you. Listen.
+You are engaged in a speculation to carry out which you want the loan of
+twelve thousand pounds. Draw up a paper in which you state what my share
+will be of the profits, what interest I shall get for my money, and give
+particulars of the property. Then I will take it to my solicitor, if you
+insist upon it, although I am willing to accept what you think is fair.”
+
+“You must take it to a solicitor, of course,” he answered, thoughtfully.
+“I may as well tell you at once, however, that he will probably advise
+you against investing it in such a way.”
+
+“That will make no difference at all,” she declared. “Solicitors hate
+all investments, I know, except their horrid mortgages. There are only
+two conditions that I shall make.”
+
+“What are they?” he asked.
+
+“The first is that you must not say a word of this to my sister.”
+
+Tavernake frowned.
+
+“That is a little difficult,” he remarked. “It happens that your sister
+knows something about the estate and my plans.”
+
+“There is no need to tell her the name of your partner,” Elizabeth said.
+“I want this to be our secret entirely, yours and mine.”
+
+Her hand fell upon his; he gripped the sides of his chair. Again he was
+conscious of this bewildering, incomprehensible sensation.
+
+“And the other condition?” he demanded, hoarsely.
+
+“That you come sometimes and tell me how things are going on.”
+
+“Come here?” he repeated.
+
+She nodded.
+
+“Please! I am very lonely. I shall look forward to your visits.”
+
+Tavernake rose slowly to his feet. He held out his hand--she knew better
+than to attempt to keep him. He made a speech which was for him gallant,
+but while he made it he looked into her eyes with a directness to which
+she was indeed unaccustomed.
+
+“I shall come,” he said. “I should have wanted to come, anyhow.”
+
+Then he turned abruptly away and left the room. It was the first speech
+of its sort which he had ever made in his life.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII. TAVERNAKE BLUNDERS
+
+
+Tavernake felt that he had indeed wandered into an alien world as he
+took his place the following evening among the little crowd of people
+who were waiting outside the stage-door of the Atlas Theatre. These were
+surroundings to which he was totally unaccustomed. Two very handsome
+motor-cars were drawn up against the curb, and behind them a string of
+electric broughams and taxicabs, proving conclusively that the young
+ladies of the Atlas Theatre were popular in other than purely theatrical
+circles.
+
+The handful of young men by whom Tavernake was surrounded were of a
+genus unknown to him. They were all dressed exactly alike, they all
+seemed to breathe the same atmosphere, to exhibit the same indifference
+towards the other loungers. One or two more privileged passed in
+through the stage-door and disappeared. Tavernake contented himself with
+standing on the edge of the curbstone, his hands thrust into the pockets
+of his dark overcoat, his bowler hat, which was not quite the correct
+shape, slightly on the back of his head; his serious, stolid face
+illuminated by the gleam from a neighboring gas lamp.
+
+Presently, people began to emerge from the door. First of all, the
+musicians and a little stream of stage hands.
+
+Then a girl's hat appeared in the doorway, and the first of the Atlas
+young ladies came out, to be claimed at once by her escort. Very soon
+afterwards, Beatrice arrived. She recognized Tavernake at once and
+crossed over to him.
+
+“Well?” she asked.
+
+“You looked very nice,” he said, slowly, as he led the way down
+the street. “Of course, I knew about your singing, but everything
+else--seemed such a surprise.”
+
+“For instance?”
+
+“Why, I mean your dancing,” he went on, “and somehow or other you looked
+different on the stage.”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“'Different' won't do for me,” she persisted. “I must have something
+more specific.”
+
+“Well, then, you looked much prettier than I thought you were,”
+ Tavernake declared, solemnly. “You looked exceedingly nice.”
+
+“You really thought so?” she asked, a little doubtfully.
+
+“I really thought so. I thought you looked much nicer than any of the
+others.”
+
+She squeezed his arm affectionately.
+
+“Dear Leonard,” she said, “it's so nice to have you think so. Do you
+know, Mr. Grier actually asked me out to supper.”
+
+“What impertinence!” Tavernake muttered.
+
+Beatrice threw her head back and laughed.
+
+“My dear brother,” she protested, “it was a tremendous compliment. You
+must remember that it was entirely through him, too, that I got the
+engagement. Four pounds a week I am going to have. Just think of it!”
+
+“Four pounds a week is all very well,” Tavernake admitted. “It seems a
+great deal of money to earn like that. But I don't think you ought to go
+out to supper with any one whom you know so slightly.”
+
+“Dear prig! You know, you are a shocking prig, Leonard.”
+
+“Am I?” he answered, without offence, and with the air of one seriously
+considering the subject.
+
+“Of course you are. How could you help it, living the sort of life
+you've led all your days? Never mind, I like you for it. I don't know
+whether I want to go out to supper with anybody--I really haven't
+decided yet--but if I did, it would certainly be better for me to go
+with Mr. Grier, because he can do me no end of good at the theatre, if
+he likes.”
+
+Tavernake was silent for several moments. He was conscious of feeling
+something which he did not altogether understand. He only knew that
+it involved a strong and unreasonable dislike to Mr. Grier. Then he
+remembered that he was her brother, that he had the right to speak with
+authority.
+
+“I hope that you will not go out to supper with any one,” he said.
+
+She began to laugh but checked herself.
+
+“Well,” she remarked, “that sounds very terrible. Shall we take a 'bus?
+To tell you the truth, I am dying of hunger. We rehearsed for two hours
+before the performance, and I ate nothing but a sandwich--I was so
+excited.”
+
+Tavernake hesitated a moment--he certainly was not himself this evening!
+
+“Would you like to have some supper at a restaurant,” he asked, “before
+we go home?”
+
+“I should love it,” she declared, taking his arm as they passed through
+a stream of people. “To tell you the truth, I was so hoping that you
+would propose it.”
+
+“I think,” Tavernake said, deliberately, “that there is a place a little
+way along here.”
+
+They pushed their way down the Strand and entered a restaurant which
+Tavernake knew only by name. A small table was found for them and
+Beatrice looked about with delight.
+
+“Isn't this jolly!” she exclaimed, taking off her gloves. “Why, there
+are five or six of the girls from the theatre here already. There are
+two, see, at the corner table, and the fair-haired girl--she is just
+behind me in the chorus.”
+
+Tavernake glanced around. The young women whom she pointed out were
+all escorted by men who were scrupulously attired in evening dress. She
+seemed to read his thoughts as she laughed at him.
+
+“You stupid boy,” she said. “You don't suppose that I want to be like
+them, do you? There are lots of things it's delightful to look on at,
+and that's all. Isn't this fish good? I love this place.”
+
+Tavernake looked around him with an interest which he took no pains
+to conceal. Certainly the little groups of people by whom they were
+surrounded on every side had the air of finding some zest in life which
+up to the present, at any rate, had escaped him. They came streaming in,
+finding friends everywhere, laughing and talking, insisting upon tables
+in impossible places, calling out greetings to acquaintances across the
+room, chaffing the maitre d'hotel who was hastening from table to table.
+The gathering babel of voices was mingled every now and then with the
+popping of corks, and behind it all were the soft strains of a very
+seductive little band, perched up in the balcony. Tavernake felt the
+color mounting into his cheeks. It was true: there was something here
+which was new to him!
+
+“Beatrice,” he asked her suddenly, “have you ever drunk champagne?”
+
+She laughed at him.
+
+“Often, my dear brother,” she answered. “Why?”
+
+“I never have,” he confessed. “We are going to have some now.”
+
+She would have checked him but he had summoned a waiter imperiously and
+given his order.
+
+“My dear Leonard,” she protested, “this is shocking extravagance.”
+
+“Is it?” he replied. “I don't care. Tell me about the theatre. Were they
+kind to you there? Will you be able to keep your place?”
+
+“The girls were all much nicer than I expected,” she told him, “and the
+musical director said that my voice was much too good for the chorus.
+Oh, I do hope that they will keep me!”
+
+“They would be idiots if they didn't,” he declared, vigorously. “You
+sing better and you dance more gracefully and to me you seemed much
+prettier than any one else there.”
+
+She laughed into his eyes.
+
+“My dear brother,” she exclaimed, “your education is progressing indeed!
+It is positively the first evening I have ever heard you attempt to make
+pretty speeches, and you are quite an adept already.”
+
+“I don't know about that,” he protested. “I suppose it never occurred
+to me before that you were good-looking,” he added, examining her
+critically, “or I dare say I should have told you so. You see, one
+doesn't notice these things in an ordinary way. Lots of other people
+must have told you so, though.”
+
+“I was never spoilt with compliments,” she said. “You see, I had a
+beautiful sister.”
+
+The words seemed to have escaped her unconsciously. Almost as they
+passed her lips, her expression changed. She shivered, as though
+reminded of something unpleasant. Tavernake, however, noticed nothing.
+For the greater part of the day he had been sedulously fighting against
+a new and unaccustomed state of mind. He had found his thoughts slipping
+away, time after time, until he had had to set his teeth and use all
+his will power to keep his attention concentrated upon his work. And now
+once more they had escaped, again he felt the strange stir in his blood.
+The slight flush on his cheek grew suddenly deeper. He looked past the
+girl opposite to him, out of the restaurant, across the street, into
+that little sitting-room in the Milan Court. It was Elizabeth who was
+there in front of him. Again he heard her voice, saw the turn of her
+head, the slow, delightful curve of the lips, the eyes that looked into
+his and spoke to him the first strange whispers of a new language. His
+heart gave a quick throb. He was for the moment transformed, a prisoner
+no longer, a different person, indeed, from the stolid, well-behaved
+young man who found himself for the first time in his life in these
+unaccustomed surroundings. Then Beatrice leaned towards him, her voice
+brought him back to the present--not, alas, the voice which at that
+moment he would have given so much to have heard.
+
+“To-night,” she murmured, “I feel as though we were at the beginning of
+new things. We must drink a toast.”
+
+Tavernake filled her glass and his own.
+
+“Luck to you in your new profession!” he said.
+
+“And here is one after your own heart, you most curious of men!” she
+exclaimed, a few seconds later. “To the undiscovered in life!”
+
+He drained his glass and set it down empty.
+
+“The undiscovered,” he muttered, looking around. “It is a very good
+toast, Beatrice. There are many things of which one might remain
+ignorant all one's life if one relied wholly upon one's own
+perceptions.”
+
+“I believe,” she agreed, “that if I had not appeared you were in great
+danger of becoming narrow.”
+
+“I am sure of it,” he answered, “but you see you came.”
+
+She was thoughtful for a moment.
+
+“This reminds me just a little of that first dreary feast of ours,” she
+said. “You knew what it was like then to feed a genuinely starving girl.
+And I was miserable, Leonard. It didn't seem to me that there was any
+other end save one.”
+
+“You've got over all that nonsense?” he asked anxiously.
+
+“Yes, I suppose so,” she answered. “You see, I've started life again and
+one gets stronger. But there are times even now,” she added, “when I am
+afraid.”
+
+The mirth had suddenly died from her face. She looked older, tired,
+and careworn. The shadows were back under her eyes; she glanced around
+almost timorously. He filled her glass.
+
+“That is foolishness,” he said. “Nothing nor anybody can harm you now.”
+
+Some note in his voice attracted her attention. Strong and square, with
+hard, forceful face, he sat wholly at his ease among these unfamiliar
+surroundings, a very tower of refuge, she felt, to the weak. His
+face was not strikingly intellectual--she was not sure now about his
+mouth--but one seemed to feel that dogged nature, the tireless pains by
+which he would pursue any aim dear to him. The shadows passed away from
+her mind. What was dead was gone! It was not reasonable that she should
+be haunted all her days by the ghosts of other people's sins. The
+atmosphere of the place, the atmosphere of the last few hours, found its
+way again into her blood. After all, she was young, the music was sweet,
+her pulses were throbbing to the tune of this new life. She drank her
+wine and laughed, her head beating time to the music.
+
+“We have been sad long enough,” she declared. “You and I, my dear
+serious brother, will embark in earnest now upon the paths of frivolity.
+Tell me, how did things go to-day?”
+
+It flashed into his mind that he had great news, but that it was not for
+her. About that matter there was still doubt in his mind, but he could
+not speak of it.
+
+“I have had an offer,” he said guardedly. “I cannot say much about it at
+present, for nothing is certain, but I am sure that I shall be able to
+raise the money somehow.”
+
+His tone was calm and confident. There was no self-assurance or bluster
+about it, and yet it was convincing. She looked at him curiously.
+
+“You are a very positive person, Leonard,” she remarked. “You must have
+great faith in yourself, I think.”
+
+He considered the question for a moment.
+
+“Perhaps I have,” he admitted. “I do not think that there is any other
+way to succeed.”
+
+The atmosphere of the place was becoming now almost languorous. The band
+had ceased to play; little parties of men and women were standing about,
+bidding one another goodnight. The lamps had been lowered, and in the
+gloom the voices and laughter seemed to have become lower and more
+insinuating; the lights in the eyes of the women, as they passed down
+the room on their way out, softer and more irresistible.
+
+“I suppose we must go,” she said reluctantly.
+
+Tavernake paid his bill and they turned into the street. She took his
+arm and they turned westward. Even out here, the atmosphere of the
+restaurant appeared to have found its way. The soberness of life, its
+harder and more practical side, was for the moment obscured. It was
+not the daytime crowd, this, whose footsteps pressed the pavements. The
+careworn faces of the money-seekers had vanished. The men and women to
+whom life was something of a struggle had sought their homes--resting,
+perhaps, before they took up their labors again. Every moment taxicabs
+and motor-cars whirled by, flashing upon the night a momentary
+impression of men in evening dress, of women in soft garments with
+jewels in their hair. The spirit of pleasure seemed to have crept into
+the atmosphere. Even the poorer people whom they passed in the street,
+were laughing or singing.
+
+Tavernake stopped short.
+
+“To-night,” he declared, “is not the night for omnibuses. We are going
+to have a taxicab. I know that you are tired.”
+
+“I should love it,” she admitted.
+
+They hailed one and drove off. Beatrice leaned back among the cushions
+and closed her eyes, her ungloved hand rested almost caressingly upon
+his. He leaned forward. There were new things in the world--he was sure
+of it now, sure though they were coming to him through the mists, coming
+to him so vaguely that even while he obeyed he did not understand.
+Her full, soft lips were slightly parted; her heavily-fringed eyelids
+closed; her deep brown hair, which had escaped bounds a little, drooping
+over her ear. His fingers suddenly clasped hers tightly.
+
+“Beatrice!” he whispered.
+
+She sat up with a start, her eyes questioning his, the breath coming
+quickly through her parted lips.
+
+“Once you asked me to kiss you, Beatrice,” he said. “To-night--I am
+going to.”
+
+She made no attempt to repulse him. He took her in his arms and
+kissed her. Even in that moment he knew that he had made a mistake.
+Nevertheless, he kissed her again and again, crushing her lips against
+his.
+
+“Please let me go, Leonard,” she begged at last.
+
+He obeyed at once. He understood quite well that some strange thing had
+happened. It seemed to him during those next few minutes that everything
+which had passed that night was a dream, that this vivid picture of a
+life more intense, making larger demands upon the senses than anything
+he had yet experienced, was a mirage, a thing which would live only
+in his memory, a life in which he could never take any part. He had
+blundered; he had come into a new world and he had blundered. A sense of
+guilt was upon him. He had a sudden wild desire to cry out that it was
+Elizabeth whom he had kissed. Beatrice was sitting upright in her place,
+her head turned a little away from him. He felt that she was expecting
+him to speak--that there were inevitable words which he should say. His
+silence was a confession. He would have lied but the seal was upon his
+lips. So the moment passed, and Tavernake had taken another step forward
+towards his destiny! ...
+
+As he helped her out of the cab, her fingers tightened for a moment upon
+his hand. She patted it gently as she passed out before him into the
+house, leaving the door open. When he had paid the cabman and followed,
+she had disappeared. He looked into the sitting-room; it was empty.
+Overhead, he could hear her footsteps as she ascended to her room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII. AN EVENING CALL
+
+
+In the morning, when he left for the city, she was not down. When he
+came home in the evening, she was gone. Without removing his hat
+or overcoat, he took the letter which he found propped up on the
+mantelpiece and addressed to him to the window and read it.
+
+DEAR BROTHER LEONARD,--It wasn't your fault and I don't think it was
+mine. If either of us is to blame, it is certainly I, for though you are
+such a clever and ambitious young person, you really know very little
+indeed of the world,--not so much, I think, as I do. I am going to stay
+for a few nights, at any rate, with one of the girls at the theatre,
+who I know wants some one to share her tiny flat with her. Afterwards, I
+shall see.
+
+Don't throw this letter in the fire and don't think me ungrateful. I
+shall never forget what you did for me. How could I?
+
+I will send you my address as soon as I am sure of it, or you can always
+write me to the theatre.
+
+                Good-bye, dear Leonard,
+                                        YOUR SISTER BEATRICE.
+
+Tavernake looked from the sheet of notepaper out across the gray square.
+He knew that he was very angry, angry though he deliberately folded
+the letter up and placed it in his pocket, angry though he took off
+his overcoat and hung it up with his usual care; but his anger was with
+himself. He had blundered badly. This episode of his life was one which
+he had better forget. It was absolutely out of harmony with all his
+ideas. He told himself that he was glad Beatrice was gone. Housekeeping
+with an imaginary sister in this practical world was an absurdity.
+Sooner or later it must have come to an end. Better now, before it had
+gone too far--better now, much better! All the same, he knew that he was
+going to be very lonely.
+
+He rang the bell for the woman who waited upon them, and whom he seldom
+saw, for Beatrice herself had supplied their immediate wants. He found
+some dinner ready, which he ate with absolute unconsciousness. Then he
+threw himself fiercely into his work. It was all very well for the first
+hour or so, but as ten o'clock grew near he began to find a curious
+difficulty in keeping his attention fixed upon those calculations. The
+matter of average rentals, percentage upon capital--things which but
+yesterday he had found fascinating--seemed suddenly irksome. He could
+fix his attention upon nothing. At last he pushed his papers away, put
+on his hat and coat, and walked into the street.
+
+At the Milan Court, the hall-porter received his inquiry for Elizabeth
+with an air of faint but well-bred surprise. Tavernake, in those days,
+was a person exceedingly difficult to place. His clothes so obviously
+denoted the station in life which he really occupied, while the slight
+imperiousness of his manner, his absolute freedom from any sort of
+nervousness or awkwardness, seemed to bespeak a consideration which
+those who had to deal with him as a stranger found sometimes a little
+puzzling.
+
+“Mrs. Wenham Gardner is in her rooms, I believe, sir,” the man said. “If
+you will wait for a moment, I will inquire.”
+
+He disappeared into his office, thrusting his head out, a moment or two
+later, with the telephone receiver still in his hand.
+
+“Mrs. Gardner would like the name again, sir, please,” he remarked.
+
+Tavernake repeated it firmly.
+
+“You might say,” he added, “that I shall not detain her for more than a
+few minutes.”
+
+The man disappeared once more. When he returned, he indicated the lift
+to Tavernake.
+
+“If you will go up to the fifth floor, sir,” he said, “Mrs. Gardner
+will see you.”
+
+Tavernake found his courage almost leaving him as he knocked at the door
+of her rooms. Her French maid ushered him into the little sitting-room,
+where, to his dismay, he found three men, one sitting on the table, the
+other two in easy-chairs. Elizabeth, in a dress of pale blue satin, was
+standing before the mirror. She turned round as Tavernake entered.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake shall decide!” she exclaimed, waving her hand to him.
+“Mr. Tavernake, there is a difference of opinion about my earrings. Major
+Post here,”--she indicated a distinguished-looking elderly gentleman,
+with carefully trimmed beard and moustache, and an eyeglass attached to
+a thin band of black ribbon--“Major Post wants me to wear turquoises. I
+prefer my pearls. Mr. Crease half agrees with me, but as he never agrees
+with any one, on principle, he hates to say so. Mr. Faulkes is wavering.
+You shall decide; you, I know, are one of those people who never waver.”
+
+“I should wear the pearls,” Tavernake said.
+
+Elizabeth made them a little courtesy.
+
+“You see, my dear friends,” she declared, “you have to come to England,
+after all, to find a man who knows his own mind and speaks it without
+fear. The pearls it shall be.”
+
+“It may be decision,” Crease drawled, speaking with a slight American
+accent, “or it may be gallantry. Mr. Tavernake knew your own choice.”
+
+“The last word, as usual,” she sighed. “Now, if you good people will
+kindly go on downstairs, I will join you in a few minutes. Mr. Tavernake
+is my man of business and I am sure he has something to say to me.”
+
+She dismissed them all pleasantly. As soon as the door was closed she
+turned to Tavernake. Her manner seemed to become a shade less gracious.
+
+“Well?”
+
+“I don't know why I came,” Tavernake confessed bluntly. “I was restless
+and I wanted to see you.”
+
+She looked at him for a moment and then she laughed. Tavernake felt a
+sense of relief; at least she was not angry.
+
+“Oh, you strangest of mortals!” she exclaimed, holding out her hands.
+“Well, you see me--in one of my most becoming gowns, too. What do you
+think of the fit?”
+
+She swept round and faced him again with an expectant look. Tavernake,
+who knew nothing of women's fashions, still realized the superbness of
+that one unbroken line.
+
+“I can't think how you can move a step in it,” he said, “but you look--”
+
+He paused. It was as though he had lost his breath. Then he set his
+teeth and finished.
+
+“You look beautiful,” he declared. “I suppose you know that. I suppose
+they've all been telling you so.”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“They haven't all your courage, dear Briton,” she remarked, “and if they
+did tell me so, I am not sure that I should be convinced. You see, most
+of my friends have lived so long and lived so quickly that they have
+learned to play with words until one never knows whether the things they
+speak come from their hearts. With you it is different.”
+
+“Yes,” Tavernake admitted, “with me it is different!”
+
+She glanced at the clock.
+
+“Well,” she said, “you have seen me and I am glad to have seen you, and
+you may kiss my fingers if you like, and then you must run away. I am
+engaged to have supper with my friends downstairs.”
+
+He raised her fingers clumsily enough to his lips and kept them there
+for a moment. When he let them go, she wrung them as though in pain,
+and looked at him. She turned abruptly away. In a sense she was
+disappointed. After all, he was an easy victim!
+
+“Elise,” she called out, “my cloak.”
+
+Her maid came hurrying from the next room. Elizabeth turned towards her,
+holding out her shoulders. She nodded to Tavernake.
+
+“You know the way down, Mr. Tavernake? I shall see you again soon,
+sha'n't I? Good-night!”
+
+She scarcely glanced at him as she sent him away, yet Tavernake walked
+on air.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV. A WARNING FROM Mr. PRITCHARD
+
+
+Tavernake hesitated for a moment under the portico of the Milan Court,
+looking out at the rain which had suddenly commenced to descend. He
+scarcely noticed that he had a companion until the man who was standing
+by his side addressed him.
+
+“Say, your name is Tavernake, isn't it?”
+
+Tavernake, who had been on the point of striding away, turned sharply
+around. The man who had spoken to him was wearing morning clothes of
+dark gray tweed and a soft Homburg hat. His complexion was a little
+sallow and he was clean-shaven except for a slight black moustache. He
+was smoking a black cigar and his accent was transatlantic. Something
+about his appearance struck Tavernake as being vaguely familiar, but he
+could not at first recall where he had seen him before.
+
+“That is my name, certainly,” Tavernake admitted.
+
+“I am going to ask you a somewhat impertinent question,” his neighbor
+remarked.
+
+“I suppose you can ask it,” Tavernake rejoined. “I am not obliged to
+answer, am I?”
+
+The man smiled.
+
+“Come,” he said, “that's honest, at any rate. Are you in a hurry for a
+few minutes?”
+
+“I am in no particular hurry,” Tavernake answered. “What do you want?”
+
+“A few nights ago,” the stranger continued, lowering his voice a little,
+“I met you with a young lady whose appearance, for some reason which
+we needn't go into, interested me. To-night I happened to overhear you
+inquiring, only a few minutes ago, for the sister of the same young
+lady.”
+
+“What you heard doesn't concern me in the least,” Tavernake retorted. “I
+should say that you had no business to listen.”
+
+His companion smiled.
+
+“Well,” he declared, “I have always heard a good deal about British
+frankness, and it seems to me that I'm getting some. Anyway, I'll
+tell you where I come in. I am interested in Mrs. Wenham Gardner. I am
+interested, also, in her sister, whom I think you know--Miss Beatrice
+Franklin, not Miss Tavernake!”
+
+Tavernake made no immediate reply. The man was an American, without a
+doubt. Perhaps he knew something of Beatrice. Perhaps this was one
+of the friends of that former life concerning which she had told him
+nothing.
+
+“You are not, by any chance, proposing,” Tavernake said at last, “to
+discuss either of these ladies with me? I do not know you or what your
+business may be. In any case, I am going now.”
+
+The other laid his hand on Tavernake's shoulder.
+
+“You'll be soaked to the skin,” he protested. “I want you to come into
+the smoking-room here with me for a few minutes. We will have a drink
+together and a little conversation, if you don't mind.”
+
+“But I do mind,” Tavernake declared. “I don't know who you are and I
+don't want to know you, and I am not going to talk about Mrs. Gardner,
+or any other lady of my acquaintance, with strangers. Good-night!”
+
+“One moment, please, Mr. Tavernake.”
+
+Tavernake hesitated. There was something curiously compelling in the
+other's smooth, distinct voice.
+
+“I'd like you to take this card,” he said. “I told you my name before
+but I expect you've forgotten it,--Pritchard--Sam Pritchard. Ever heard
+of me before?”
+
+“Never!”
+
+“Not to have heard of me in the United States,” the other continued,
+with a grim smile, “would be a tribute to your respectability. Most of
+the crooks who find their way over here know of Sam Pritchard. I am a
+detective and I come from New York.”
+
+Tavernake turned and looked the man over. There was something convincing
+about his tone and appearance. It did not occur to him to doubt for a
+moment a word of this stranger's story.
+
+“You haven't anything against her--against either of them?” he asked,
+quickly.
+
+“Nothing directly,” the detective answered. “All the same, you have been
+calling upon Mrs. Wenham Gardner this evening, and if you are a friend
+of hers I think that you had better come along with me and have that
+talk.”
+
+“I will come,” Tavernake agreed, “but I come as a listener. Remember
+that I have nothing to tell you. So far as you are concerned, I do not
+know either of those ladies.”
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+“Well,” he said, “I guess we'll let it go at that. All the same, if you
+don't mind, we'll talk. Come this way and we'll get to the smoking-room
+through the hotel. It's under cover.”
+
+Tavernake moved restlessly in his chair.
+
+“What the devil is all this talk about crooks!” he exclaimed
+impatiently. “I didn't come here to listen to this sort of thing. I am
+not sure that I believe a word of what you say.”
+
+“Why should you,” Pritchard remarked, “without proof? Look here.”
+
+He drew a leather case from his pocket and spread it out. There were a
+dozen photographs there of men in prison attire. The detective pointed
+to one, and with a little shiver Tavernake recognized the face of the
+man who had been sitting at the right hand of Elizabeth.
+
+“You don't mean to say,” he faltered, “that Mrs. Gardner--”
+
+The detective folded up his case and replaced it in his pocket.
+
+“No,” he said, “we haven't any photographs of your lady friend there,
+nor of her sister. And yet, it may not be so far off.”
+
+“If you are trying to fasten anything upon those ladies,--” Tavernake
+began, threateningly.
+
+The detective laughed and patted him on the shoulder.
+
+“It isn't my business to try and fasten things upon any one,” he
+interrupted. “At the same time, you seem to be a friend of Mrs. Wenham
+Gardner, and it is just as well that some one should warn her.”
+
+“Warn her of what?” Tavernake asked.
+
+The detective looked at his cigar meditatively.
+
+“Make her understand that there is trouble ahead,” he replied.
+
+Tavernake sipped his whiskey and soda and lit a cigarette. Then he
+turned in his chair and looked thoughtfully at his companion. Pritchard
+was a striking-looking man, with hard, clean-cut features--a man of
+determination.
+
+“Mr. Pritchard, I am a clerk in an estate office. My people were
+work-people and I am trying to better myself in the world. I haven't
+learned how to beat about a subject, but I have learned a little of the
+world, and I know that people such as you are not in the habit of doing
+things without a reason. Why the devil have you brought me in here to
+talk about Mrs. Gardner and her sister? If you've anything to say, why
+don't you go to Mrs. Gardner herself and say it? Why do you come and
+talk to strangers about their affairs? I am here listening to you, but I
+tell you straight I don't like it.”
+
+Pritchard nodded.
+
+“Say, I am not sure that I don't like that sort of talk,” he declared.
+“I know all about you, young man. You're in Dowling & Spence's office
+and you've got to quit. You've got an estate you want financing.
+Miss Beatrice Franklin was living under your roof--as your sister, I
+understand--until yesterday, and Mrs. Gardner, for some reason of her
+own, seems to be doing her best to add you to the list of her admirers.
+I am not sure what it all means but I could make a pretty good guess.
+Here's my point, though. You're right. I didn't bring you here for your
+health. I brought you here because you can do me a service and yourself
+one at the same time, and you'll be doing no one any harm, nobody you
+care about, anyway. I have no grudge against Miss Beatrice. I'd just as
+soon she kept out of the trouble that's coming.”
+
+“What is this service?” Tavernake asked.
+
+Pritchard for the moment evaded the point.
+
+“I dare say you can understand, Mr. Tavernake,” he said, “that in my
+profession one has to sometimes go a long way round to get a man or a
+woman just where you want them. Now we merely glanced at that table as
+we came in, and I can tell you this for gospel truth--there isn't one
+of that crowd that I couldn't, if I liked, haul back to New York on some
+charge or another. You wonder why I don't do it. I'll tell you. It's
+because I am waiting--waiting until I can bring home something more
+serious, something that will keep them out of the way for just as long
+as possible. Do you follow me, Mr. Tavernake?”
+
+“I suppose I do,” Tavernake answered, doubtfully. “You are only talking
+of the men, of course?”
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+“My young friend,” he agreed, “I am only talking of the men. At the same
+time, I guess I'm not betraying any confidence, or telling you anything
+that Mrs. Wenham Gardner doesn't know herself, when I say that she's
+doing her best to qualify for a similar position.”
+
+“You mean that she is doing something against the law!” Tavernake
+exclaimed, indignantly. “I don't believe it for a moment. If she is
+associating with these people, it's because she doesn't know who they
+are.”
+
+Pritchard flicked the ash from his cigar.
+
+“Well,” he said, “every man has a right to his own opinions, and for my
+part I like to hear any one stick up for his friends. It makes no odds
+to me. However, here are a few facts I am going to bring before you.
+Four months ago, one of the turns at a vaudeville show down Broadway
+consisted of a performance by a Professor Franklin and his two
+daughters, Elizabeth and Beatrice. The professor hypnotized, told
+fortunes, felt heads, and the usual rigmarole. Beatrice sang, Elizabeth
+danced. People came to see the show, not because it was any good but
+because the girls, even in New York, were beautiful.”
+
+“A music-hall in New York!” Tavernake muttered.
+
+The detective nodded.
+
+“Among the young bloods of the city,” he continued, “were two brothers,
+as much alike as twins, although they aren't twins, whose names were
+Wenham and Jerry Gardner. There's nothing in fast life which those
+young men haven't tried. Between them, I should say they represented
+everything that was known of debauchery and dissipation. The eldest
+can't be more than twenty-seven to-day, but if you were to see them
+in the morning, either of them, before they had been massaged and
+galvanized into life, you'd think they were little old men, with just
+strength enough left to crawl about. Well, to cut a long story short,
+both of them fell in love with Elizabeth.”
+
+“Brutes!” Tavernake interjected.
+
+“I guess they found Miss Elizabeth a pretty tough nut to crack,” the
+detective went on. “Anyhow, you know what her price was from her name,
+which is hers right enough. Wenham, who was a year younger than his
+brother, was the first to bid it. Three months ago, Mr. and Mrs. Wenham
+Gardner, Miss Beatrice, and the devoted father left New York in the
+Lusitania and came to London.”
+
+“Where is this Wenham Gardner, then?” Tavernake demanded.
+
+Pritchard took his cigar case from his pocket and selected another
+cigar.
+
+“Say, that's where you strike the nail right on the head,” he remarked.
+“Where is this Wenham Gardner?”
+
+“I don't mind telling you, Mr. Tavernake, that to discover his
+whereabouts is exactly what I am over on this side for. I have a
+commission from the family to find out, and a blank cheque to do it
+with.”
+
+“Do you mean that he has disappeared, then?” asked Tavernake.
+
+“Off the face of the earth, sir,” Pritchard replied. “Something like two
+months ago, the young married couple, with Miss Beatrice, started for
+a holiday tour somewhere down in the west of England. A few days after
+they started, Miss Beatrice comes back to London alone. She goes to
+a boarding-house, is practically penniless, but she has shaken her
+sister--has, I believe, never spoken with her since. A little later,
+Elizabeth alone turns up in London. She has plenty of money, more
+money than she has ever had the control of before in her life, but no
+husband.”
+
+“So far, I don't see anything remarkable about that,” Tavernake
+interposed.
+
+“That may or may not be,” Pritchard answered, drily. “This creature,
+Wenham Gardner--I hate to call him a man--was her abject slave--up till
+the time they reached London, at any rate. He would never have quit of
+his own accord. He stopped quite suddenly communicating with all his
+friends. None of their cables, even, were answered.”
+
+“Why don't you go and ask Mrs. Gardner where he is?” Tavernake demanded
+bluntly.
+
+“I have already,” Pritchard declared, “taken that liberty. With tears
+in her eyes, she assured me that after some slight quarrel, in which
+she admits that she was the one to blame, her husband walked out of the
+house where they were staying, and she has not seen him since. She was
+quite ready with all the particulars, and even implored me to help find
+him.”
+
+“I cannot imagine,” Tavernake said, “why any one should disbelieve her.”
+
+The detective smiled.
+
+“There are a few little outside circumstances,” he remarked, looking at
+the ash of his cigar. “In the first place, how do you suppose that this
+young Wenham Gardner spent the last week of his stay in New York?”
+
+“How should I know?” Tavernake replied, impatiently.
+
+“By realizing every cent of his property on which he could lay his
+hands,” the detective continued. “It isn't at any time an easy business,
+and the Gardner interest is spread out in many directions, but he must
+have sailed with something like forty thousand pounds in hard cash.
+A suspicious person might presume that that forty thousand pounds has
+found its way to the stronger of the combination.”
+
+“Anything else?” Tavernake asked.
+
+“I won't worry you much more,” the detective answered. “There are a few
+other circumstances which seem to need explanation, but they can wait.
+There is one serious one, however, and that is where you come in.”
+
+“Indeed!” Tavernake remarked. “I was hoping you would come to that
+soon.”
+
+“The two sisters, Beatrice and Elizabeth, have been together ever
+since we can learn anything of their history. Those people who don't
+understand the disappearance of Wenham Gardner would like to know why
+they quarreled and parted, why Beatrice is keeping away from her sister
+in this strange manner. I personally, too, should like to know from Miss
+Beatrice when she last saw Wenham Gardner alive.”
+
+“You want me to ask Miss Beatrice these things?” Tavernake demanded.
+
+“It might come better from you,” Pritchard admitted. “I have written her
+to the theatre but naturally she has not replied.”
+
+Tavernake looked curiously at his companion.
+
+“Do you really suppose,” he asked, “that, even granted there were any
+unusual circumstances in connection with that quarrel--do you seriously
+suppose that Beatrice would give her sister away?”
+
+The detective sighed.
+
+“No doubt, Mr. Tavernake,” he said, “these young ladies are friends of
+yours, and perhaps for that reason you are a little prejudiced in their
+favor. Their whole bringing-up and associations, however, have certainly
+not been of a strict order. I cannot help thinking that persuasion might
+be brought to bear upon Miss Beatrice, that it might be pointed out to
+her that a true story is the safest.”
+
+“Well, if you've finished,” Tavernake declared, “I'd like to tell you
+what I think of your story. I think it's all d--d silly nonsense! This
+Wenham Gardner, by your own saying, was half mad. There was a quarrel
+and he's gone off to Paris or somewhere. As to your suggestions about
+Mrs. Gardner, I think they're infamous.”
+
+Pritchard was unmoved by his companion's warmth.
+
+“Why, that's all right, Mr. Tavernake,” he affirmed. “I can quite
+understand your feeling like that just at first. You see, I've been
+among crime and criminals all my days, and I learn to look for a certain
+set of motives when a thing of this sort happens. You've been brought
+up among honest folk, who go the straightforward way about life, and
+naturally you look at the same matter from a different point of view.
+But you and I have got to talk this out. I want you to understand that
+those very charming young ladies are not quite the class of young women
+whom you know anything about. Mind you, I haven't a word to say against
+Miss Beatrice. I dare say she's as straight as they make 'em. But--you
+must take another whiskey and soda, Mr. Tavernake. Now, I insist upon
+it. Tim, come right over here.”
+
+Mr. Pritchard seemed to have forgotten what he was talking about. The
+room had been suddenly invaded. The whole of the little supper party,
+whose individual members he had pointed out to his companion, came
+trooping into the room. They were all apparently on the best of terms
+with themselves, and they all seemed to make a point of absolutely
+ignoring Pritchard's presence. Elizabeth was the one exception. She was
+carrying a tiny Chinese spaniel under one arm; with the fingers of her
+other hand she held a tortoise-shell mounted monocle to her eye, and
+stared directly at the two men. Presently she came languidly across the
+room to them.
+
+“Dear me,” she said, “I had no idea that even your wide circle of
+acquaintances, Mr. Pritchard, included my friend, Mr. Tavernake.”
+
+The two men rose to their feet. Tavernake felt confused and angry. It
+was as though he had been playing the traitor in listening, even for a
+moment, to these stories.
+
+“Mr. Pritchard introduced himself to me only a few minutes ago,” he
+declared. “He brought me in here and I have been listening to a lot of
+rubbish from him of which I don't believe a single word.”
+
+She flashed a wonderful smile upon him.
+
+“Mr. Pritchard is so very censorious,” she murmured. “He takes such a
+very low view of human nature. After all, though, I suppose we must not
+blame him. I think that as men and women we do not exist to him. We are
+simply the pegs by means of which he can climb a little higher in the
+esteem of his employers.”
+
+Pritchard took up his soft hat and stick.
+
+“Mrs. Gardner,” he said, “I will confess that I have been wasting my
+time with this young man. You are a trifle severe upon me. You may find,
+and before long, that I am your best friend.”
+
+She laughed delightfully.
+
+“Dear Mr. Pritchard,” she exclaimed, “it is a strange thought, that! If
+only I dared hope that some day it might come true!”
+
+“More unlikely things, madam, are happening every hour,” the detective
+remarked. “The world--our little corner of it, at any rate--is full
+of anomalies. There might even come a time to any one of us three when
+liberty was more dangerous than the prison cell itself.”
+
+He nodded carelessly to Tavernake, and with a bow to Elizabeth turned
+and left the room. Elizabeth remained as though turned to stone, looking
+after him as he descended the stairs.
+
+“The man is a fool!” Tavernake cried, roughly.
+
+Elizabeth shook her head and sighed.
+
+“He is something far more ineffective,” she said. “He is just a little
+too clever.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER, XV. GENERAL DISCONTENT
+
+
+Elizabeth did not at once rejoin her friends. Instead, she sank on to
+the low settee close to where she had been standing, and drew Tavernake
+down to her side. She waved her hand across at the others, who were
+calling for her.
+
+“In a moment, dear people,” she said.
+
+Then she leaned back among the cushions and laughed at her companion.
+
+“Tell me, Mr. Tavernake,” she asked, “don't you feel that you have
+stepped into a sort of modern Arabian Nights?”
+
+“Why?”
+
+“Oh, I know Mr. Pritchard's weakness,” she continued. “He loves to throw
+a glamour around everything he says or does. Because he honors me by
+interesting himself in my concerns, he has probably told you all sorts
+of wonderful things about me and my friends. A very ingenious romancer,
+Mr. Pritchard, you know. Confess, now, didn't he tell you some stories
+about us?”
+
+She might have spared herself the trouble of beating about the bush.
+There was no hesitation about Tavernake.
+
+“He said that your friends were every one of them criminals,” Tavernake
+declared, “and he admitted that he was working hard at the present
+moment to discover that you were one, too.”
+
+She laughed softly but heartily.
+
+“I wonder what was his object,” she remarked, “in taking you into his
+confidence.”
+
+“He happened to know,” Tavernake explained, “that I was intimate with
+your sister. He wanted me to ask Beatrice a certain question.”
+
+Elizabeth laughed no more. She looked steadfastly into his eyes.
+
+“And that question?”
+
+“He wanted me to ask Beatrice why she left you and hid herself in
+London.”
+
+She tried to smile but not very successfully.
+
+“According to his story,” Tavernake continued, “you and Beatrice and
+your husband were away together somewhere in the country. Something
+happened there, something which resulted in the disappearance of your
+husband. Beatrice came back alone and has not been near you since. Soon
+afterwards, you, too, came back alone. Mr. Gardner has not been seen or
+heard of.”
+
+Elizabeth was bending over her dog, but even Tavernake, unobservant
+though he was, could see that she was shaken.
+
+“Pritchard is a clever man, generally,” she remarked, “diabolically
+clever. Why has he told you all this, I wonder? He must have known that
+you would probably repeat it to me. Why does he want to show me his
+hand?”
+
+“I have no idea,” Tavernake replied. “These matters are all beyond
+me. They do not concern me in any way. I am not keeping you from your
+friends? Please send me away when you like.”
+
+“Don't go just yet,” she begged. “Sit with me for a moment. Can't you
+see,” she added, whispering, “that I have had a shock? Sit with me. I
+can't go back to those others just yet.”
+
+Tavernake did as he was bidden. The woman at his side was still
+caressing the little animal she carried. Watching her, however,
+Tavernake could see that her bosom was rising and falling quickly. There
+was an unnatural pallor in her cheeks, a terrified gleam in her eyes.
+Nevertheless, these things passed. In a very few seconds she was herself
+again.
+
+“Come,” she said, “it is not often that I give way. The only time I am
+ever afraid is when there is something which I do not understand. I do
+not understand Mr. Pritchard to-night. I know that he is my enemy. I
+cannot imagine why he should talk to you. He must have known that you
+would repeat all he said. It is not like him. Tell me, Mr. Tavernake,
+you have heard all sorts of things about me. Do you believe them? Do
+you believe--it's rather a horrible thing to ask, isn't it?” she went on
+hurriedly,--“do you believe that I made away with my husband?”
+
+“You surely do not need to ask me that question,” Tavernake answered,
+fervently. “I should believe your word, whatever you told me. I should
+not believe that you could do anything wrong.”
+
+Her hand touched his for a moment and he was repaid.
+
+“Don't think too well of me,” she begged. “I don't want to disappoint
+you.”
+
+Some one pushed open the swing doors and she started nervously. It was
+only a waiter who passed through into the bar.
+
+“What I think of you,” Tavernake said slowly, “nothing could alter, but
+because I am stupid, I suppose, there is quite a good deal that I cannot
+understand. I cannot understand, for instance, why they should suspect
+you of having anything to do with your husband's disappearance. You can
+prove where you were when he left you?”
+
+“Quite easily,” she answered, “only, unfortunately, no one seems to
+have seen him go. He timed his departure so cunningly that he apparently
+vanished into thin air. Even then,” she continued, “but for one thing
+I don't suppose that any one would have had suspicions. I dare say Mr.
+Pritchard told you that before we left New York my husband sold out some
+of his property and brought it over to Europe with him in cash. We had
+both determined that we would live abroad and have nothing more to do
+with America. It was not I who persuaded him to do this. It made no
+difference to me. If he had run away and left me, the courts would have
+given me money. If he had died and I had been a widow, he would have
+left me his property. But simply because there was all this money in
+our hands, and because he disappeared, his people and this man Pritchard
+suspect me.”
+
+“It is wicked,” he muttered.
+
+She turned slowly towards him.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake,” she said, “do you know that you can help me very much
+indeed?”
+
+“I only wish I could,” he replied. “Try me.”
+
+“Can't you see,” she went on, “that the great thing against me is that
+Beatrice left me suddenly when we were on that wretched expedition, and
+came back alone? She is in London, I know, quite close to me, and still
+she hides. Pritchard asks himself why. Mr. Tavernake, go and tell her
+what people are saying, go and tell her everything that has happened,
+let her understand that her keeping away is doing me a terrible injury,
+beg her to come and let people see that we are reconciled, and warn her,
+too, against Pritchard. Will you do this for me?”
+
+“Of course I will,” Tavernake answered. “I will see her to-morrow.”
+
+Elizabeth drew a little sigh of relief.
+
+“And you'll let me know what she says?” she asked, rising.
+
+“I shall be only too glad to,” Tavernake assured her.
+
+“Good-night!”
+
+She looked up into his face with a smile which had turned the heads of
+hardened stagers in New York. No wonder that Tavernake felt his heart
+beat against his ribs! He took her hands and held them for a moment.
+Then he turned abruptly away.
+
+“Good-night!” he said.
+
+He disappeared through the swing doors. She strolled across the room to
+where her friends were sitting in a circle, laughing and talking. Her
+father, who had just come in and joined them, gripped her by the arm as
+she sat down.
+
+“What does it mean?” he demanded, with shaking voice. “Did you see
+that he was there with Pritchard--your young man--that wretched estate
+agent's clerk? I tell you that Pritchard was pumping him for all he was
+worth.”
+
+“My dear father,” she whispered, coldly, “don't be melodramatic. You
+give yourself away the whole time. Go to bed if you can't behave like a
+man.”
+
+The lights had been turned low, there was no one else in the room. The
+little old gentleman with the eyeglass leaned forward.
+
+“Have you any notion, my dear Elizabeth,” he asked, “why our friend
+Pritchard is so much in evidence just at present?”
+
+“Not on account of you, Jimmy,” she answered, “nor of any one else here,
+in fact. The truth is he has conceived a violent admiration for me--an
+admiration so pronounced, indeed, that he hates to let me out of his
+sight.”
+
+They all laughed uproariously. Then Walter Crease, the journalist,
+leaned forward,--a man with a long, narrow face, yellow-stained fingers,
+and hollow cheekbones. He glanced around the room before he spoke, and
+his voice sounded like a hoarse whisper.
+
+“See here,” he said, “seems to me Pritchard is getting mighty awkward.
+He hasn't got his posse around him in this country, anyway.”
+
+There was a dead silence for several seconds. Then the little old
+gentleman nodded solemnly.
+
+“I am a trifle tired of Pritchard myself,” he admitted, “and he
+certainly knows too much. He carries too much in his head to go around
+safely.”
+
+The eyes of Elizabeth were bright.
+
+“He treats us like children,” she declared. “To-night he has told the
+whole of my affairs to a perfect stranger. It is intolerable!”
+
+The little party broke up soon after. Only Walter Crease and the
+man called Jimmy Post were left talking, and they retired into the
+window-seat, whispering together.
+
+Tavernake, with his hands thrust deep in his overcoat pockets, left the
+hotel and strode along the Strand. Some fancy seized him before he had
+gone many paces, and turning abruptly to the left he descended to the
+Embankment. He made his way to the very seat upon which he had sat once
+before with Beatrice. With folded arms he leaned back in the corner,
+looking out across the river, at the curving line of lights, at the
+black, turgid waters, the slowly-moving hulk of a barge on its way down
+the stream. It was a new thing, this, for him to have to accuse himself
+of folly, of weakness. For the last few days he had moved in a mist of
+uncertainty, setting his heel upon all reflection, avoiding every issue.
+To-night he could escape those accusing thoughts no longer; to-night he
+was more than ever bitter with himself. What folly was this which had
+sprung up in his life--folly colossal, unimaginable, as unexpected as
+though it had fallen a thunderbolt from the skies! What had happened to
+change him so completely!
+
+His thought traveled back to the boarding-house. It was there that the
+thing had begun. Before that night upon the roof, the finger-posts which
+he had set up with such care and deliberation along the road which led
+towards his coveted goal, had seemed to him to point with unfaltering
+directness towards everything in life worthy of consideration. To-night
+they were only dreary phantasms, marking time across a miserable plain.
+Perhaps, after all, there had been something in his nature, some rebel
+thing, intolerable yet to be reckoned with, which had been first born of
+that fateful curiosity of his. It had leapt up so suddenly, sprung with
+such scanty notice into strenuous and insistent life. Yet what place had
+it there? He must fight against it, root it out with both hands. What
+was this world of intrigue, this criminal, undesirable world, to him?
+His common sense forbade him altogether to dissociate Elizabeth from her
+friends, from her surroundings. She was the secret of the pain which was
+tearing at his heartstrings, of all the excitement, the joy, the passion
+which had swept like a full flood across the level way of his life,
+which had set him drifting among the unknown seas. Yet it was Beatrice
+who had brought this upon him. If she had never left, if he had not
+tasted the horrors of this new loneliness, he might have been able to
+struggle on. He missed her, missed her diabolically. The other things,
+marvelous though they were, had been more or less like a mirage.
+This world of new emotions had spread like a silken mesh over all his
+thoughts, over all his desires. Beatrice had been a tangible person,
+restful, delightful, a real companion, his one resource against this
+madness. And now she was gone, and he was powerless to get her back.
+He turned his head, he looked up the road along which he had torn that
+night with his arms around her. She owed him her life and she had gone!
+With all a man's inconsequence, it seemed to him as he rose heavily to
+his feet and started homeward, that she had repaid him with a certain
+amount of ingratitude, that she had left him at the one moment in his
+life when he needed her most.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI. AN OFFER OF MARRIAGE
+
+
+The next afternoon, at half-past four, Tavernake was having tea with
+Beatrice in the tiny flat which she was sharing with another girl, off
+Kingsway. She opened the door to him herself, and though she chattered
+ceaselessly, it seemed to him that she was by no means at her ease. She
+installed him in the only available chair, an absurd little wicker thing
+many sizes too small for him, and seated herself upon the hearth-rug a
+few feet away.
+
+“You have soon managed to find me out, Leonard,” she remarked.
+
+“Yes,” he answered. “I had to go to the stage doorkeeper for your
+address.”
+
+“He hadn't the slightest right to give it you,” she declared.
+
+Tavernake shrugged his shoulders.
+
+“I had to have it,” he said simply.
+
+“The power of the purse again!” she laughed. “Now that you are here, I
+don't believe that you are a bit glad to see me. Are you?”
+
+He did not answer for a moment. He was thinking of that vigil upon
+the Embankment, of the long walk home, of the battle with himself, the
+continual striving to tear from his heart this new thing, for which,
+with a curious and most masculine inconsistency, he persisted in holding
+her responsible.
+
+“You know, Leonard,” she continued, getting up abruptly and beginning to
+make the tea, “I believe that you are angry with me. If you are, all I
+can say is that you are a very foolish person. I had to come away. Can't
+you see that?”
+
+“I cannot,” he answered stolidly.
+
+She sighed.
+
+“You are not a reasonable person,” she declared. “I suppose it is
+because you have led such a queer life, and had no womenfolk to look
+after you. You don't understand. It was absurd, in a way, that I should
+ever have called myself your sister, that we should even have attempted
+such a ridiculous experiment. But after--after the other night--”
+
+“Can't we forget that?” he interrupted.
+
+She raised her eyes and looked at him.
+
+“Can you?” she asked.
+
+There was a curious, almost a pleading earnestness in her tone. Her eyes
+had something new to say, something which, though it failed to stir his
+blood, made him vaguely uncomfortable. Nevertheless, he answered her
+without hesitation.
+
+“Yes,” he replied, “I could forget it. I will promise to forget it.”
+
+It was unaccountable, but he almost fancied that he saw this new thing
+pass from her face, leaving her pale and tremulous. She looked away
+again and busied herself with the tea-caddy, but the fingers which held
+the spoon were shaking a little.
+
+“Oh, I suppose I could forget,” she said, “but it would be very
+difficult for either of us to behave as though it had never happened.
+Besides, it really was an impossible situation, you know,” she went on,
+looking down into the tea-caddy. “It is much better for me to be here
+with Annie. You can come and see me now and then and we can still be
+very good friends.”
+
+Tavernake was annoyed. He said nothing, and Beatrice, glancing up,
+laughed at his gloomy expression.
+
+“You certainly are,” she declared, “the most impossible, the most
+primitive person I ever met. London isn't Arcadia, you know, and you are
+not my brother. Besides, you were such an autocrat. You didn't even like
+my going out to supper with Mr. Grier.”
+
+“I hate the fellow!” Tavernake admitted. “Are you seeing much of him?”
+
+“He took us all out to supper last night,” she replied. “I thought it
+was very kind of him to ask me.”
+
+“Kind, indeed! Does he want to marry you?” Tavernake demanded.
+
+She set down the teapot and again she laughed softly. In her plain black
+gown, very simple, adorned only by the little white bow at her neck,
+quakerlike and spotless, with the added color in her cheeks, too, which
+seemed to have come there during the last few moments, she was a very
+alluring person.
+
+“He can't,” she declared. “He is married already.”
+
+Then there came to Tavernake an inspiration, an inspiration so wonderful
+that he gripped the sides of his chair and sat up. Here, after all, was
+the way out for him, the way out from his garden of madness, the way to
+escape from that mysterious, paralyzing yoke whose burden was already
+heavy upon his shoulders. In that swift, vivid moment he saw something
+of the truth. He saw himself losing all his virility, the tool and
+plaything of this woman who had bewitched him, a poor, fond creature
+living only for the kind words and glances she might throw him at her
+pleasure. In those few seconds he knew the true from the false.
+Without hesitation, he gripped with all the colossal selfishness of his
+unthinking sex at the rope which was thrown to him.
+
+“Well, then, I do,” he said firmly. “Will you marry me, Beatrice?”
+
+She threw her head back and laughed, laughed long and softly, and
+Tavernake, simple and unversed in the ways of women, believed that she
+was indeed amused.
+
+“Neither you nor any one else, dear Leonard!” she exclaimed.
+
+“But I want you to,” he persisted. “I think that you will.”
+
+There was coquetry now in the tantalizing look she flashed him.
+
+“Am I, too, then, one of these things to be attained in your life?” she
+asked. “Dear Leonard, you mustn't say it like that. I don't like the
+look of your jaw. It frightens me.”
+
+“There is nothing to be afraid of in marrying me,” he answered. “I
+should make you a very good husband. Some day you would be rich, very
+rich indeed. I am quite sure that I shall succeed, if not at once,
+very soon. There is plenty of money to be made in the world if one
+perseveres.”
+
+She had the air of trying to take him seriously.
+
+“You sound quite convincing,” she admitted, “but I do wish that you
+would put all these thoughts out of your mind, Leonard. It doesn't sound
+like you in the least. Remember what you told me that first night; you
+assured me that women had not the slightest part in your life.”
+
+“I have changed,” he confessed. “I did not expect anything of the sort
+to happen, but it has. It would be foolish of me to deny it. I have been
+all my life learning, Beatrice,” he continued, with a sudden curious
+softness in his tone, “and yet, somehow or other, it seems to me that I
+never knew anything at all until lately. There was no one to direct me,
+no one to show me just what is worth while in life. You have taught me a
+great deal, you have taught me how little I know. And there are things,”
+ he went on, solemnly, “of which I am afraid, things which I do not begin
+even to understand. Can't you see how it is with me? I am really very
+ignorant. I want some one who understands; I want you, Beatrice, very
+badly.”
+
+She patted the back of his hand caressingly.
+
+“You mustn't talk like that, Leonard,” she said. “I shouldn't make you a
+good wife. I am not going to marry any one.”
+
+“And why?” he asked.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“That is my secret,” she told him, looking into the fire.
+
+“You mean to say that, you will never marry?” he persisted.
+
+“Oh, I suppose I shall change, like other women,” she answered. “Just at
+present, I feel like that.”
+
+“Is it because your sister's marriage--”
+
+She caught hold of both his hands; her eyes were suddenly full of
+terror.
+
+“You mustn't talk about Elizabeth,” she begged, “you please mustn't talk
+about her. Promise that you won't.”
+
+“But I came here to talk about her,” he replied.
+
+Beatrice, for a moment, said nothing. Then she threw down his hands and
+laughed once more. As she flung herself back in her place, it seemed to
+Tavernake that he saw once more the girl who had stood upon the roof of
+the boarding-house.
+
+“You came to talk about Elizabeth!” she exclaimed. “I forgot. Well, go
+on, what is it?”
+
+“Your sister is in trouble!”
+
+“Are you her confidant?” Beatrice asked.
+
+“I am not exactly that,” he admitted, “but she has asked me to come and
+see you.”
+
+Beatrice had suddenly grown hard, her lips were set together, even her
+attitude was uncompromising.
+
+“Say exactly what you have to say,” she told him. “I will not
+interrupt.”
+
+“It sounds foolish,” Tavernake declared, “because I know so little, but
+it seems that your sister is being annoyed by a man named Pritchard, an
+American detective. She tells me that he suspects her of being concerned
+in some way with the disappearance of her husband. One of his reasons is
+that you left her abruptly and went into hiding, that you will not see
+or speak to her. She wishes you to be reconciled.”
+
+“Is that all?” Beatrice asked.
+
+“It is all,” he replied, “so long as you understand its significance.
+If you go to see your sister, or let her come to see you, this man
+Pritchard will have one of his causes for suspicion removed.”
+
+“So you came as Elizabeth's ambassador,” Beatrice said, half as though
+to herself. “Well, here is my answer. I will not go to Elizabeth. If she
+finds out my whereabouts and comes here, then I shall go away again and
+hide. I shall never willingly exchange another word with her as long as
+I live.”
+
+Tavernake looked at her doubtfully.
+
+“But she is your sister!” he explained.
+
+“She is my sister,” Beatrice repeated, “and yet what I have said to you
+I mean.”
+
+There was a short silence. Tavernake felt unaccountably ill at ease.
+Something had sprung up between them which he did not understand. He was
+swift to recognize, however, the note of absolute finality in her tone.
+
+“I have given my message,” he declared. “I shall tell her what you say.
+Perhaps I had better go now.”
+
+He half rose to his feet. Suddenly she lost control of herself.
+
+“Leonard, Leonard,” she cried, “don't you see that you are being very
+foolish indeed? You have been good to me. Let me try and repay it a
+little. Elizabeth is my sister, but listen! What I say to you now I say
+in deadly earnest. Elizabeth has no heart, she has no thought for other
+people, she makes use of them and they count for no more to her than
+the figures that pass through one's dreams. She has some sort of hateful
+gift,” Beatrice continued, and her voice shook and her eyes flashed,
+“some hateful gift of attracting people to her and making them do her
+bidding, of spoiling their lives and throwing them away when they have
+ceased to be useful. Leonard, you must not let her do this with you.”
+
+He rose to his feet awkwardly. Very likely it was all true, and yet,
+what difference did it make?
+
+“Thank you,” he said.
+
+They stood, for a moment, hand in hand. Then they heard the sound of a
+key in the lock.
+
+“Here's Annie coming back!” Beatrice exclaimed.
+
+Tavernake was introduced to Miss Annie Legarde, who thought he was a
+very strange person indeed because he did not fit in with any of the
+types of men, young or old, of whom she knew anything. And as for
+Tavernake, he considered that Miss Annie Legarde would have looked at
+least as well in a hat half the size, and much better without the
+powder upon her face. Her clothes were obviously more expensive than
+Beatrice's, but they were put on with less care and taste.
+
+Beatrice came out on to the landing with him.
+
+“So you won't marry me, Beatrice?” he said, as she held out her hand.
+
+She looked at him for a moment and then turned away with a faint sob,
+without even a word of farewell. He watched her disappear and heard
+the door shut. Slowly he began to descend the stone steps. There was
+something to him a little fateful about the closed door above, the long
+yet easy descent into the street.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII. THE BALCONY AT IMANO'S
+
+
+At six o'clock that evening, Tavernake rang up the Milan Court and
+inquired for Elizabeth. There was a moment or two's delay and then he
+heard her reply. Even over the telephone wires, even though he stood,
+cramped and uncomfortable, in that stuffy little telephone booth, he
+felt the quick start of pleasure, the thrill of something different
+in life, which came to him always at the sound of her voice, at the
+slightest suggestion of her presence.
+
+“Well, my friend, what fortune?” she asked him.
+
+“None,” he answered. “I have done my best. Beatrice will not listen to
+me.”
+
+“She will not come and see me?”
+
+“She will not.”
+
+Elizabeth was silent for a moment. When she spoke again, there was a
+change in her tone.
+
+“You have failed, then.”
+
+“I did everything that could be done,” Tavernake insisted eagerly. “I
+am quite sure that nothing anybody could say would move Beatrice. She is
+very decided indeed.”
+
+“I have another idea,” Elizabeth remarked, after a brief pause. “She
+will not come to me; very well, I must go to her. You must take me
+there.”
+
+“I cannot do that,” Tavernake answered.
+
+“Why not?”
+
+“Beatrice has refused absolutely to permit me to tell you or any one
+else of her whereabouts,” he declared. “Without her permission I cannot
+do it.”
+
+“Do you mean that?” she asked.
+
+“Of course,” he answered uncomfortably.
+
+There was another silence. When she spoke again, her voice had changed
+for the second time. Tavernake felt his heart sink as he listened.
+
+“Very well,” she said. “I thought that you were my friend, that you
+wished to help me.”
+
+“I do,” he replied, “but you would not have me break my word?”
+
+“You are breaking your word with me,” she told him.
+
+“It is a different thing,” he insisted.
+
+“You will not take me there?” she said once more.
+
+“I cannot,” Tavernake answered.
+
+“Very well, good-bye!”
+
+“Don't go,” he begged. “Can't I see you somewhere for a few minutes this
+evening?”
+
+“I am afraid not,” Elizabeth replied coolly.
+
+“Are you going out?” he persisted.
+
+“I am going to the Duke of York's Theatre with some friends,” she
+answered. “I am sorry. You have disappointed me.”
+
+She rang off and he turned away from the telephone booth into the
+street. It seemed to him, as he walked down the crowded thoroughfare,
+that some reflection of his own self-contempt was visible in the
+countenances of the men and women who were hurrying past him. Wherever
+he looked, he was acutely conscious of it. In his heart he felt the
+bitter sense of shame of a man who wilfully succumbs to weakness. Yet
+that night he made his efforts.
+
+For four hours he sat in his lonely rooms and worked. Then the unequal
+struggle was ended. With a groan he caught up his hat and coat and
+left the house. Half an hour later, he was among the little crowd of
+loiterers and footmen standing outside the doors of the Duke of York's
+Theatre.
+
+It was still some time before the termination of the performance. As the
+slow minutes dragged by, he grew to hate himself, to hate this new
+thing in his life which had torn down his everyday standards, which had
+carried him off his feet in this strange and detestable fashion. It
+was a dormant sense, without a doubt, which Elizabeth had stirred into
+life--the sense of sex, quiescent in him so long, chiefly through
+his perfect physical sanity; perhaps, too, in some measure, from his
+half-starved imagination. It was significant, though, that once aroused
+it burned with surprising and unwavering fidelity. The whole world of
+women now were different creatures to him, but they left him as utterly
+unmoved as in his unawakened days. It was Elizabeth only he wanted,
+craved for fiercely, with all this late-born passion of mingled
+sentiment and desire. He felt himself, as he hung round there upon the
+pavement, rubbing shoulders with the liveried servants, the loafers,
+and the passers-by, a thing to be despised. He was like a whipped dog
+fawning back to his master. Yet if only he could persuade her to come
+with him, if it were but for an hour! If only she would sit opposite him
+in that wonderful little restaurant, where the lights and the music, the
+laughter and the wine, were all outward symbols of this new life from
+before which her fingers seemed to have torn aside the curtains! His
+heart beat with a fierce impatience. He watched the thin stream of
+people who left before the play was over, suburbanites mostly, in
+a hurry for their trains. Very soon the whole audience followed,
+commissionaires were busy with their whistles, the servants eagerly
+looking right and left for their masters. And then Elizabeth! She came
+out in the midst of half-a-dozen others, brilliant in a wonderful
+cloak and dress of turquoise blue, laughing with her friends, to all
+appearance the gayest of the party. Tavernake stepped quickly forward,
+but at that moment there was a crush and he could not advance. She
+passed within a yard of him, escorted by a couple of men, and for a
+moment their eyes met. She raised her eyebrows, as though in surprise,
+and her recognition was of the slightest. She passed on and entered a
+waiting motorcar, accompanied by the two men. Tavernake stood and looked
+after it. She did not even glance round. Except for that little gesture
+of cold surprise, she had ignored him. Tavernake, scarcely knowing what
+he did, turned slowly towards the Strand.
+
+He was face to face now with a crisis before which he seemed powerless.
+Men were there in the world to be bullied, cajoled, or swept out of the
+way. What did one do with a woman who was kind one moment and insolent
+the next, who raised her eyebrows and passed on when he wanted her, when
+he was there longing for her? Those old solid dreams of his--wealth,
+power, his name on great prospectuses, a position in the world--these
+things now appeared like the day fancies of a child. He had seen his way
+towards them. Already he had felt his feet upon the rungs of the ladder
+which leads to material success. This was something different, something
+greater. Then a sense of despair chilled his heart. He felt how
+ignorant, how helpless he was. He had not even studied the first
+text-book of life. Those very qualities which had served him so well
+before were hopeless here. Persistence, Beatrice had told him once, only
+annoys a woman.
+
+He came to a standstill outside the entrance to the Milan Court, and
+retraced his steps. The thought of Beatrice had brought something
+soothing with it. He felt that he must see her, see her at once. He
+walked back along the Strand and entered the restaurant where Beatrice
+and he had had their memorable supper. From the vestibule he could just
+see Grier's back as he stood talking to a waiter by the side of a round
+table in the middle of the room. Tavernake slowly withdrew and made his
+way upstairs. There were one or two little tables there in the balcony,
+hidden from the lower part of the room. He seated himself at one,
+handing his coat and hat mechanically to the waiter who came hurrying
+up.
+
+“But, Monsieur,” the man explained, with a deprecating gesture, “these
+tables are all taken.”
+
+Tavernake, who kept an account book in which he registered even his car
+fares, put five shillings in the man's hand.
+
+“This one I will have,” he said, firmly, and sat down.
+
+The man looked at him and turned aside to speak to the head waiter. They
+conversed together in whispers. Tavernake took no notice. His jaw was
+set. Himself unseen, he was gazing steadfastly at that table below. The
+head waiter shrugged his shoulders and departed; his other clients
+must be mollified. There was a finality which was unanswerable about
+Tavernake's methods.
+
+Tavernake ate and drank what they brought to him, ate and drank and
+suffered. Everything was as it had been that other night--the popping
+of corks, the soft music, the laughter of women, the pleasant, luxurious
+sense of warmth and gayety pervading the whole place.
+
+It was all just the same, but this time he sat outside and looked on.
+Beatrice was seated next Grier, and on her other side was a young man of
+the type which Tavernake detested, partly because it inspired him with
+a reluctant but insistent sense of inferiority. The young man was
+handsome, tall, and thin. His evening clothes fitted him perfectly,
+his studs and links were of the latest mode, his white tie arranged as
+though by the fingers of an artist. And yet he was no tailor's model.
+A gentleman, beyond a doubt, Tavernake decided, watching grudgingly the
+courteous movement of his head, listening sometimes to his well-bred but
+rather languid voice. Beatrice laughed often into his face. She admired
+him, of course. How could she help it! Grier sat at her other side. He,
+too, talked to her whenever he had the chance. It was a new fever which
+Tavernake was tasting, a new fever burning in his blood. He was jealous;
+he hated the whole party below. In imagination he saw Elizabeth with her
+friends, supping most likely in that other, more resplendent restaurant,
+only a few yards away. He imagined her the centre of every attention.
+Without a doubt, she was looking at her neighbor as she had looked at
+him. Tavernake bit his lip, frowning. If he had had it in his power,
+in those black moments, to have thrown a thunderbolt from his place, he
+would have wrecked every table in the room, he would have watched with
+joy the white, startled faces of the revelers as they fled away into
+the night. It was a new torture, indescribable, bitter. Indeed, this
+curiosity of his, of which he had spoken to Beatrice as they had walked
+together down Oxford Street on that first evening, was being satisfied
+with a vengeance! He was learning of those other things of life. He had
+sipped at the sweetness; he was drinking the bitters!
+
+An altercation by his side distracted him. Again there was the head
+waiter and a protesting guest. Tavernake looked up and recognized
+Professor Franklin. With his broad-brimmed hat in his hand, the
+professor, in fluent phraseology and a strong American accent, was
+making himself decidedly disagreeable.
+
+“You had better send for your manager right away, young man,” he
+declared. “On Tuesday night he brought me here himself and I engaged
+this table for the week. No, I tell you I won't have any other! I guess
+my order was good enough. You send for Luigi right here. You know who I
+am? Professor Franklin's my name, from New York, and if I say I mean to
+have a thing, I expect to get it.”
+
+For the first time he recognized Tavernake, and paused for a moment in
+his speech.
+
+“Have I got your table, Professor?” Tavernake asked, slowly.
+
+“You have, sir,” the professor answered. “I did not recognize you when
+I came in or I would have addressed you personally. I have particular
+reasons for occupying a front table here every night this week.”
+
+The thoughts began to crowd in upon Tavernake's brain. He hesitated.
+
+“Why not sit down with me?” he suggested.
+
+The professor acquiesced without a word. The head waiter, with a sigh
+of relief, took his hat and overcoat and accepted his order. Tavernake
+leaned across the table.
+
+“Professor,” he said, “why do you insist upon sitting up here?”
+
+The professor moved his head slowly downwards.
+
+“My young friend, I speak to you in confidence?”
+
+“In confidence,” Tavernake repeated.
+
+“I come here secretly,” the professor continued, “because it is the only
+chance I have of seeing a very dear relative of mine. I am obliged to
+keep away from her just now, but from here I can watch, I can see that
+she is well.”
+
+“You mean your daughter Beatrice,” Tavernake said, calmly.
+
+The professor trembled all over.
+
+“You know!” he muttered.
+
+“Yes, I know,” Tavernake answered. “I have been able to be of some
+slight assistance to your daughter Beatrice.”
+
+The professor grasped his hand.
+
+“Yes, yes,” he said, “Elizabeth is very angry with you because you
+will not tell her where to find the little girl. You are right, Mr.
+Tavernake. You must never tell her.”
+
+“I don't intend it,” Tavernake declared.
+
+“Say, this is a great evening for me!” the professor went on, eagerly.
+“I found out by accident myself. I was at the bar and I saw her come in
+with a lot of others.”
+
+“Why don't you go and speak to her?” Tavernake asked.
+
+The professor shivered.
+
+“There has been a disagreement,” he explained. “Beatrice and Elizabeth
+have quarreled. Mind you, Beatrice was right.”
+
+“Then why don't you go to her instead of staying with Elizabeth?”
+ Tavernake demanded, bluntly.
+
+The professor temporarily collapsed. He drank heavily of the whiskey and
+soda by his side, and answered gloomily.
+
+“My young friend,” he said, “Beatrice, when she left us, was penniless.
+Mind you, Elizabeth is the one with brains. It is Elizabeth who has the
+money. She has a strong will, too. She keeps me there whether I will or
+not, she makes me do many things--many things, surely--which I hate. But
+Elizabeth has her way. If I had gone with Beatrice, if I were to go to
+her now, I should be only a burden upon her.”
+
+“You have no money, then?” Tavernake remarked.
+
+The professor shook his head sadly.
+
+“Speculations, my young friend,” he replied, “speculations undertaken
+solely with the object of making a fortune for my children. I have had
+money and lost it.”
+
+“Can't you earn any?” Tavernake asked. “Beatrice doesn't seem
+extravagant.”
+
+The professor regarded this outspoken young man with an air of hurt
+dignity.
+
+“If you will forgive me,” he said. “I think that we will choose another
+subject of conversation.”
+
+“At any rate,” Tavernake declared, “you must be fond of your daughter or
+you would not come here night after night just to look at her.”
+
+The professor shook out a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed his
+eyes.
+
+“Beatrice was always my favorite,” he announced solemnly, “but
+Elizabeth--well, you can't get away from Elizabeth,” he added, leaning
+across the table. “To tell you the truth, Mr. Tavernake, Elizabeth
+terrifies me sometimes, she is so bold. I am afraid where her scheming
+may land us. I would be happier with Beatrice if only she had the means
+to satisfy my trifling wants.”
+
+He turned to the waiter and ordered a pint of champagne.
+
+“Veuve Clicquot '99,” he instructed the man. “At my age,” he remarked,
+with a sigh, “one has to be careful about these little matters. The
+wrong brand of champagne means a sleepless night.”
+
+Tavernake looked at him in a puzzled way. The professor was a riddle
+to him. He represented no type which had come within the orbit of his
+experience. With the arrival of the champagne, the professor became
+almost eloquent. He leaned forward, gazing stealthily down at the round
+table.
+
+“If I could tell you of that girl's mother, Mr. Tavernake,” he said, “if
+I could tell you what her history, our history, has been, it would seem
+to you so strange that you would probably regard me as a romancer. No,
+we have to carry our secrets with us.”
+
+“By-the-bye,” Tavernake asked, “what are you a professor of?”
+
+“Of the hidden sciences, sir,” was the immediate reply. “Phrenology was
+my earliest love. Since then I have studied in the East; I have spent
+many years in a monastery in China. I have gratified in every way my
+natural love of the occult. I represent today those people of advanced
+thought who have traveled, even in spirit, for ever such a little
+distance across the line which divides the Seen from the Unseen, the
+Known from the Infinite.”
+
+He took a long draught of champagne. Tavernake gazed at him in blank
+amazement.
+
+“I don't know much about science,” he said. “It is only lately that I
+have begun to realize how ignorant I really am. Your daughter has helped
+to teach me.”
+
+The professor sighed heavily.
+
+“A young woman of attainments, sir,” he remarked, “of character, too.
+Look at the way she carries her head. That was a trick of her mother's.”
+
+“Don't you mean to speak to her at all, then?” Tavernake asked.
+
+“I dare not,” the professor replied. “I am naturally of a truthful
+disposition, and if Elizabeth were to ask me if I had spoken to her
+sister, I should give myself away at once. No, I look on and that is
+all.”
+
+Tavernake drummed with his fingers upon the tablecloth. Something in
+the merriment of that little party downstairs had filled him with a very
+bitter feeling.
+
+“You ought to go and claim her, professor,” he declared. “Look down at
+them now. Is that the best life for a girl? The men are almost strangers
+to her, and the girls are not fit for her to associate with. She has no
+friends, no relatives. Your daughter Elizabeth can do without you very
+well. She is strong enough to take care of herself.”
+
+“But my dear sir,” the professor objected, “Beatrice could not support
+me.”
+
+Tavernake paid his bill without another word. Downstairs the lights had
+been lowered, the party at the round table were already upon their feet.
+
+“Good-night, professor!” he said. “I am going to see the last of
+Beatrice from the top of the stairs.”
+
+The professor followed him--they stood there and watched her depart with
+Annie Legarde. The two girls got into a taxicab together, and Tavernake
+breathed a sigh of relief, a relief for which he was wholly unable to
+account, when he saw that Grier made no effort to follow them. As soon
+as the taxi had rolled away, they descended and passed into the street.
+Then the professor suddenly changed his tone.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake,” he said, “I know what you are thinking about me: I am a
+weak old man who drinks too much and who wasn't born altogether honest.
+I can't give up anything. I'd be happier, really happier, on a crust
+with Beatrice, but I daren't, I simply daren't try it. I prefer the
+flesh pots with Elizabeth, and you despise me for it. I don't blame you,
+Mr. Tavernake, but listen.”
+
+“Well?” Tavernake interjected.
+
+The professor's fingers gripped his arm.
+
+“You've known Beatrice longer--you don't know Elizabeth very well,
+but let me tell you this. Elizabeth is a very wonderful person. I know
+something about character, I know something about those hidden powers
+which men and women possess--strange powers which no one can understand,
+powers which drag a man to a woman's feet, or which make him shiver when
+he passes another even in a crowd. You see, these things are a science
+with me, Mr. Tavernake, but I don't pretend to understand everything.
+All I know is that Elizabeth is one of those people who can just do what
+she likes with men. I am her father and I am her slave. I tell myself
+that I would rather be with Beatrice, and I am as powerless to go as
+though I were bound with chains. You are a young ignorant man, Mr.
+Tavernake, you know nothing of life, and I will give you a word of
+warning. It is better for you that you keep away from over there.”
+
+He raised one hand and pointed across the street towards the Milan
+Court; with the other he once more gripped Tavernake's arm.
+
+“Why she should take the trouble even to speak with you for a moment, I
+do not know,” the professor continued, “but she does. It has pleased her
+to talk with you--why I can't imagine--only if I were you I would get
+away while there is yet time. She is my daughter but she has no heart,
+no pity. I saw her smile at you. I am sorry always for the man she
+smiles upon like that. Goodnight, Mr. Tavernake!”
+
+The professor crossed the street. Tavernake watched him until he was out
+of sight. Then he felt an arm thrust through his.
+
+“Why, this is what I call luck!” a familiar voice exclaimed. “Mr.
+Tavernake, you're the very man I was looking for!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII. A MIDNIGHT ADVENTURE
+
+
+Tavernake was not sociably inclined and took no pains to conceal the
+fact. Mr. Pritchard, however, was not easily to be shaken off.
+
+“So you've been palling up to the old man, eh?” he remarked, in friendly
+fashion.
+
+“I came across the professor unexpectedly,” Tavernake answered, coldly.
+“What do you want with me, please? I am on my way home.”
+
+Pritchard laughed softly to himself.
+
+“Say, there's something about you Britishers I can't help admiring!” he
+declared. “You are downright, aren't you?”
+
+“I suppose you think we are too clumsy to be anything else,” Tavernake
+replied. “This is my 'bus coming. Good-night!”
+
+Pritchard's hand, however, tightened upon his companion's arm.
+
+“Look here, young man,” he said, “don't you be foolish. I'm a valuable
+acquaintance for you, if you only realized it. Come along across the
+street with me. My club is on the Terrace, just below. Stroll along
+there with me and I'll tell you something about the professor, if you
+like.”
+
+“Thank you,” Tavernake answered, “I don't think I care about hearing
+gossip. Besides, I think I know all there is to be known about him.”
+
+“Did you give Miss Beatrice my message?” Pritchard asked suddenly.
+
+“If I did,” Tavernake replied, “I have no answer for you.”
+
+“Will you tell her this,” Pritchard began,--
+
+“No, I will tell her nothing!” Tavernake interrupted. “You can look
+after your own affairs. I have no interest in them and I don't want to
+have. Good-night!”
+
+Pritchard laughed again but he did not relax his grasp upon the other's
+arm.
+
+“Now, Mr. Tavernake,” he said, “it won't do for you to quarrel with me.
+I shouldn't be surprised if you discovered that I am one of the most
+useful acquaintances you ever met in your life. You needn't come into
+the club unless you like, but walk as far as there with me. When we get
+on to the Terrace, with closed houses on one side and a palisade upon
+the other, I am going to say something to you.”
+
+“Very well,” Tavernake decided, reluctantly. “I don't know what there is
+you can have to tell me, but I'll come as far as there, at any rate.”
+
+They crossed the Strand and turned into Adam Street. As they neared the
+further corner, Pritchard stepped from the pavement into the middle of
+the street, and looked searchingly around.
+
+“Say, you'll excuse my being a little careful,” he remarked. “This is
+rather a lonely part for the middle of London, and I have been followed
+for the last two days by people whose company I am not over keen about.”
+
+“Followed? What for?” Tavernake demanded.
+
+“Oh, the usual thing!” answered the detective, with a shrug of the
+shoulders. “That company of crooks I showed you last night don't fancy
+having me around. They've a good many grudges up against Sam Pritchard.
+I am not quite so safe over here as I should be in New York. Most of
+them are off to Paris tomorrow, thank Heavens!”
+
+“And you?” Tavernake asked. “Are you going, too?”
+
+Pritchard shook his head.
+
+“If only those fools would believe it, I'm not over here on their
+business at all. I came over on a special commission this time, as you
+know. I have a word of warning for you, Mr. Tavernake. I guess you won't
+like to hear it, but you've got to.”
+
+Tavernake stopped short.
+
+“I don't want your warnings!” he said angrily. “I don't want you
+interfering in my affairs!”
+
+The detective smiled quietly. Then a new expression suddenly tightened
+his lips.
+
+“Never mind about that just now!” he exclaimed. “See here, take this
+police whistle from my left hand, quick, and blow it for all that you
+are worth!”
+
+It was characteristic of Tavernake that he was prepared to obey without
+a second's hesitation. The opportunity, however, was denied him. The
+events which followed came and passed like a thought. A blow on his left
+wrist and the whistle fell into the road. A dark figure had sprung up,
+apparently from space; a long arm was twined around Pritchard's neck,
+bending him backwards; there was a gleam of steel within a few inches of
+his throat. And then Tavernake saw a wonderful thing. With a turn of his
+wrist, Pritchard suddenly seemed to lift the form of his assailant into
+the air. Tavernake caught a swift impression of a man's white face, the
+head pointing to the street, the legs twitching convulsively. Head
+over heels Pritchard seemed to throw him, while the knife clattered
+harmlessly into the roadway. The man lay crumpled up and moaning before
+the door of one of the houses. Pritchard sprang after him. The door had
+been cautiously opened and the man crawled through; Pritchard followed;
+then the door closed and Tavernake beat upon it in vain.
+
+For several seconds--it seemed to Tavernake much longer--he stood
+gazing at the door, breathing heavily, absolutely unable to collect his
+thoughts. The whole affair had happened with such amazing celerity! He
+could not bring himself to realize it, to believe that it was Pritchard
+who had been with him only a few seconds ago, who in danger of his
+life had performed that marvelous trick of jiu-jutsu, had followed
+his unknown assailant into that dark, mysterious house, from no single
+window of which was a single gleam of light visible. Tavernake had led
+an uneventful life. Of the passions which breed murder and the desire
+to kill he knew nothing. He was dazed with the suddenness of it all. How
+could such a thing happen in the midst of London, in a thoroughfare only
+momentarily deserted, at the further end of which, indeed, were many
+signs of life! Then the thought of that knife made him shiver--blue
+glittering steel cutting the air like whipcord. He remembered the look
+in the assassin's face--horrible, an epitome of the passions, which
+seemed to reveal to him in that moment the existence of some other, some
+unknown world, about which he had neither read nor dreamed.
+
+The sound of footsteps came as an immense relief. A man came round the
+corner, smoking a cigarette and humming softly to himself. The presence
+of another human being seemed suddenly to bring Tavernake's feet back
+upon the earth. He moved toward the pavement and addressed the newcomer.
+
+“Can you tell me how to get inside that house?” he asked quickly.
+
+The man removed the cigarette from his mouth and stared at his
+questioner.
+
+“I should ring the bell,” he replied, “but surely it's unoccupied? What
+do you want to get in there for?”
+
+“Less than a minute ago,” Tavernake told him, “I was walking here with
+a friend. A man came up behind us and tried deliberately to stab him.
+He bolted afterwards through that door, my friend followed him, the door
+was closed in my face.”
+
+The newcomer was a youngish man, a musician, who had just come from
+a concert and was on his way to the club at the end of the street.
+Probably, had he been a journalist, his curiosity would have been
+greater than his incredulity. As it was, however, he gazed at Tavernake,
+for a moment, blankly.
+
+“Look here,” he said, “this doesn't sound a very likely story of yours,
+you know.”
+
+“I don't care whether it's likely or not,” Tavernake answered hotly;
+“it's true! The knife's somewhere in the road there--it fell up against
+the railings.”
+
+They crossed the road together and searched. There were no signs of the
+weapon. Tavernake peered over the railings.
+
+“When my friend struck the other man and twisted him over,” he
+explained, “the knife seemed to fly up into the air; it might even have
+reached the gardens.”
+
+His companion turned slowly away.
+
+“Well, it's no use looking down there for it,” he remarked. “We might
+try the door, if you like.”
+
+They leaned their weight against it, hammered at the panels, and waited.
+The door was fast closed and no reply came. The musician shrugged his
+shoulders and prepared to depart, after one more glance at Tavernake,
+half suspicious, half questioning.
+
+“If you think it worth while,” he said, “you had better fetch the
+police, perhaps. If you take my advice, though, I think I should go home
+and forget all about it.”
+
+He passed on, leaving Tavernake speechless. The idea that people might
+not believe his story had never seriously occurred to him. Yet all of a
+sudden he began to doubt it himself. He stepped back into the road and
+looked up at the windows of the house--dark, uncurtained, revealing
+no sign of life or habitation. Had he really taken that walk with
+Pritchard, stood on this spot with him only a minute or two ago? Then he
+picked up the police whistle and he had no longer any doubts. The whole
+scene was before him again, more vividly than ever. Even at this moment,
+Pritchard might be in need of help!
+
+He turned and walked sharply to the corner of the Terrace, finding
+himself almost immediately face to face with a policeman.
+
+“You must come into this house with me at once!” Tavernake exclaimed,
+pointing backwards. “A friend of mine was attacked here just now; a man
+tried to stab him. They are both in that house. The man ran away and my
+friend followed him. The door is closed and no one answers.”
+
+The constable looked at Tavernake very much as the musician had done.
+
+“Do either of them live there, sir?” he asked.
+
+“How should I know!” Tavernake answered. “The man sprang upon my friend
+from behind. He had a knife in his hand--I saw it. My friend threw him
+over and he escaped into that house. They are both there now.
+
+“Which house is it, sir?” the policeman inquired.
+
+They were standing almost in front of it. The gate was open and
+Tavernake beat against the panels with the flat of his hand. Then, with
+a cry of triumph, he stooped down and picked something up from a crack
+in the flagged stones.
+
+“The key!” he cried. “Come on, quick!”
+
+He thrust it into the lock and turned it; the door swung smoothly open.
+The policeman laid his hand upon Tavernake's shoulder.
+
+“Look here,” he said, “let's have that story of yours again, a little
+more clearly. Who is it that's in this house?”
+
+“Five minutes ago,” Tavernake began, speaking rapidly, “I met a man in
+the Strand whom I know slightly--Pritchard, an American detective. He
+said that he had something to say to me and he asked me to walk round
+with him to a club in this Terrace. We were in the middle of the road
+there, talking, when a man sprang at him; he must have come up behind
+quite noiselessly. The man had a knife in his hand. My friend threw him
+head over heels--it was some trick of jiu-jutsu; I have seen it done at
+the Polytechnic. He fell in front of this door which must either have
+been ajar or else some one who was waiting must have let him in. He
+crawled through and my friend followed him. The door was slammed in my
+face.”
+
+“How long ago was this?” the policeman asked.
+
+“Not much more than five minutes,” Tavernake answered.
+
+The policeman coughed.
+
+“It's a very queer story, sir.”
+
+“It's true!” Tavernake declared, fiercely. “You and I have got to search
+this house.”
+
+The policeman nodded.
+
+“There's no harm in that, sir, anyway.”
+
+He flashed his lantern around the hall--unfurnished, with paper hanging
+from the walls. Then they began to enter the rooms, one by one. Nowhere
+was there any sign of occupation. From floor to floor they passed, in
+grim silence. In the front chamber of the attic was a camp bedstead, two
+or three humble articles of furniture, and a small stove.
+
+“Caretaker's kit,” the policeman muttered. “Nothing seems to have been
+used for some time.”
+
+They descended the stairs again.
+
+“You say you saw the two men enter this house, sir?” the policeman
+remarked doubtfully.
+
+“I did,” Tavernake declared. “There is no doubt about it.”
+
+“The back entrances are all properly locked,” the policeman pointed out.
+“None of the windows by which any one could escape have been opened.
+We've been into every room. There's no one in the house now, sir, is
+there?”
+
+“There doesn't seem to be,” Tavernake admitted.
+
+The policeman looked him over once more; Tavernake certainly had not the
+appearance of one attempting a hoax.
+
+“I am afraid there is nothing more we can do, sir,” the man said
+civilly. “You had better give me your name and address.”
+
+“Can't we go over the place once more?” Tavernake suggested. “I tell you
+I saw them come in.”
+
+“I have my beat outside to look after, sir,” the constable answered. “If
+it wasn't that you seem respectable, I should begin to think that you
+wanted me out of the way for a bit. Name and address, please.”
+
+Tavernake gave them readily. They passed out together into the street.
+
+“I shall report this matter,” the man said, closing his book. “Perhaps
+the sergeant will have the house searched again. If you take my advice,
+sir,” he added, “you'll go home.”
+
+“I saw them both pass through that door,” Tavernake repeated, half
+to himself, still standing upon the pavement and staring at the unlit
+windows.
+
+The constable made no reply but moved off. Soon he reached the corner of
+the Terrace and disappeared. Tavernake slowly crossed the road and with
+his back to the railings looked steadfastly at the dark front of
+gray stone houses. Big Ben struck one o'clock, several people passed
+backwards and forwards. Men were coming out from the club, and
+separating for the night; the roar of the city was growing fainter. Yet
+Tavernake felt indisposed to move. The look in that man's drawn white
+face and black eyes haunted him, There was tragedy there, the shadow of
+terrible things, fear, and the murderous desire to kill! Through that
+door they had passed, the two men, one in flight, the other in pursuit.
+Where were they now? Perhaps it had been a trap. Pritchard had spoken
+seriously enough of his enemies.
+
+Then, as he stood there, he saw for the first time a thin line of light
+through the closely-drawn curtains of a room on the ground floor of the
+adjoining house. Without a moment's hesitation, he crossed the road and
+rang the bell. The door was opened, after a trifling delay, by a man
+in plain clothes, who might, however, have been a servant in mufti. He
+looked at Tavernake suspiciously.
+
+“I am sorry to have disturbed you,” Tavernake explained, “but I saw some
+one go in the house next to you, a little time ago. Can you tell me if
+you have heard any noises or voices during the last half-hour?”
+
+The man shook his head.
+
+“We have heard nothing, sir,” he said.
+
+“Who lives here?” Tavernake asked.
+
+“Did you call me up at one o'clock in the morning to ask silly
+questions?” the man replied insolently. “Every one's in bed here and I
+was just going.”
+
+“There's a light in your ground floor room,” Tavernake remarked.
+“There's some one talking there now--I can hear voices.”
+
+The man closed the door in his face. For some time Tavernake wandered
+restlessly about, starting at last reluctantly homewards. He had reached
+the Strand and was crossing Trafalgar Square when a sudden thought held
+him. He stood still for a moment in the middle of the street. Then he
+turned abruptly round. In less than five minutes he was once more on the
+Terrace.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX. TAVERNAKE INTERVENES
+
+
+Tavernake had the feelings of a man suddenly sobered as he turned once
+more into the Adelphi Terrace. Waiting until no one was in sight, he
+opened the door of the empty house with the Yale key which he had kept,
+and carefully closed it. He struck a match and listened for several
+minutes intently; not a sound from anywhere. He moved a few yards
+further to the bottom of the stairs, and listened again; still silence.
+He turned the handle of the ground floor apartment and commenced a fresh
+search. Room by room he examined by the light of his rapidly dwindling
+matches. This time he meant to leave behind him no possibility of any
+mistake. He even measured the depths of the walls for any secret hiding
+place. From room to room he passed, leisurely, always on the alert,
+always listening. Once, as he opened a door on the third floor there
+was a soft scurrying as though of a skirt across the floor. He struck
+a match quickly, to find a great rat sitting up and looking at him with
+black, beady eyes. It was the only sign of life he found in the whole
+building.
+
+When he had finished his search, he came down to the ground floor and
+entered the room corresponding with the one from which he had heard
+voices in the adjoining house. He crouched here upon the dusty boards
+for some time, listening. Now and then he fancied that he could still
+hear voices on the other side of the wall, but he was never absolutely
+certain.
+
+At last he rose to stretch himself, and almost as he did so a fresh
+sound from outside attracted his notice. A motor-car had turned into the
+Terrace. He walked to the uncurtained window and stood there, sure of
+being himself unseen. Then his heart gave a great leap. Unemotional
+though he was, this was a happening which might well have excited a
+more phlegmatic individual. A motor-car which he remembered very well,
+although it was driven now by a man in dark livery, had stopped at the
+next house. A woman and two men had descended. Tavernake never glanced
+at the latter; his eyes were fastened upon their companion. She was
+wrapped in a long cloak, but she lifted her skirts as she crossed the
+pavement, and he saw the flash of her silver buckles. Her carriage, her
+figure, were unmistakable. It was Elizabeth who was paying this early
+morning visit next door! Already the little party had disappeared. They
+did not even ring the bell. The door must have been opened silently
+at their coming. The motor-car glided off. Once more the Terrace was
+deserted.
+
+Tavernake felt sure that he knew now the solution,--there was a way from
+this house into the next one. He struck another match and, standing back
+a few yards, looked critically at the dividing wall. In ancient days
+this had evidently been a dwelling-house of importance, elaborately
+decorated, as the fresco work upon the ceiling still indicated. The wall
+had been divided into three panels, with a high wainscoting. Inch by
+inch he examined it from one end to the other; he started from the back
+and came toward the front. About three-quarters of the way there, he
+paused. It was very simple, after all. The solid wall for a couple of
+feet suddenly ceased, and the design was continued with an expanse of
+stretched canvas, which yielded easily to his finger. He leaned his ear
+against it; he could hear now distinctly the sound of voices--he heard
+even the woman's laughter. For the height of about four feet the wall
+had been bodily removed. He made a small hole in the canvas--there was
+still darkness. He enlarged the hole until he could thrust his hand
+through--there was nothing but canvas the other side. He knew now where
+he was. There was only that single thickness of canvas between him and
+the room. He had but to make the smallest hole in it and he would be
+able to see through. Even now, with the removal of the barrier on his
+side, the voices were more distinct. A complete section of the wall had
+evidently been taken out and replaced by a detachable framework of wood
+covered with stretched canvas. He stood back for a moment and felt with
+his finger; he could almost trace the spot where the woodwork fitted
+upon hinges. Then he went on his hands and knees again, and with his
+penknife in his hand he paused to listen. He could hear the man Crease
+talking--a slow, nasal drawl. Then he heard Pritchard's voice, followed
+by what seemed to be a groan. There was a silence, then Elizabeth seemed
+to ask a question. He heard her low laugh and some note in it sent a
+shiver through his body. Pritchard was speaking fiercely now. Then, in
+the middle of his sentence, there was silence once more, followed by
+another groan. He could almost feel the people in that room holding
+their breaths.
+
+Tavernake was rapidly forgetting all caution. The point of his knife was
+through the canvas. Slowly he worked it round until a small piece, the
+size of a half-crown, was partially cut through. With infinite pains he
+got his head and shoulders into the small recess and for the first time
+looked into the room. Pritchard was sitting almost in the middle of the
+apartment; his arms seemed to be bound to the chair and his legs were
+tied together. A few yards away, Elizabeth, her fur coat laid aside, was
+lounging back in an easy-chair, her dress all glittering with sequins,
+a curious light in her eyes, a cruel smile parting her lips. By her
+side--sitting, in fact, on the arm of her chair--was Crease, his long,
+worn face paler, even, than usual; his lips curled in a smile of cynical
+amusement. Major Post was there, carefully dressed as though he had been
+attending some social gathering, standing upon the hearth-rug with his
+coat-tails under his arms. The professor, in whose face seemed written
+the most abject terror, was talking. Tavernake now could hear every word
+distinctly.
+
+“My dear Elizabeth! My dear Crease! You are both too precipitate! I tell
+you that I protest--I protest most strongly. Mr. Pritchard, I am sure,
+with a little persuasion, will listen to reason. I will not be a party
+to any such proceeding as--as this. You understand, Crease? We have gone
+quite far enough as it is. I will not have it.”
+
+Elizabeth laughed softly.
+
+“My dear father,” she said, “you will really have to take something for
+your nerves. Nothing need happen to Mr. Pritchard at all unless he asks
+for it. He has his chance--. no one should expect more.”
+
+“You are right, my dear Elizabeth,” declared Crease, speaking very
+slowly and with his usual drawl. “This question of his health for
+the future--at any rate, for the immediate future--is entirely in
+Pritchard's own hands. There is no one who has received so many warnings
+as he. Bramley was cautioned twice; Mallison was warned three times and
+burned to death; Forsith had word from us only once, and he was shot in
+a drunken brawl. This man Pritchard has been warned a dozen times, he
+has escaped death twice. The time has come to show him that we are in
+earnest. Threats are useless; the time has come for deeds. I say that
+if Pritchard refuses this trifling request of ours, let us see that he
+leaves this house in such a state that he will not be able to do us any
+harm for some time at least.”
+
+“But he will give his word!” the professor cried excitedly. “I am quite
+sure that if you allow me to talk to him reasonably, he will pledge
+his word to go back to the States and interfere no longer with your
+affairs.”
+
+Pritchard turned his head slightly. He was a little pale, and the blood
+was dropping slowly on to the floor from a wound in his temple, but his
+tone was contemptuous.
+
+“I will give you my word, Professor, and you, Elizabeth Gardner, and
+you, Jim Post, and you, Walter Crease, that crippled, or straight, in
+evil or good health, from the very jaws of death I will hang on to life
+until you have paid your just debts. You understand that, all of you?
+I don't know what sort of a show this is. You may be in earnest, or you
+may be trying a rag. In any case, let me assure you of this. You won't
+get me to beg for mercy. If you force me to drink that stuff you are
+talking about, I'll find the antidote, and as sure as there's a prison
+in America, so surely I'll make you suffer for it! If you take my
+advice,” he went on slowly, “and I know what I'm talking about, you'll
+cut these ropes and set open your front door. You 'll live longer, all
+of you.”
+
+“An idiot,” Elizabeth remarked pleasantly, “can do but little harm in
+the world. The word of a person of weak intellect is not to be relied
+upon. For my part, I am very tired of our friend, Mr. Pritchard. If you
+others had been disposed to go to much greater lengths, if you had said
+'Hang him from the ceiling,' I should have been well pleased.”
+
+Pritchard made a slight movement in his chair--it was certainly not a
+movement of fear.
+
+“Madam,” he said, “I admire your candor. Let me return it. I don't
+believe there's one of you here has the pluck to attempt to do me
+any serious injury. If there is, get on with it. You hear, Mr. Walter
+Crease? Bring out that bottle of yours.”
+
+Crease removed his cigar from his lips and rose slowly to his feet. From
+his waistcoat pocket he produced a small phial, from which he drew the
+cork.
+
+“Seems to me it's up to us to do the trick,” he remarked languidly.
+“Catch hold of his forehead, Jimmy.”
+
+The man known as Major Post threw away his cigarette, and coming round
+behind Pritchard's chair, suddenly bent the man's head backward.
+Crease advanced, phial in hand. Then all Hell seemed to be let loose in
+Tavernake. He stepped back in his place and marked the extent of that
+wooden partition. Then, setting his teeth, he sprang at it, throwing
+the great weight of his massive shoulder against the framework door.
+Scratched and bleeding, but still upon his feet, he burst into the room,
+with the noise of bricks falling behind,--an apparition so unexpected
+that the little company gathered there seemed turned into some waxwork
+group from the Chamber of Horrors--motionless, without even the power of
+movement.
+
+Tavernake, in those few moments, was like a giant among a company of
+degenerates. He was strong, his muscles were like whipcord, and his
+condition was perfect. Walter Crease went over like a log before his
+fist; Major Post felt the revolver at which he had snatched struck from
+his hand, and he himself remembered nothing more till he came to his
+senses some time afterwards. A slash and a cut and Pritchard was free.
+The professor stood wringing his hands. Elizabeth had risen to her feet.
+She was pale, but she was still more nearly composed than any other
+person in the room. Tavernake and Pritchard were masters of the
+situation. Pritchard leaned toward the mirror and straightened his tie.
+
+“I am afraid,” he said looking down at Walter Crease's groaning figure,
+“that our hosts are scarcely in fit condition to take leave of us. Never
+mind, Mrs. Gardner, we excuse ourselves to you. I cannot pretend to be
+sorry that my friend's somewhat impetuous entrance has disturbed your
+plans for the evening, but I do hope that you will realize now the
+fatuousness of such methods in these days. Good-night! It is time we
+finished our stroll together, Tavernake.”
+
+They moved towards the door--there was no one to stop them. Only the
+professor tried to say a few words.
+
+“My dear Mr. Pritchard--my dear Pritchard, if you will allow me to call
+you so,” he exclaimed, “let me beg of you, before you leave us, not to
+take this trifling adventure too seriously! I can assure you that it was
+simply an attempt to coerce you, not in the least an affair to be taken
+seriously!”
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+“Professor,” he said, “and you, Walter Crease, and you, Jimmy Post, if
+you're able to listen, listen to me. You have played the part of
+children to-night. So surely as men and women exist who live as you do,
+so surely must the law wait upon their heels. You cannot cheat justice.
+It is as inexorable as Time itself. When you try these little tricks,
+you simply give another turn to the wheel, add another danger to life.
+You had better learn to look upon me as necessary, all of you, for I am
+certainly inevitable.”
+
+They passed backwards through the door, then they went down the silent
+hall and out into the street. Even as they did so, the clock struck a
+quarter to two.
+
+“My friend Tavernake,” Pritchard declared, lighting a cigarette with
+steady fingers, “you are a man. Come into the club with me while I bathe
+my forehead. After all, we'll have that drink together before we say
+goodnight.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX. A PLEASANT REUNION
+
+
+Tavernake awoke some hours later with a puzzled sense of having lost
+his own identity, of having taken up another man's life, stepped into
+another man's shoes. From the day of his first arrival in London, a raw
+country youth, till the night when he had spoken to Beatrice on the roof
+of Blenheim House, nothing that could properly be called an adventure
+had ever happened to him. He had never for a moment felt the want of it;
+he had not even indulged in the reading of books of romance. The thing
+which had happened last night, as in the cold morning sunlight he sat up
+in his bed, seemed to him a thing grotesque, inconceivable. It was
+not really possible that those people--those well-bred, well-looking
+people--had seriously contemplated an enormity which seemed to belong
+to the back pages of history, or that he, Tavernake, had burst through
+a wall with no weapons in his hand, and had dominated the situation! He
+sat there steadily thinking. It was incredible, but it was true! There
+existed still in his mind some faint doubt as to whether they would
+really have proceeded to extremities. Pritchard himself had made light
+of the whole affair, afterwards had treated it, indeed, as a huge
+practical joke. Tavernake, remembering that little group as he had first
+seen it, remained doubtful.
+
+By degrees, his own personal characteristics began to assert themselves.
+He began to wonder how his action would affect his commercial interests.
+He had probably made an enemy of this wonderful sister of Beatrice's,
+the woman who had so completely filled his thoughts during the last few
+days, the woman, too, who was to have found the money by means of which
+he was to set his feet upon the first rung of the ladder. This was a
+thing, he decided, which must be settled at once. He must see her and
+know exactly what terms they were on, whether or not she meant to be off
+with her bargain. The thought of action of any sort was stimulating. He
+rose and dressed, had his breakfast, and set out on his pilgrimage.
+
+Soon after eleven o'clock, he presented himself at the Milan Court and
+asked for Mrs. Wenham Gardner. For several minutes he waited about in
+nervous anticipation, then he was told that she was not at home. More
+than a little disappointed, he pressed for news of her. The hall porter
+thought that she had gone down into the country, and if so it
+was doubtful when she would be back. Tavernake was now seriously
+disconcerted.
+
+“I want particularly to wire to her,” he insisted. “Please find out from
+her maid how I shall direct a telegram.”
+
+The hall porter, who was a most superior person, regarded him blandly.
+
+“We do not give addresses, sir,” he explained, “unless at the expressed
+wish of our clients. If you leave a telegram here, I will send it up to
+Mrs. Gardner's rooms to be forwarded.”
+
+Tavernake scribbled one out, begging for news of her return, added
+his address and left the place. Then he wandered aimlessly about the
+streets. There seemed something flat about the morning, some aftermath
+of the excitement of the previous night was still stirring in his blood.
+Nevertheless, he pulled himself together with an effort, called for a
+young surveyor whom he had engaged to assist him, and spent the rest of
+the day out upon the hill. Religiously he kept his thoughts turned
+upon his work until the twilight came. Then he hurried home to meet the
+disappointment which he had more than half anticipated. There was no
+telegram for him! He ate his dinner and sat with folded arms, looking
+out into the street. Still no telegram! The restlessness came back once
+more. Soon after ten o'clock it became unbearable. He found himself
+longing for company, the loneliness of his little room since the
+departure of Beatrice had never seemed so real a thing. He stood it as
+long as he could and then, catching up his hat and stick, he set his
+face eastwards, walking vigorously, and with frequent glances at the
+clocks he passed.
+
+A few minutes past eleven o'clock, he found himself once more in
+that dark thoroughfare at the back of the theatre. The lamp over
+the stage-door was flickering in the same uncertain manner, the same
+motor-cars were there, the same crowd of young men, except that each
+night they seemed to grow larger. This time he had a few minutes only to
+wait. Beatrice came out among the earliest. At the sight of her he was
+suddenly conscious that he had, after all, no excuse for coming, that
+she would probably cross-examine him about Elizabeth, would probably
+guess the secret of his torments. He shrank back, but he was a moment
+too late for she had seen him. With a few words of excuse to the others
+with whom she was talking, she picked up her skirts and came swiftly
+across the muddy street. Tavernake had no time to escape. He
+remained there until she came, but his cheeks were hot, and he had an
+uncomfortable feeling that his presence, that their meeting like this,
+was an embarrassment to both of them.
+
+“My dear Leonard,” she exclaimed, “why do you hide over there?”
+
+“I don't know,” he answered simply.
+
+She laughed.
+
+“It looks as though you didn't want to see me,” she remarked. “If you
+didn't, why are you here?”
+
+“I suppose I did want to see you,” he replied. “Anyhow, I was lonely. I
+wanted to talk to some one. I walked all the way up here from Chelsea.”
+
+“You have something to tell me?” she suggested.
+
+“There was something,” he admitted. “I thought perhaps you ought to
+know. I had supper with your father last night. We talked about you.”
+
+She started as though he had struck her; her face was suddenly pale and
+anxious.
+
+“Are you serious, Leonard?” she asked. “My father?”
+
+He nodded.
+
+“I am sorry,” he said. “I ought not to have blundered it out like that.
+I forgot that you--you were not seeing anything of him.”
+
+“How did you meet him?”
+
+“By accident,” he answered. “I was sitting alone up in the balcony at
+Imano's, and he wanted my table because he could see you from there, so
+we shared it, and then we began talking. I knew who he was, of course;
+I had seen him in your sister's room. He told me that he had engaged the
+table for every night this week.”
+
+She looked across the road.
+
+“I can't go out with those people now,” she declared. “Wait here for
+me.”
+
+She went back to her friends and talked to them for a moment or two.
+Tavernake could hear Grier's protesting voice and Beatrice's light
+laugh. Evidently they were trying uselessly to persuade her to change
+her mind. Soon she came back to him.
+
+“I am sorry,” he said reluctantly. “I am afraid that I have spoiled your
+evening.”
+
+“Don't be foolish, please,” she replied taking his arm. “Do you believe
+that my father will be up in the balcony at Imano's to-night?”
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+“He told me so.”
+
+“We will go and sit up there,” she decided. “He knows where I am to be
+found now so it doesn't matter. I should like to see him.”
+
+They walked off together. Though she was evidently absent and
+distressed, Tavernake felt once more that sense of pleasant
+companionship which her near presence always brought him.
+
+“There is something else I must ask you,” she began presently. “I want
+to know if you have seen Pritchard lately.”
+
+“I was with him last night,” Tavernake answered.
+
+She shivered.
+
+“He was asking questions?”
+
+“Not about you,” Tavernake assured her quickly. “It is your sister in
+whom he is interested.”
+
+Beatrice nodded, but she seemed very little relieved. Tavernake could
+see that the old look of fear was back in her face.
+
+“I am sorry, Beatrice,” he said, regretfully. “I seem just now to be
+always bringing you reminiscences of the people whom it terrifies you to
+hear about.”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“It isn't your fault, Leonard,” she declared, “only it is rather strange
+that you should be mixed up with them in any way, isn't it? I suppose
+some day you'll find out everything about me. Perhaps you'll be sorry
+then that you ever even called yourself my brother.”
+
+“Don't be foolish,” he answered, brusquely.
+
+She patted his hand.
+
+“Is the speculation going all right?” she asked.
+
+“I am hoping to get the money together this week,” he replied. “If I get
+it, I shall be well off in a year, rich in five years.”
+
+“There is just a doubt about your getting it, then?” she inquired.
+
+“Just a doubt,” he admitted. “I have a solicitor who is doing his best
+to raise a loan, but I have not heard from him for two days. Then I have
+also a friend who has promised it to me, a friend upon whom I am not
+quite sure if I can rely.”
+
+They turned into the Strand.
+
+“Tell me about my father, Leonard,” she begged.
+
+He hesitated; it was hard to know exactly how to speak of the professor.
+
+“Perhaps if you have talked with him at all,” she went on, “it will help
+you to understand one of the difficulties I had to face in life.”
+
+“He is, I should imagine, a little weak,” Tavernake suggested,
+hesitatingly.
+
+“Very,” she answered. “My mother left him in my charge, but I cannot
+keep him.”
+
+“Your sister--” he began.
+
+She nodded.
+
+“My sister has more influence than I. She makes life easier for him.”
+
+They reached the restaurant and made their way upstairs. Tavernake
+appropriated the same table and once more the head waiter protested.
+
+“If the gentleman comes again to-night,” Tavernake said, “you will find
+that he will be only too glad to have supper with us.”
+
+Then the professor came. He made his usual somewhat theatrical
+entrance, carrying his broad-brimmed hat in his hand, brandishing his
+silver-topped cane. When he saw Tavernake and Beatrice, he stopped
+short. Then he held out both hands, which Beatrice immediately seized.
+There were tears in his eyes, tears running down his cheeks. He sat down
+heavily in the chair which Tavernake was holding for him.
+
+“Beatrice,” he exclaimed, “why, this is most affecting! You have come
+here to have supper with your old father. You trust me, then?”
+
+“Absolutely,” she replied, still clasping his hands. “If you give me
+away to Elizabeth, it will be the end. The next time I shall never be
+found.”
+
+“For some days,” he assured her, “I have known exactly where you were to
+be found. I have never spoken of it. You are safe. My meals up here,”
+ he added, with a little sigh, “have been sad feasts. To-night we will
+be cheerful. Some quails, I think, quails and some Clicquot for you, my
+dear. You need it. Ah, this is a happiness indeed!”
+
+“You know Mr. Tavernake, father,” she remarked, after he had given a
+somewhat lengthy order to the waiter.
+
+“I met and talked with Mr. Tavernake here the other night,” the
+professor admitted, with condescension.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake was very good to me at a time when I needed help,”
+ Beatrice told him.
+
+The professor grasped Tavernake's hands.
+
+“You were good to my child,” he said, “you were good to me. Waiter,
+three cocktails immediately,” he ordered, turning round. “I must drink
+your health, Mr. Tavernake--I must drink your health at once.”
+
+Tavernake leaned forward towards Beatrice.
+
+“I wonder,” he suggested, “whether you would not rather be alone with
+your father.”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“You know so much,” she replied, “and it really doesn't seem to matter.
+Tell me, father, how do you spend your time?”
+
+“I must confess, dear,” the professor said, “that I have little to do.
+Your sister Elizabeth is quite generous.”
+
+Beatrice sat back in her chair as though she had been struck.
+
+“Father,” she exclaimed, “listen! You are living on that money! Doesn't
+it seem terrible to you? Oh, how can you do it!”
+
+The professor looked at his daughter with an expression of pained
+surprise.
+
+“My dear,” he explained, “your sister Elizabeth has always been the
+moneyed one of the family. She has brains and I trust her. It is not for
+me to inquire as to the source of the comforts she provides for me. I
+feel myself entitled to receive them, and so I accept.”
+
+“But, father,” she went on, “can't you see--don't you know that it's his
+money--Wenham's?”
+
+“It is not a matter, this, my child,” the professor observed, sharply,
+“which we can discuss before strangers. Some day we will speak of it,
+you and I.”
+
+“Has he--been heard of?” she asked, in a whisper.
+
+The professor frowned.
+
+“A hot-tempered young man, my dear,” he declared uneasily, “a hot
+tempered young man, indeed. Elizabeth gives me to understand that it was
+just an ordinary quarrel and away he went.”
+
+Beatrice was white to the lips.
+
+“An ordinary quarrel!” she muttered.
+
+She sat quite still. Tavernake unconsciously found himself watching her.
+There were things in her eyes which frightened him. It seemed as though
+she were looking out of the gay little restaurant, with its lights and
+music and air of comfort, out into some distant quarter of the world,
+some other and very different place. She was living through something
+which chilled her heart, something terrifying. Tavernake saw those
+things in her face and his eyes spelt them out mercilessly.
+
+“Father,” she whispered, leaning towards him, “do you believe what you
+have just been saying to me?”
+
+It was the professor's turn to be disturbed. He concealed his
+discomfiture, however, with a gesture of annoyance.
+
+“That is scarcely a proper question, Beatrice,” he answered sharply.
+“Ah,” he added, with more geniality, “the cocktails! My young friend
+Tavernake, I drink to our better acquaintance! You are English, as I
+can see, a real Britisher. Some day you must come out to our own great
+country--my daughter, of course, has told you that we are Americans. A
+great country, sir,--the greatest I have ever lived in--room to breathe,
+room to grow, room for a young man like you to plant his ambitions and
+watch them blossom. To our better acquaintance, Mr. Tavernake, and may
+we meet some day in the United States!”
+
+Tavernake drank the first cocktail in his life and wiped the tears from
+his eyes. The professor found safety in conversation.
+
+“You know,” he went on, “that I am a man of science. Physiognomy
+delights me. Men and women as I meet them represent to me varying types
+of humanity, all interesting, all appealing to my peculiar love of the
+science of psychology. You, my dear Mr. Tavernake, if I may venture to
+be so personal, represent to me, as you sit there, the exact prototype
+of the young working Englishman. You are, I should judge, thorough,
+dogmatic, narrow, persistent, industrious, and bound to be successful
+according to the scope and nature of your ambitions. In this country
+you will never develop. In my country, sir, we should make a colossus of
+you. We should teach you not to be content with small things; we should
+raise your hand which you yourself kept to your side, and we should
+point your finger to the skies. Waiter,” he added, turning abruptly
+round, “if the quails are not yet ready I will take another of these
+excellent cocktails.”
+
+Tavernake was embarrassed. He saw that Beatrice was anxious to talk to
+her father; he saw, also, that her father was determined not to talk
+to her. With a little sigh, however, she resigned herself to the
+inevitable.
+
+“I have lectured, sir,” the professor continued, “in most of the cities
+of the United States, upon the human race. The tendencies of every
+unit of the human race are my peculiar study. When I speak to you of
+phrenology, sir, you smile, and you think, perhaps, of a man who sits in
+a back room and takes your shilling for feeling the bumps of your head.
+I am not of this order of scientific men, sir. I have diplomas from
+every university worth mentioning. I blend the sciences which treat with
+the human race. I know something of all of them. Character reading to me
+is at once a passion and a science. Leave me alone with a man or a woman
+for five minutes, paint me a map of Life, and I will set the signposts
+along which that person will travel, and I shall not miss one.”
+
+“You are doing no work over here, father, are you?” Beatrice asked.
+
+“None, my dear,” he answered, with a faint note of regret in his tone.
+“Your sister Elizabeth seemed scarcely to desire it. Her movements are
+very uncertain and she likes to have me constantly at hand. My daughter
+Elizabeth,” he continued, turning to Tavernake, “is a very beautiful
+young woman, left in my charge under peculiar circumstances. I feel it
+my duty, therefore, to be constantly at hand.”
+
+Again there was a flash of that strange look in the girl's face. She
+leaned forward, but her father declined to meet her gaze.
+
+“May I ask one or two personal questions?” she faltered. “Remember, I
+have not seen or heard anything from either of you for seven months.”
+
+“By all means, my dear,” the professor declared. “Your sister, I am glad
+to say, is well. I myself am as you see me. We have had a pleasant time
+and we have met some dear old friends from the other side. Our greatest
+trouble is that you are temporarily lost to us.”
+
+“Elizabeth doesn't guess--”
+
+“My child,” the professor interrupted, “I have been loyal to you.
+If Elizabeth knew that I could tell her at any moment your exact
+whereabouts, I think that she would be more angry with me than ever she
+has been in her life, and, my dear,” he added, “you know, when Elizabeth
+is angry, things are apt to be unpleasant. But I have been dumb. I have
+not spoken, nor shall I. Yet,” the professor went on, “you must not
+think, Beatrice, that because I yield to your whim in this matter I
+recognize any sufficient cause why you should voluntarily estrange
+yourself from those whose right and privilege it is to look after you.
+You are able, I am glad to see, to make your way in the world. I have
+attended the Atlas Theatre, and I am glad to see that you have lost
+none of your old skill in the song and dance. You are deservedly popular
+there. Soon, I have no doubt, you will aspire to more important parts.
+Still, my dear child,” the professor continued, disposing of his second
+cocktail, “I see no reason why your very laudable desire to remain
+independent should be incompatible with a life under your sister's roof
+and my protection. Mr. Tavernake here, with his British instincts, will,
+I am sure, agree with me that it is not well for a young lady--my own
+daughter, sir, but I may say it--of considerable personal attractions,
+to live alone or under the chaperonage merely of these other young
+ladies of the theatre.”
+
+“I think,”, Tavernake said, “that your daughter must have very strong
+reasons for preferring to live alone.”
+
+“Imaginary ones, my dear sir,” the professor assured him,--“altogether
+imaginary. The quails at last! And the Clicquot! Now this is really a
+delightful little meeting. I drink to its repetition. This is indeed a
+treat for me. Beatrice, my love to you! Mr. Tavernake, my best respects!
+The only vintage, sir,” he concluded, setting down his empty glass
+appreciatively.
+
+“To go back to what you were saying just now,” Tavernake remarked, “I
+quite agree with you about Beatrice's living alone. I am very anxious
+for her to marry me.”
+
+The professor set down his knife and fork. His appearance was one of
+ponderous theatricality.
+
+“Sir,” he declared, “this is indeed a most momentous statement. Am I to
+take it as a serious offer for my daughter's hand?”
+
+Beatrice leaned over and laid her fingers upon his.
+
+“Father,” she said, “it doesn't matter please. I am not willing to marry
+Mr. Tavernake.”
+
+The professor looked from one to the other and coughed.
+
+“Are Mr. Tavernake's means,” he asked, “of sufficient importance to
+warrant his entering into matrimony?”
+
+“I have no money at all to speak of,” Tavernake answered. “That really
+isn't important. I shall very soon make all that your daughter can
+spend.”
+
+“I agree with my daughter, sir,” the professor declared. “The subject
+might well be left until such time as you have improved your position.
+We will dismiss it, therefore,--dismiss it at once. We will talk--”
+
+“Father,” Beatrice interrupted, “let us talk about yourself. Don't
+you think you would be more contented, happier, if you were to try to
+arrange for a few--a few demonstrations or lectures over here, as you
+at first intended? I know that you must find having nothing to do such a
+strain upon you,” she added.
+
+It was perhaps by accident that her eyes were fixed upon the glass which
+the professor was carrying to his lips. He set it down at once.
+
+“My child,” he said, in a low tone, “I understand you.”
+
+“No, no,” she insisted, “I didn't mean that, but you are always better
+when you are working. A man like you,” she went on, a little wistfully,
+“should not waste his talents.”
+
+He sighed.
+
+“You are perhaps right, my child,” he admitted. “I will go and see my
+agents to-morrow. Up till now,” he went on, “I have refused all offers.
+I have felt that Elizabeth, the care of Elizabeth in her peculiar
+position, demanded my whole attention. Perhaps you are right. Perhaps I
+have over-estimated the necessity of being constantly at her right
+hand. She is a very clever woman Elizabeth,” he concluded, “very clever
+indeed.”
+
+“Where is she now, father?” Beatrice asked.
+
+“She motored into the country early this morning with some friends,”
+ the professor said. “They went to a party last night with Walter Crease,
+London correspondent to the New York Gazette,” he explained, turning a
+little away from Tavernake. “They were all home very late, I understand,
+and Elizabeth complained of a headache this morning. Personally, I
+regret to say that I was not up when they left.”
+
+Beatrice leaned quite close to her father.
+
+“Do you see anything of the man Pritchard?” she inquired.
+
+The professor was suddenly flabby. He set down his glass, spilling half
+its contents. He stole a quick glance at Tavernake.
+
+“My child,” he exclaimed, “you ought to consider my nerves! You know
+very well that the sudden mention of any one whom I dislike so intensely
+is bad for me. I am surprised at you, Beatrice. You show a culpable lack
+of consideration for my infirmities.”
+
+“I am sorry, father,” she whispered, “but is he here?”
+
+“He is,” the professor admitted. “Between ourselves,” he added, a white,
+scared look upon his pale face, “he is spoiling my whole peace of mind.
+My enjoyment of the comforts which Elizabeth is able to provide for me
+is interfered with by that man's constant presence. He seldom speaks,
+and yet he seems always to be watching. I do not trust him, Beatrice. I
+am a judge of men and I tell you that I do not trust him.”
+
+“I wish that Elizabeth would go away,” Beatrice said in a low tone. “Of
+course, I have no right--to say things. Nothing serious has perhaps ever
+happened. And yet--and yet, for her own sake, I do not think that she
+should stay here in London with Pritchard close at hand.”
+
+The professor raised his glass with shaking fingers.
+
+“Elizabeth knows what is best,” he declared, “I am sure that Elizabeth
+knows what is best, but I, too, am beginning to wish that she would go
+away. Last night we met him at Walter Crease's.”
+
+Once more he turned a little nervously towards Tavernake, who was
+looking down into the body of the restaurant with immovable face.
+
+“We tried to persuade him then to go away. He is really in rather a
+dangerous position here. Jimmy Post has sworn that he will not be taken
+back to New York, and there are one or two others--a pretty desperate
+crew. We tried last night to reason with Pritchard.”
+
+“It was no good?” she whispered.
+
+“No good at all,” the professor answered, drily. “Perhaps, if we had not
+been interrupted, we might have convinced him.”
+
+“Tell me about it,” she begged.
+
+The professor shook his head. Tavernake still had that air of paying no
+attention whatever to their conversation.
+
+“It is not for you to know about, my dear,” he concluded. “You have
+chosen very wisely to keep out of these matters. Elizabeth has such
+wonderful courage. My own nerve, I regret to say, is not quite what it
+was. Waiter, I will take a liqueur of the old brandy in a large glass.”
+
+The brandy was brought, but the professor seemed haunted by memories and
+his spirits never wholly returned. Not until the lights were turned down
+and Tavernake had paid the bill, did he partially recover his former
+manner.
+
+“Dear child,” he said, as they stood up together, “I cannot tell you
+what the pleasure has been of this brief reunion.”
+
+She rested her fingers upon his shoulders and looked up into his face.
+
+“Father,” she begged, softly, “come to me. I can keep you, if you don't
+mind for a short time being poor. You shall have all my salary except
+just enough for my clothes, and anything will do for me to wear. I will
+try so hard to make you comfortable.”
+
+He looked at her with an air of offended dignity.
+
+“My child,” he replied, “you must not talk to me like that. If I did not
+feel that my duty lay with Elizabeth, I should insist upon your coming
+to me, and under those conditions it would be I who should provide, not
+you. But for the moment I cannot leave your elder sister altogether. She
+needs me.”
+
+Beatrice turned away a little sadly. They all three descended the
+stairs.
+
+“I shall leave our young friend, Mr. Tavernake, to escort you to your
+home,” the professor announced. “I myself shall telephone to see if
+Elizabeth has returned. If she is still away, I shall spend an hour or
+two, I think, with my friends at the Blue Room Club. Beatrice, this has
+been a joy to me, a joy soon, I hope, to be repeated.”
+
+He took both her hands. She smiled at him with an attempt at
+cheerfulness.
+
+“Good-night, father!” she said.
+
+“And to you, sir, also, good-night!” the professor added, taking
+Tavernake's hand and holding it for a minute in his, while he looked
+impressively in his face. “I will not say too much, but I will say this:
+so much as I have seen of you, I like. Good-night!”
+
+He turned and strode away. Both Beatrice and Tavernake watched him until
+he disappeared. Then, with a sigh, she picked up her skirts with her
+right hand, and took Tavernake's arm.
+
+“Do you mind walking home?” she asked. “My head aches.”
+
+Tavernake looked for a moment wistfully across the road toward the Milan
+Court. Beatrice's hand, however, only held his arm the tighter.
+
+“I am going to make you come with me every step of the way,” she
+declared, “so you can just as well make the best of it. Afterwards--”
+
+“What about afterwards?” he interrupted.
+
+“Afterwards,” she continued, with decision, “you are to go straight
+home!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI. SOME EXCELLENT ADVICE
+
+
+Tavernake, in response to a somewhat urgent message, walked into his
+solicitor's office almost as soon as they opened on the following
+morning. The junior partner of the firm, who took an interest in him,
+and was anxious, indeed, to invest a small amount in the Marston Rise
+Building Company, received him cordially but with some concern.
+
+“Look here, Tavernake,” he said, “I thought I'd better write a line and
+ask you to come down. You haven't forgotten, have you, that our option
+of purchase lasts only three days longer?”
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+“Well, what of it?” he asked.
+
+“It's just as well that you should understand the situation,” the lawyer
+continued. “Your old people are hard upon our heels in this matter,
+and there will be no chance of any extension--not even for an hour. Mr.
+Dowling has already put in an offer a thousand pounds better than yours;
+I heard that incidentally yesterday afternoon; so you may be sure
+that the second your option has legally expired, the thing will be off
+altogether so far as you're concerned.”
+
+“That's all very well,” Tavernake remarked, “but what about the plots
+that already belong to me?”
+
+“They have some sort of scheme for leaving those high and dry,” the
+solicitor explained. “You see, the drainage and lighting will be largely
+influenced by the purchaser of the whole estate. If Dowling gets it,
+he means to treat your plots so that they will become practically
+valueless. It's rather a mean sort of thing, but then he's a mean little
+man.”
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+“Well,” he announced, “I was coming to see you, anyhow, this morning, to
+talk to you about the money.”
+
+“Your friend isn't backing out?” the lawyer asked, quickly.
+
+“My friend has not said anything about backing out yet,” Tavernake
+replied, “but circumstances have arisen during the last few days which
+have altered my own views as to the expediency of business relations
+with this person. I haven't any reason to suppose that the money won't
+be forthcoming, but if I could get it from any other source, I should
+prefer it.”
+
+The solicitor looked blank.
+
+“Of course,” he said, “I'll do what I can, if you like, but I may as
+well tell you at once that I don't think I should have a ghost of a
+chance of raising the whole amount.”
+
+“I suppose,” Tavernake inquired, thoughtfully, “your firm couldn't do
+anything?”
+
+“We could do something, certainly,” the solicitor answered, “on account
+of our own clients. We might, perhaps, manage up to five thousand
+pounds. That would still leave us wanting seven, however, and I scarcely
+see where we could get it.”
+
+Tavernake was silent for a few moments.
+
+“You haven't quarreled with your friend, have you?” the solicitor asked.
+
+“No, there has been no quarrel,” Tavernake replied. “I have another
+reason.”
+
+“If I were you, I'd try and forget it,” his friend advised. “To tell you
+the truth, I have been feeling rather anxious about this affair. It's
+a big thing, you know, and the profit is as sure as the dividend on
+Consols. I should hate to have that little bounder Dowling get in and
+scoop it up.”
+
+“It's a fine investment,” admitted Tavernake, “and, as you say, there
+isn't the slightest risk. That's why I was hoping you might have been
+able to manage it without my calling upon my friend.”
+
+Mr. Martin shook his head.
+
+“It isn't so easy to convince other people. All the same, I don't want
+to get left. If you'll take my advice, you'll go and call on your friend
+at once, and see exactly how matters stand. If everything's O.K. and you
+can induce him to part a few hours before it is absolutely necessary, I
+must confess that it would take a load off my mind. I don't like these
+affairs that have to be concluded at the last possible moment.”
+
+“Well,” Tavernake agreed, “I must try what I can do, then. There is
+nothing else fresh, I suppose?”
+
+“Nothing,” the solicitor answered. “Come back, if you can make any
+definite arrangement, or telephone. The matter is really bothering me a
+little. I don't want to have the other people slip in now.”...
+
+Tavernake, instead of obeying his first impulse and making his way
+direct to the Milan Court, walked to the flat in Kingsway, climbed up
+the stone steps, and asked for Beatrice. She met him at her own door,
+fully dressed.
+
+“My dear Leonard!” she exclaimed, in surprise. “What an early caller!”
+
+“I want a few words with you,” he said. “Can you spare me five minutes?”
+
+“You must walk with me to the theatre,” she replied, “I am just off to
+rehearsal.”
+
+They descended the stairs together.
+
+“I have something to tell you,” Tavernake began, “something to tell you
+which you won't like to hear.”
+
+“Something which I won't like to hear,” she repeated, fearfully. “Go on,
+Leonard. It can't be worse than it sounds.”
+
+“I don't know why I've come to tell you,” he went on. “I never meant to.
+It came into my mind all of a sudden and I felt that I must. It has to
+do with your sister and the Marston Rise affair.”
+
+“My sister and the Marston Rise affair!” Beatrice exclaimed,
+incredulously.
+
+Then a sudden light broke in upon her. She stopped short and clutched at
+his hand.
+
+“You don't mean that it was Elizabeth who was going to find you the
+money?” she cried.
+
+“I do,” he answered. “She offered it of her own accord. I do not know
+why I talked to her of my own affairs, but she led me on to speak of
+them. Your sister is a wonderful person,” he continued, dropping his
+voice. “I don't know why, but she made me talk as no one else has ever
+made me talk before. I simply had to tell her things. Then, when I had
+finished, she showed me her bankbooks and suggested that she should
+invest some of her money in the Rise.”
+
+“But do you mean to tell me,” Beatrice persisted, “that it is her money
+upon which you are relying for this purchase?”
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+“You see,” he explained, “Mr. Dowling dropped upon us before I was
+prepared. As soon as he found out, he went to the owners of the estate
+and made them a bid for it. The consequence was that they shortened my
+option and gave me very little chance indeed to find the money. When
+your sister offered it, it certainly seemed a wonderful stroke of
+fortune. I could give her eight or ten per cent, whereas she would only
+get four anywhere else, and I should make a profit for myself of over
+ten thousand pounds, which I cannot do unless I find the money to buy
+the estate.”
+
+“But you mustn't touch that money, you mustn't have anything to do with
+it!” Beatrice exclaimed, walking very fast and looking straight ahead.
+“You don't understand. How should you?”
+
+“Do you mean that the money was stolen?” Tavernake asked, after a
+moment's pause.
+
+“No, not stolen,” Beatrice replied, “but it comes--oh! I can't tell you,
+only Elizabeth has no right to it. My own sister! It is all too awful!”
+
+“Do you think that she has come by this money dishonestly?”
+
+“I am not sure,” Beatrice murmured. “There are worse things, more
+terrible things even than theft.”
+
+The practical side of Tavernake's nature was very much to the fore
+that morning. He began to wonder whether women, after all, strange and
+fascinating creatures though they were, possessed judgment which could
+be relied upon--whether they were not swayed too much by sentiment.
+
+“Beatrice,” he said, “you must understand this. I have no time to raise
+the money elsewhere. If I don't get it from your sister, supposing she
+is still willing to let me have it, my chance has gone. I shall have to
+take a situation in some one else's office as a clerk--probably not so
+good a place as I held at Dowling & Spence's. On the other hand, the use
+of that money for a very short time would be the start of my career. All
+that you say is so vague. Why need I know anything about it? I met your
+sister in the ordinary way of business and she has made an ordinary
+business proposition to me, one by which she will be, incidentally, very
+greatly benefited. I never thought of telling you this at all, but when
+the time came I hated to go and draw that money from your sister without
+having said anything to you. So I came this morning, but I want you, if
+you possibly can, to look at the matter from my point of view.”
+
+She was silent for several moments. Then she glanced at him curiously.
+
+“Why on earth,” she asked, “should my sister make this offer to you? She
+isn't a fool. She doesn't usually trust strangers.”
+
+“She trusted me, apparently,” Tavernake answered.
+
+“Can you understand why?” Beatrice demanded.
+
+“I think that I can,” he replied. “If one can rely upon one's
+perception, she is surrounded by people whom she might find agreeable
+companions but whom she is scarcely likely to have much confidence in.
+Perhaps she realized that I wasn't like them.”
+
+“And you want very much to take this money?” she said, half to herself.
+
+“I want to very much indeed,” Tavernake admitted. “I was on my way
+to see her this morning and to ask her to let me have it a day or two
+before the time, but I felt, somehow, that there seemed to be a certain
+amount of deceit in going to her and taking it without saying a word to
+you. I felt that I had to come here first. But Beatrice, don't ask me to
+give it up. It means such a long time before I can move again. It's the
+first step that's so difficult, and I must--I must make a start. It's
+such a chance, this. I have spent so many hours thinking about it. I
+have planned and worked and sketched it all out as no one else could do.
+I must have that money.”
+
+They walked on in silence until they reached the stage door. Beatrice
+was thinking of her companion as she had seen him so often, poring over
+his plans, busy with ruler and india-rubber, absolutely absorbed in the
+interest of his task. She remembered the first time he had talked
+about this scheme of his, how his whole face had changed, the almost
+passionate interest with which he had worked the thing out even to its
+smallest details. She realized how great a part of his life the thing
+had become, what a terrible blow it would be to him to have to abandon
+it. She turned and faced him.
+
+“Leonard,” she said, “perhaps, after all, you are right. Perhaps I give
+way too much to what, after all, is only a sentimental feeling. I am
+thankful that you came and told me; I shall always be thankful for that.
+Take the money, but pay it back as soon as you can.”
+
+“I shall do that,” he answered. “I shall do that you may rely upon it.”
+
+She laid her hand upon his arm.
+
+“Leonard,” she begged, “I know that Elizabeth is very beautiful and very
+fascinating, and I don't wonder that you like to go and see her, but I
+want to ask you to promise me one thing.”
+
+He felt as though he were suddenly turned into stone. It was not
+possible--it could not be possible that she had guessed his secret!
+
+“Well?” he demanded.
+
+“Don't let her introduce you to her friends; don't spend too much time
+there,” she continued. “Elizabeth is my sister and I don't--really I
+don't want to say anything that doesn't sound kind, but her friends are
+not fit people for you to know, and Elizabeth--well she hasn't very much
+heart.”
+
+He was silent for several moments.
+
+“How did you know I liked going to see your sister?” he asked,
+abruptly.
+
+She smiled.
+
+“My dear Leonard,” she said, “you are not very clever at hiding your
+feelings. When you came to see me the other day, do you imagine I
+believed for a single moment that you asked me to marry you simply
+because you cared? I think, Leonard, that it was because you were
+afraid, you were afraid of something coming into your life so big,
+so terrifying, that you were ready to clutch at the easiest chance of
+safety.”
+
+“Beatrice, this is absurd!” he exclaimed.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“No, it isn't that,” she declared. “Do you know, my dear Leonard, what
+there was about you from the very first which attracted me?”
+
+“No,” he answered.
+
+“It was your honesty,” she continued. “You remember that night upon the
+roof at Blenheim House? You were going to tell a lie for me, and I know
+how you hated it. You love the truth, you are truthful naturally; I
+would rely upon you wherever I was. I know that you would keep your
+word, I know that you would be honest. A woman loves to feel that about
+a man--she loves it--and I don't want you to be brought near the people
+who sneer at honesty and all good things. I don't want you to hear their
+point of view. You may be simple and commonplace in some respects; I
+want you to stay just as you are. Do you understand?”
+
+“I understand,” Tavernake replied gravely.
+
+A call boy shouted her name down the stone passage. She patted him on
+the shoulder and turned away.
+
+“Run along now and get the money,” she said. “Come and see me when it's
+all over.”
+
+Tavernake left her with a long breath of relief and made his way towards
+the Strand. At the corner of Wellington Street he came face to face
+with Pritchard. They stopped at once. There seemed to be something
+embarrassing about this meeting. Pritchard patted him familiarly on the
+shoulder.
+
+“How goes it, old man?” he asked.
+
+“I am all right,” Tavernake answered, somewhat awkwardly. “How are you?”
+
+“I guess I'd be the better for a drink,” Pritchard declared. “Come
+along. Pretty well done up the other night, weren't we? We'll step into
+the American Bar here and try a gin fizz.”
+
+They found themselves presently perched upon two high stools in a
+deserted corner of the bar to which Pritchard had led the way. Tavernake
+sipped his drink tentatively.
+
+“I should like,” he said, “to ask you a question or two about Wednesday
+night.”
+
+Pritchard nodded.
+
+“Go right ahead,” he invited.
+
+“You seem to take the whole affair as a sort of joke,” Tavernake
+remarked.
+
+“Well, isn't that what it was?” the detective asked, smiling.
+
+Tavernake shrugged his shoulders.
+
+“There didn't seem to me to be much joke about it!” he exclaimed.
+
+Pritchard laughed gayly.
+
+“You are not used to Americans, my young friend,” he said. “Over on this
+side you are all so fearfully literal. You are not seriously supposing
+that they meant to dose me with that stuff the other night, eh?”
+
+“I never thought that there was any doubt about it at all,” Tavernake
+declared deliberately.
+
+Pritchard stroked his moustache meditatively.
+
+“Well,” he remarked, “you are certainly green, and yet I don't know why
+you shouldn't be. Americans are always up to games of that sort. I am
+not saying that they didn't mean to give me a scare, if they could, or
+that they wouldn't have been glad to get a few words of information out
+of me, or a paper or two that I keep pretty safely locked up. It would
+have been a better joke on me then. But as for the rest, as for really
+trying to make me take that stuff, of course, that was all bunkum.”
+
+Tavernake sat quite still in his chair for several minutes.
+
+“Will you take another gin fizz, Mr. Pritchard?” he asked.
+
+“Why not?”
+
+Tavernake gave the order. He sat on his stool whistling softly to
+himself.
+
+“Then I suppose,” he said at last, “I must have looked a pretty sort of
+an ass coming through the wall like a madman.”
+
+Pritchard shook his head.
+
+“You looked just about what you were,” he answered, “a d----d good sort.
+I'm not playing up to you that it was all pretense. You can never trust
+that gang. The blackguard outside was in earnest, anyway. After all, you
+know, they wouldn't miss me if I were to drop quietly out. There 's no
+one else they 're quite so much afraid of. There 's no one else knows
+quite as much about them.”
+
+“Well, we'll let it go at that,” Tavernake declared. “You know so much
+of all these people, though, that I rather wish you 'd tell me something
+I want very much to know.”
+
+“It's by telling nothing,” the detective replied quickly, “that I know
+as much as I do. Just one cocktail, eh?”
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+“I drank my first cocktail last night,” he remarked. “I had supper with
+the professor and his daughter.”
+
+“Not Elizabeth?” Pritchard asked swiftly.
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+“With Miss Beatrice,” he answered.
+
+Pritchard set down his glass.
+
+“Say, Tavernake,” he inquired, “you are friendly with that young lady,
+Miss Beatrice, aren't you?”
+
+“I certainly am,” Tavernake answered. “I have a very great regard for
+her.”
+
+“Then I can tell you how to do her a good turn,” Pritchard continued,
+earnestly. “Keep her away from that old blackguard. Keep her away from
+all the gang. Believe me, she is looking for trouble by even speaking to
+them.”
+
+“But the man's her father,” Tavernake objected, “and he seems fond of
+her.”
+
+“Don't you believe it,” Pritchard went on. “He's fond of nothing and
+nobody but himself and easy living. He's soft, mind you, he's got plenty
+of sentiment, he 'll squeeze a tear out of his eye, and all that sort
+of thing, but he'd sell his soul, or his daughter's soul, for a little
+extra comfort. Now Elizabeth doesn't know exactly where her sister is,
+and she daren't seem anxious, or go around making inquiries. Beatrice
+has her chance to keep away, and I can tell you it will be a thundering
+sight better for her if she does.”
+
+“Well, I don't understand it at all,” Tavernake declared. “I hate
+mysteries.”
+
+Pritchard set down his empty glass.
+
+“Look here,” he remarked, “this affair is too serious, after all, for us
+to talk round like a couple of gossips. I have given you your warning,
+and if you're wise you 'll remember it.”
+
+“Tell me this one thing,” Tavernake persisted. “Tell me what is the
+cause of the quarrel between the two? Can't something be done to bring
+them together again?”
+
+Pritchard shook his head.
+
+“Nothing,” he answered. “As things are at present, they are better
+apart. Coming my way?”
+
+Tavernake followed him out of the place. Pritchard took his arm as he
+turned down toward the Strand.
+
+“My young friend,” he said, “here is a word of advice for you. The
+Scriptures say that you cannot serve God and mammon. Paraphrase that to
+the present situation and remember that you cannot serve Elizabeth and
+Beatrice.”
+
+“What then?” Tavernake demanded.
+
+The detective waited until he had lit the long black cigar between his
+teeth.
+
+“I guess you'd better confine your attentions to Beatrice,” he
+concluded.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII. DINNER WITH ELIZABETH
+
+
+The rest of that day was for Tavernake a period of feverish anxieties.
+He received two telegrams from Mr. Martin, his solicitor, and he
+himself was more uneasy than he cared to admit. At three o'clock in
+the afternoon, at eight in the evening, and again at eleven o'clock at
+night, he presented himself at the Milan Court, always with the same
+inquiry. On the last occasion, the hall porter had cheering news for
+him.
+
+“Mrs. Wenham Gardner returned from the country an hour ago, sir,” he
+announced. “I can send your name up now, if you wish to see her.”
+
+Tavernake was conscious of a sense of immense relief. Of course, he had
+known that she had not really gone away for good, but all the same her
+absence, especially after the event of the night before last, was a
+little disquieting.
+
+“My name is Tavernake,” he said. “I do not wish to intrude at such an
+hour, but if she could see me for a moment, I should be glad.”
+
+He sat down and waited patiently. Soon a message came that Mr. Tavernake
+was to go up. He ascended in the lift and knocked at the door of her
+suite. Her maid opened it grudgingly. She scarcely took the pains to
+conceal her disapproval of this young man--so ordinary, so gauche. Why
+Madame should waste her time upon such a one, she could not imagine!
+
+“Mrs. Gardner will see you directly,” she told him. “Madame is dressing
+now to go out for supper. She will be able to spare you only a few
+seconds.”
+
+Tavernake remained alone in the luxurious little sitting-room for nearly
+ten minutes. Then the door of the inner room was opened and Elizabeth
+appeared. Tavernake, rising slowly to his feet, looked at her for a
+moment in reluctant but wondering admiration. She was wearing an ivory
+satin gown, without trimming or lace of any sort, a gown the fit of
+which seemed to him almost a miracle. Her only jewelry was a long rope
+of pearls and a small tiara. Tavernake had never been brought into close
+contact with any one quite like this.
+
+She was putting on her gloves as she entered and she gave him her left
+hand.
+
+“What an extraordinary person you are, Mr. Tavernake!” she exclaimed.
+“You really do seem to turn up at the most astonishing times.”
+
+“I am very sorry to have intruded upon you to-night,” he said. “As
+regards the last occasion, however, upon which I made an unexpected
+appearance, I make no apologies whatever,” he added coolly.
+
+She laughed softly. She was looking full into his eyes and yet he could
+not tell whether she was angry with him or only amused.
+
+“You were by way of being a little melodramatic, were you not?” she
+remarked. “Still, you were very much in earnest, and one forgives a
+great deal to any one who is really in earnest. What do you want with me
+now? I am just going downstairs to supper.”
+
+“It is a matter of business,” Tavernake replied. “I have a friend who
+is a partner with me in the Marston Rise building speculation, and he is
+worried because there is some one else in the field wanting to buy the
+property, and the day after to-morrow is our last chance of paying over
+the money.”
+
+She looked at him as though puzzled.
+
+“What money?”
+
+“The money which you agreed to lend me, or rather to invest in our
+building company,” he reminded her.
+
+She nodded.
+
+“Of course! Why, I had forgotten all about it for the moment. You are
+going to give me ten per cent interest or something splendid, aren't
+you? Well, what about it? You don't want to take it away with you now, I
+suppose?”
+
+“No,” he answered, “it isn't that. To be honest with you, I came to make
+sure that you hadn't changed your mind.”
+
+“And why should I change my mind?”
+
+“You might be angry with me,” he said, “for interfering in your concerns
+the night before last.”
+
+“Perhaps I am,” she remarked, indifferently.
+
+“Do you wish to withdraw from your promise?” he asked.
+
+“I really haven't thought much about it,” she replied, carelessly.
+“By-the-bye, have you seen Beatrice lately?”
+
+“We agreed, I think,” he reminded her, “that we would not talk about
+your sister.”
+
+She looked at him over her shoulder.
+
+“I do not remember that I agreed to anything of the sort,” she declared.
+“I think it was you who laid down the law about that. As a matter of
+fact, I think that your silence about her is very unkind. I suppose you
+have seen her?”
+
+“Yes, I have seen her,” Tavernake admitted.
+
+“She continues to be tragic,” Elizabeth asked, “whenever my name is
+mentioned?”
+
+“I should not call it tragic,” Tavernake answered, reluctantly. “One
+gathers, however, that something transpired between you before she left,
+of a serious nature.”
+
+She looked at him earnestly.
+
+“Really,” she said, “you are a strange, stolid young man. I wonder,” she
+went on, smiling into his face, “are you in love with my sister?”
+
+Tavernake made no immediate response, only something flashed for a
+moment in his eyes which puzzled her.
+
+“Why do you look at me like that?” she demanded. “You are not angry with
+me for asking?”
+
+“No, I am not angry,” he replied. “It isn't that. But you must know--you
+must see!”
+
+Then she indeed did see that he was laboring under a very great emotion.
+She leaned towards him, laughing softly.
+
+“Now you are really becoming interesting,” she murmured. “Tell me--tell
+me all about it.”
+
+“I don't know what love is!” Tavernake declared fiercely. “I don't know
+what it means to be in love!”
+
+Again she laughed in his face.
+
+“Are you so sure?” she whispered.
+
+She saw the veins stand out upon his temples, watched the passion which
+kept him at first tongue-tied.
+
+“Sure!” he muttered. “Who can be sure when you look like that!”
+
+He held out his arms. With a swift little backward movement she flitted
+away and leaned against the table.
+
+“What a brother-in-law you would make!” she laughed. “So steady, so
+respectable, alas! so serious! Dear Mr. Tavernake, I wish you joy. As a
+matter of fact, you and Beatrice are very well suited for one another.”
+
+The telephone bell rang. She moved over and held the receiver to her
+ear. Her face changed. After the first few words to which she listened,
+it grew dark with anger.
+
+“You mean to say that Professor Franklin has not been in since
+lunch-time?” she exclaimed. “I left word particularly that I should
+require him to-night. Is Major Post there, then? No? Mr. Crease--no?
+Nor Mr. Faulkes? Not one of them! Very well, ring me up directly the
+professor comes in, or any of them.”
+
+She replaced the receiver with a gesture of annoyance. Tavernake was
+astonished at the alteration in her expression. The smile had gone, and
+with its passing away lines had come under her eyes and about her mouth.
+Without a word to him she strode away into her bedroom. Tavernake was
+just wondering whether he should retire, when she came back.
+
+“Listen, Mr. Tavernake,” she said, “how far away are your rooms?”
+
+“Down at Chelsea,” he answered, “about two miles and a half.”
+
+“Take a taxi and drive there,” she commanded, “or stop. You will find my
+car outside. I will telephone down to say that you are to use it. Change
+into your evening clothes and come back for me. I want you to take me
+out to supper.”
+
+He looked at her in amazement. She stamped her foot.
+
+“Don't stand there hesitating!” she ordered. “Do as I say! You don't
+expect I am going to help you to buy your wretched property if you
+refuse me the simplest of favors? Hurry, I say! Hurry!”
+
+“I am really very sorry,” Tavernake interposed, “but I do not possess a
+dress suit. I would go, with pleasure, but I haven't got such a thing.”
+
+She looked at him for a moment incredulously. Then she broke into a fit
+of uncontrollable laughter. She sat down upon the edge of a couch and
+wiped the tears from her eyes.
+
+“Oh, you strange, you wonderful person!” she exclaimed. “You want to buy
+an estate and you want to borrow twelve thousand pounds, and you know
+where Beatrice is and you won't tell me, and you are fully convinced,
+because you burst into a house through the wall, that you saved poor
+Pritchard from being poisoned, and you don't possess a dress suit! Never
+mind, as it happens it doesn't matter about the dress suit. You shall
+take me out as you are.”
+
+Tavernake felt in his pockets and remembered that he had only thirty
+shillings with him.
+
+“Here, carry my purse,” she said carelessly. “We are going downstairs to
+the smaller restaurant. I have been traveling since six o'clock, and I
+am starving.”
+
+“But how about my clothes?” Tavernake objected. “Will they be all
+right?”
+
+“It doesn't matter where we are going,” she answered. “You look very
+well as you are. Come and let me put your tie straight.”
+
+She came close to him and her fingers played for a moment with his tie.
+She was very near to him and she laughed deliberately into his face.
+Tavernake held himself quite stiff and felt foolish. He also felt
+absurdly happy.
+
+“There,” she remarked, when she had arranged it to her satisfaction,
+“you look all right now. I wonder,” she added, half to herself, “what
+you do look like. Something Colonial and forceful, I think. Never
+mind, help me on with my cloak and come along. You are a most
+respectable-looking escort, and a very useful one.”
+
+
+Although Tavernake was nominally the host, it was Elizabeth who selected
+the table and ordered the supper. There were very few other guests in
+the room, the majority being down in the larger restaurant, but among
+these few Tavernake noticed two of the girls from the chorus at the
+Atlas. Elizabeth had chosen a table from which she had a view of the
+door, and she took the seat facing it. From the first Tavernake felt
+certain that she was watching for some one.
+
+“Talk to me now, please, about this speculation,” she insisted. “I
+should like to know all about it, and whether you are sure that I shall
+get ten per cent for my money.”
+
+Tavernake was in no way reluctant. It was a safe topic for conversation,
+and one concerning which he had plenty to say. But after a time she
+stopped him.
+
+“Well,” she said, “I have discovered at any rate one subject on which
+you can be fluent. Now I have had enough of building properties, please,
+and house building. I should like to hear a little about Beatrice.”
+
+Tavernake was dumb.
+
+“I do not wish to talk about Beatrice,” he declared, “until I understand
+the cause of this estrangement between you.”
+
+Her eyes flashed angrily and her laugh sounded forced.
+
+“Not even talk of her! My dear friend,” she protested, “you scarcely
+repay the confidence I am placing in you!”
+
+“You mean the money?”
+
+“Precisely,” she continued. “I trust you, why I do not know--I suppose
+because I am something of a physiognomist--with twelve thousand pounds
+of my hard-earned savings. You refuse to trust me with even a few simple
+particulars about the life of my own sister. Come, I don't think that
+things are quite as they should be between us.”
+
+“Do you know where I first met your sister?” Tavernake asked.
+
+She shook her head pettishly.
+
+“How should I? You told me nothing.”
+
+“She was staying in a boarding-house where I lived,” Tavernake went on.
+“I think I told you that but nothing else. It was a cheap boarding-house
+but she had not enough money to pay for her meals. She was tired of
+life. She was in a desperate state altogether.”
+
+“Are you trying to tell me, or rather trying not to tell me, that
+Beatrice was mad enough to think of committing suicide?” Elizabeth
+inquired.
+
+“She was in the frame of mind when such a step was possible,” he
+answered, gravely. “You remember that night when I first saw you in the
+chemist's shop across the street? She had been very ill that evening,
+very ill indeed. You could see for yourself the effect meeting you had
+upon her.”
+
+Elizabeth nodded, and crumbled a little piece of roll between her
+fingers. Then she leaned over the table towards Tavernake.
+
+“She seemed terrified, didn't she? She hurried you away--she seemed
+afraid.”
+
+“It was very noticeable,” he admitted. “She was terrified. She dragged
+me out of the place. A few minutes later she fainted in the cab.”
+
+Elizabeth smiled.
+
+“Beatrice was always over-sensitive,” she remarked. “Any sudden shock
+unnerved her altogether. Are you terrified of me, too, Mr. Tavernake?”
+
+“I don't know,” he answered, frankly. “Sometimes I think that I am.”
+
+She laughed softly.
+
+“Why?” she whispered.
+
+He looked into her eyes and he felt abject. How was it possible to sit
+within a few feet of her and remain sane!
+
+“You are so wonderful,” he said, in a low tone, “so different from any
+one else in the world!”
+
+“You are glad that you met me, then--that you are here?” she asked.
+
+He raised his eyes once more.
+
+“I don't know,” he answered simply. “If I really believed--if you were
+always kind like this--but, you see, you make two men of me. When I am
+with you I am a fool, your fool, to do as you will with. When I am away,
+some glimmerings of common sense come back, and I know.”
+
+“You know what?” she murmured.
+
+“That you are not honest,” he added.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake!” she exclaimed, lifting her head a little.
+
+“Oh, I don t mean dishonest in the ordinary way!” he protested, eagerly.
+“What I mean is that you look things which you don't feel, that you are
+willing for any one who can't help admiring you very much to believe for
+a moment that you, too, feel more kindly than you really do. This is so
+clumsy,” he broke off, despairingly, “but you understand what I mean!”
+
+“You have an adorable way of making yourself understood,” she laughed.
+“Come, do let us talk sense for a minute or two. You say that when
+you are with me you are my slave. Then why is it that you do not bring
+Beatrice here when I beg you to?”
+
+“I am your slave,” he answered, “in everything that has to do with
+myself and my own actions. In that other matter it is for your sister to
+decide.”
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+“Well,” she said, “I suppose I shall be able to endure life without
+her. At any rate, we will talk of something else. Tell me, are you not
+curious to know why I insisted upon bringing you here?”
+
+“Yes,” he admitted, “I am.”
+
+“Spoken with your usual candor, my dear Briton!” she exclaimed. “Well, I
+will gratify your curiosity. This, as you see, is not a popular supping
+place. A few people come in--mostly those who for some reason or other
+don't feel smart enough for the big restaurants. The people from the
+theatres come in here who have not time to change their clothes. As you
+perceive; the place has a distinctly Bohemian flavor.”
+
+Tavernake looked around.
+
+“They seem to come in all sorts of clothes,” he remarked. “I am glad.”
+
+“There is a man now in London,” Elizabeth continued, “whom I am just
+as anxious to see as I am to find my sister. I believe that this is the
+most likely place to find him. That is why I have come. My father was
+to have been here to take me, but as you heard he has gone out somewhere
+and not returned. None of my other friends were available. You happened
+to come in just in time.”
+
+“And this man whom you want to see,” Tavernake asked, “is he here?”
+
+“Not yet,” she answered.
+
+There were, indeed, only a few scattered groups in the place, and most
+of these were obviously theatrical. But even at that moment a man came
+in alone through the circular doors, and stood just inside, looking
+around him. He was a man of medium height, thin, and of undistinguished
+appearance. His hair was light-colored and plastered a little in front
+over his forehead. His face was thin and he walked with a slight stoop.
+Something about his clothes and his manner of wearing them stamped him
+as an American. Tavernake glanced at his companion, wondering whether
+this, perhaps, might not be the person for whom she was watching. His
+first glance was careless enough, then he felt his heart thump against
+his ribs. A tragedy had come into the room! The woman at his side sat as
+though turned to stone. There was a look in her face as of one who sees
+Death. The small patch of rouge, invisible before, was now a staring
+daub of color in an oasis of ashen white. Her eyes were as hard as
+stones; her lips were twitching as though, indeed, she had been stricken
+with some disease. No longer was he sitting with this most beautiful
+lady at whose coming all heads were turned in admiration. It was as
+though an image of Death sat there, a frozen presentment of horror
+itself!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII. ON AN ERRAND OF CHIVALRY
+
+
+The seconds passed; the woman beside him showed no sign of life.
+Tavernake felt a fear run cold in his blood, such as in all his days
+he had never known. This, indeed, was something belonging to a world of
+which he knew nothing. What was it? Illness? Pain? Surprise? There was
+only his instinct to tell him. It was terror, the terror of one who
+looks beyond the grave.
+
+“Mrs. Gardner!” he exclaimed. “Elizabeth!”
+
+The sound of his voice seemed to break the spell. A half-choked sob came
+through her teeth; the struggle for composure commenced.
+
+“I am ill,” she murmured. “Give me my glass. Give it to me.”
+
+Her fingers were feeling for it but it seemed as though she dared not
+move her head. He filled it with wine and placed the stem in her hand.
+Even then she spilled some of it upon the tablecloth. As she raised
+it to her lips, the man who stood still upon the threshold of the
+restaurant looked into her face. Slowly, as though his quest were over,
+he came down the room.
+
+“Go away,” she said to Tavernake. “Go away, please. He is coming to
+speak to me. I want to be alone with him.”
+
+Strangely enough, at that moment Tavernake saw nothing out of the common
+in her request. He rose at once, without any formal leave-taking, and
+made his way toward the other end of the cafe. As he turned the corner
+towards the smoking-room, he glanced once behind. The man had approached
+quite close to Elizabeth; he was standing before her table, they seemed
+to be exchanging greetings.
+
+Tavernake went on into the smoking-room and threw himself into an
+easy-chair. He had been there perhaps for ten minutes when Pritchard
+entered. Certainly it was a night of surprises! Even Pritchard, cool,
+deliberate, slow in his movements and speech, seemed temporarily
+flurried. He came into the room walking quickly. As the door swung
+back, he turned round as though to assure himself that he was not being
+followed. He did not at first see Tavernake. He sat on the arm of an
+easy-chair, his hands in his pockets, his eternal cigar in the corner
+of his mouth, his eyes fixed upon the doors through which he had issued.
+Without a doubt, something had disturbed him. He had the look of a man
+who had received a blow, a surprise of some sort over which he was still
+ruminating. Then he glanced around the room and saw Tavernake.
+
+“Hullo, young man!” he exclaimed. “So this is the way you follow my
+advice!”
+
+“I never promised to follow it,” Tavernake reminded him.
+
+Pritchard wheeled an easy-chair across the room and called to the
+waiter.
+
+“Come,” he said, “you shall stand me a drink. Two whiskies and sodas,
+Tim. And now, Mr. Leonard Tavernake, you are going to answer me a
+question.”
+
+“Am I?” Tavernake muttered.
+
+“You came down in the lift with Mrs. Wenham Gardner half an hour ago,
+you went into the restaurant and ordered supper. She is there still and
+you are here. Have you quarreled?”
+
+“No, we did not quarrel,” Tavernake answered. “She explained that she
+was supping in the cafe only for the sake of meeting one man. She wanted
+an escort. I filled that post until the man came.”
+
+“He is there now?” Pritchard asked.
+
+“He is there now,” Tavernake assented.
+
+Pritchard withdrew the cigar from his mouth and watched it for a moment.
+
+“Say, Tavernake,” he went on, “is that man who is now having supper with
+Mrs. Wenham Gardner the man whom she expected?”
+
+“I imagine so,” Tavernake replied.
+
+“Didn't she seem in any way scared or disturbed when he first turned
+up?”
+
+“She looked as I have seen no one else on earth look before,” Tavernake
+admitted. “She seemed simply terrified to death. I do not know why--she
+didn't explain--but that is how she looked.”
+
+“Yet she sent you away!”
+
+“She sent me away. She didn't care what became of me. She was watching
+the door all the time before he came. Who is he, Pritchard?”
+
+“That sounds a simple question,” Pritchard answered gravely, “but it
+means a good deal. There's mischief afoot to-night, Tavernake.”
+
+“You seem to thrive on it,” Tavernake retorted, drily. “Any more
+bunkum?”
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+“Come,” he said, “you're a sensible chap. Take these things for what
+they're worth. Believe me when I tell you now that there is a great deal
+more in the coming of this man than Mrs. Wenham Gardner ever bargained
+for.”
+
+“I wish you'd tell me who he is,” Tavernake begged. “All this mystery
+about Beatrice and her sister, and that lazy old hulk of a father, is
+most irritating.”
+
+Pritchard nodded sympathetically.
+
+“You'll have to put up with it a little longer, I'm afraid, my young
+friend,” he declared. “You've done me a good turn; I'll do you one. I'll
+give you some good advice. Keep out of this place so long as the old man
+and his daughter are hanging out here. The girl 's clever--oh, she's
+as clever as they make them--but she's gone wrong from the start. They
+ain't your sort, Tavernake. You don't fit in anywhere. Take my advice
+and hook it altogether.”
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+“I can't do that just now,” he said. “Good-night! I'm off for the
+present, at any rate.”
+
+Pritchard, too, rose to his feet. He passed his arm through Tavernake's.
+
+“Young man,” he remarked, “there are not many in this country whom I can
+trust. You're one of them. There's a sort of solidity about you that I
+rather admire. You are not likely to break out and do silly things. Do
+you care for adventures?”
+
+“I detest them,” Tavernake answered, “especially the sort I tumbled into
+the other night.”
+
+Pritchard laughed softly. They had left the room now and were walking
+along the open space at the end of the restaurant, leading to the main
+exit.
+
+“That's the difference between us,” he declared thoughtfully. “Now
+adventures to me are the salt of my life. I hang about here and watch
+these few respectable-looking men and women, and there doesn't seem to
+be much in it to an outsider, but, gee whiz! there's sometimes things
+underneath which you fellows don't tumble to. A man asks another in
+there to have a drink. They make a cheerful appointment to meet for
+lunch, to motor to Brighton. It all sounds so harmless, and yet there
+are the seeds of a conspiracy already sown. They hate me here, but they
+know very well that wherever they went I should be around. I suppose
+some day they'll get rid of me.”
+
+“More bunkum!” Tavernake muttered.
+
+They stood in front of the door and passed through into the courtyard.
+On their right, the interior of the smaller restaurant was shielded from
+view by a lattice-work, covered with flowers and shrubs. Pritchard came
+to a standstill at a certain point, and stooping down looked through.
+He remained there without moving for what seemed to Tavernake an
+extraordinarily long time. When he stood up again, there was a distinct
+change in his face. He was looking more serious than Tavernake had ever
+seen him. But for the improbability of the thing, Tavernake would have
+thought that he had turned pale.
+
+“My young friend,” he said, “you've got to see me through this. You 've
+a sort of fancy for Mrs. Wenham Gardner, I know. To-night you shall be
+on her side.”
+
+“I don't want any more mysteries,” Tavernake protested. “I'd rather go
+home.”
+
+“It can't be done,” Pritchard declared, taking his arm once more.
+“You've got to see me through this. Come up to my rooms for a minute.”
+
+They entered the Court and ascended to the eighth floor. Pritchard
+turned on the lights in his room, a plainly furnished and somewhat bare
+apartment. From a cupboard he took out a pair of rubber-soled shoes and
+threw them to Tavernake.
+
+“Put those on,” he directed.
+
+“What are we going to do?” Tavernake asked.
+
+“You are going to help me,” Pritchard answered. “Take my word for it,
+Tavernake, it's all right. I could tackle the job alone, but I'd rather
+not. Now drink this whiskey and soda and light a cigarette. I shall be
+ready in five minutes.”
+
+“But where are we going?” Tavernake demanded.
+
+“You are going,” Pritchard replied, “on an errand of chivalry. You are
+going to become once more a rescuer of woman in distress. You are going
+to save the life of your beautiful friend Elizabeth.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV. CLOSE TO TRAGEDY
+
+
+The actual words of greeting which passed between Elizabeth and the
+man whose advent had caused her so much emotion were unimpressive. The
+newcomer, with the tips of his fingers resting upon the tablecloth,
+leaned slightly towards her. At close quarters, he was even more
+unattractive than when Tavernake had first seen him. He was faultily
+shaped; there was something a little decadent about his deep-set eyes
+and receding forehead. Neither was his expression prepossessing. He
+looked at her as a man looks upon the thing he hates.
+
+“So, Elizabeth,” he said, “this pleasure has come at last!”
+
+“I heard that you were back in England,” she replied. “Pray sit down.”
+
+Even then her eyes never left his. All the time they seemed to be
+fiercely questioning, seeking for something in his features which eluded
+them. It was terrible to see the change which the last few minutes had
+wrought in her. Her smooth, girlish face had lost its comeliness. Her
+eyes, always a little narrow, seemed to have receded. It was such a
+change, this, as comes to a brave man who, in the prime of life, feels
+fear for the first time.
+
+“I am glad to find you at supper,” he declared, taking up the menu. “I
+am hungry. You can bring me some grilled cutlets at once,” he added to
+the waiter who stood by his side, “and some brandy. Nothing else.”
+
+The waiter bowed and hurried off. The woman played with her fan but her
+fingers were shaking.
+
+“I fear,” he remarked, “that my coming is rather a shock to you. I am
+sorry to see you looking so distressed.”
+
+“It is not that,” she answered with some show of courage. “You know me
+too well to believe me capable of seeking a meeting which I feared. It
+is the strange thing which has happened to you during these last few
+months--this last year. Do you know--has any one told you--that you seem
+to have become even more like--the image of--”
+
+He nodded understandingly.
+
+“Of poor Wenham! Many people have told me that. Of course, you know that
+we were always appallingly alike, and they always said that we should
+become more so in middle-age. After all, there is only a year between
+us. We might have been twins.”
+
+“It is the most terrible thing in likenesses I have ever seen,” the
+woman continued slowly. “When you entered the room a few seconds ago, it
+seemed to me that a miracle had happened. It seemed to me that the dead
+had come to life.”
+
+“It must have been a shock,” the man murmured, with his eyes upon the
+tablecloth.
+
+“It was,” she agreed, hoarsely. “Can't you see it in my face? I do not
+always look like a woman of forty. Can't you see the gray shadows
+that are there? You see, I admit it frankly. I was terrified--I am
+terrified!”
+
+“And why?” he asked.
+
+“Why?” she repeated, looking at him wonderingly. “Doesn't it seem to you
+a terrible thing to think of the dead coming back to life?”
+
+He tapped lightly upon the tablecloth for a minute with the fingers of
+one hand. Then he looked at her again.
+
+“It depends,” he said, “upon the manner of their death.”
+
+An executioner of the Middle Ages could not have played with his victim
+more skillfully. The woman was shivering now, preserving some outward
+appearance of calm only by the most fierce and unnatural effort.
+
+“What do you mean by that, Jerry?” she asked. “I was not even
+with--Wenham, when he was lost. You know all about it, I suppose,--how
+it happened?”
+
+The man nodded thoughtfully.
+
+“I have heard many stories,” he admitted. “Before we leave the subject
+for ever, I should like to hear it from you, from your own lips.”
+
+There was a bottle of champagne upon the table, ordered at the
+commencement of the meal. She touched her glass; the waiter filled
+it. She raised it to her lips and set it down empty. Her fingers were
+clutching the tablecloth.
+
+“You ask me a hard thing, Jerry,” she said. “It is not easy to talk
+of anything so painful. From the moment we left New York, Wenham
+was strange. He drank a good deal upon the steamer. He used to talk
+sometimes in the most wild way. We came to London. He had an attack of
+delirium tremens. I nursed him through it and took him into the country,
+down into Cornwall. We took a small cottage on the outskirts of a
+fishing village--St. Catherine's, the place was called. There we lived
+quietly for a time. Sometimes he was better, sometimes worse. The doctor
+in the village was very kind and came often to see him. He brought a
+friend from the neighboring town and they agreed that with complete rest
+Wenham would soon be better. All the time my life was a miserable one.
+He was not fit to be alone and yet he was a terrible companion. I did my
+best. I was with him half of every day, sometimes longer. I was with him
+till my own health began to suffer. At last I could stand the solitude
+no longer. I sent for my father. He came and lived with us.”
+
+“The professor,” her listener murmured.
+
+She nodded.
+
+“It was a little better then for me,” she went on, “except that poor
+Wenham seemed to take such a dislike to my father. However, he hated
+every one in turn, even the doctors, who always did their best for
+him. One day, I admit, I lost my temper. We quarreled; I could not help
+it--life was becoming insupportable. He rushed out of the house--it was
+about three o'clock in the afternoon. I have never seen him since.”
+
+The man was looking at her, looking at her closely although he was
+blinking all the time.
+
+“What do you think became of him?” he asked. “What do people think?”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“The only thing he cared to do was swim,” she said. “His clothes and hat
+were found down in the little cove near where we had a tent.”
+
+“You think, then, that he was drowned?” the man asked.
+
+She nodded. Speech seemed to be becoming too painful.
+
+“Drowning,” her companion continued, helping himself to brandy, “is not
+a pleasant death. Once I was nearly drowned myself. One struggles for a
+short time and one thinks--yes, one thinks!” he added.
+
+He raised his glass to his lips and set it down.
+
+“It is an easy death, though,” he went on, “quite an easy death. By the
+way, were those clothes that were found of poor Wenham's identified as
+the clothes he wore when he left the house?”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“One could not say for certain,” she answered. “I never noticed how he
+was dressed. He wore nearly always the same sort of things, but he had
+an endless variety.”
+
+“And this was seven months ago--seven months.”
+
+She assented.
+
+“Poor Wenham,” he murmured. “I suppose he is dead. What are you going to
+do, Elizabeth?”
+
+“I do not know,” she replied. “Soon I must go to the lawyers and ask for
+advice. I have very little more money left. I have written several times
+to New York to you, to his friends, but I have had no answer. After all,
+Jerry, I am his wife. No one liked my marrying him, but I am his wife.
+I have a right to a share of his property if he is dead. If he has
+deserted me, surely I shall be allowed something. I do not even know how
+rich he was.”
+
+The man at her side smiled.
+
+“Much better off than I ever was,” he declared. “But, Elizabeth!”
+
+“Well?”
+
+“There were rumors that, before you left New York, Wenham converted very
+large sums of money into letters of credit and bonds, very large sums
+indeed.” She shook her head. “He had a letter of credit for about a
+thousand pounds, I think,” she said. “There is very little left of the
+money he had with him.”
+
+“And you find living here expensive, I dare say?”
+
+“Very expensive indeed,” she agreed, with a sigh. “I have been looking
+forward to seeing you, Jerry. I thought, perhaps, for the sake of old
+times you might advise me.”
+
+“Of old times,” he repeated to himself softly. “Elizabeth, do you think
+of them sometimes?”
+
+She was becoming more herself. This was a game she was used to playing.
+Of old times, indeed! It seemed only yesterday that these two brothers,
+who had the reputation in those days of being the richest young men
+in New York, were both at her feet. So far, she had scarcely been
+fortunate. There was still a chance, however. She looked up. It seemed
+to her that he was losing his composure. Yes, there was something of the
+old gleam in his eyes! Once he had been madly enough in love with her.
+It ought not to be impossible!
+
+“Jerry,” she said, “I have told you these things. It has been so very,
+very painful for me. Won't you try now and be kind? Remember that I
+am all alone and it is all very difficult for me. I have been looking
+forward to your coming. I have thought so often of those times we spent
+together in New York. Won't you be my friend again? Won't you help me
+through these dark days?”
+
+Her hand touched his. For a moment he snatched his away as though stung.
+Then he caught her fingers in his and held them as though in a vice. She
+smiled, the smile of conscious power. The flush of beauty was streaming
+once more into her face. Poor fellow, he was still in love, then! The
+fingers which had closed upon hers were burning. What a pity that he was
+not a little more presentable!
+
+“Yes,” he muttered, “we must be friends, Elizabeth. Wenham had all the
+luck at first. Perhaps it's going to be my turn now, eh?”
+
+He bent towards her. She laughed into his face for a moment and then was
+once more suddenly colorless, the smile frozen upon her lips. She began
+to shiver.
+
+“What is it?” he asked. “What is it, Elizabeth?”
+
+“Nothing,” she faltered, “only I wish--I do wish that you were not so
+much like Wenham. Sometimes a trick of your voice, the way you hold your
+head--it terrifies me!”
+
+He laughed oddly.
+
+“You must get used to that, Elizabeth,” he declared. “I can't help
+being like him, you know. We were great friends always until you came. I
+wonder why you preferred Wenham.”
+
+“Don't ask me--please don't ask me that,” she begged. “Really, I think
+he happened to be there just at the moment I felt like making a clean
+sweep of everything, of leaving New York and every one and starting life
+again, and I thought Wenham meant it. I thought I should be able to keep
+him from drinking and to help him start a new life altogether over here
+or on the Continent.”
+
+“Poor little woman,” he said, “you have been disappointed, I am afraid.”
+
+She sighed.
+
+“I am only human, you know,” she went on. “Every one told me that Wenham
+was a millionaire, too. See how much I have benefited by it. I am almost
+penniless, I do not know whether he is dead or alive, I do not know what
+to do to get some money. Was Wenham very rich, Jerry?”
+
+The man laughed.
+
+“Oh, he was very rich indeed!” he assured her. “It is terrible that you
+should be left like this. We will talk about it together presently, you
+and I. In the meantime, you must let me be your banker.”
+
+“Dear Jerry,” she whispered, “you were always generous.”
+
+“You have not spoken of the little prude--dear Miss Beatrice,” he
+reminded her suddenly.
+
+Elizabeth sighed.
+
+“Beatrice was a great trial from the first,” she declared. “You know how
+she disliked you both--she was scarcely even civil to Wenham, and she
+would never have come to Europe with us if father hadn't insisted upon
+it. We took her down to Cornwall with us and there she became absolutely
+insupportable. She was always interfering between Wenham and me and
+imagining the most absurd things. One day she left us without a word of
+warning. I have never seen her since.”
+
+The man stared gloomily into his plate.
+
+“She was a queer little thing,” he muttered. “She was good, and she
+seemed to like being good.”
+
+Elizabeth laughed, not quite pleasantly.
+
+“You speak as though the rest of us,” she remarked, “were qualified to
+take orders in wickedness.”
+
+He helped himself to more brandy.
+
+“Think back,” he said. “Think of those days in New York, the life we
+led, the wild things we did week after week, month after month, the same
+eternal round of turning night into day, of struggling everywhere to
+find new pleasures, pulling vice to pieces like children trying to find
+the inside of their playthings.”
+
+“I don't like your mood in the least,” she interrupted.
+
+He drummed for a moment upon the tablecloth with his fingers.
+
+“We were talking of Beatrice. You don't even know where she is now,
+then?”
+
+“I have no idea,” Elizabeth declared.
+
+“She was with you for long in Cornwall?” he asked.
+
+Elizabeth toyed with her wineglass for a minute.
+
+“She was there about a month,” she admitted.
+
+“And she didn't approve of the way you and Wenham behaved?” he demanded.
+
+“Apparently not. She left us, anyway. She didn't understand Wenham in
+the least. I shouldn't be surprised,” Elizabeth went on, “to hear that
+she was a hospital nurse, or learning typing, or a clerk in an office.
+She was a young woman of gloomy ideas, although she was my sister.”
+
+He came a little closer towards her.
+
+“Elizabeth,” he said, “we will not talk any more about Beatrice. We will
+not talk any more about anything except our two selves.”
+
+“Are you really glad to see me again, Jerry?” she asked softly.
+
+“You must know it, dear,” he whispered. “You must know that I loved you
+always, that I adored you. Oh, you knew it! Don't tell me you didn't.
+You knew it, Elizabeth!”
+
+She looked down at the tablecloth.
+
+“Yes, I knew it,” she admitted, softly.
+
+“Can't you guess what it is to me to see you again like this?” he
+continued.
+
+She sighed.
+
+“It is something for me, too, to feel that I have a friend close at
+hand.”
+
+“Come,” he said, “they are turning out the lights here. You want to know
+about Wenham's property. Let me come upstairs with you for a little time
+and I will tell you as much as I can from memory.”
+
+He paid the bill, helped her on with her cloak. His fingers seemed like
+burning spots upon her flesh. They went up in the lift. In the corridors
+he drew her to him and she began to tremble.
+
+“What is there strange about you, Jerry?” she faltered, looking into his
+face. “You terrify me!”
+
+“You are glad to see me? Say you are glad to see me?”
+
+“Yes, I am glad,” she whispered.
+
+Outside the door of her rooms, she hesitated.
+
+“Perhaps,” she suggested, faintly,--“wouldn't it be better if you came
+to-morrow morning?”
+
+Once more his fingers touched her and again that extraordinary sense of
+fear seemed to turn her blood cold.
+
+“No,” he replied, “I have been put off long enough! You must let me in,
+you must talk with me for half an hour. I will go then, I promise. Half
+an hour! Elizabeth, haven't I waited an eternity for it?”
+
+He took the keys from her fingers and opened the door, closing it again
+behind them. She led the way into the sitting-room. The whole place was
+in darkness but she turned on the electric light. The cloak slipped from
+her shoulders. He took her hands and looked at her.
+
+“Jerry,” she whispered, “you mustn't look at me like that. You terrify
+me! Let me go!”
+
+She wrenched herself free with an effort. She stepped back to the corner
+of the room, as far as she could get from him. Her heart was beating
+fiercely. Somehow or other, neither of these two young men, over whose
+lives she had certainly brought to bear a very wonderful influence, had
+ever before stirred her pulses like this. What was it, she wondered?
+What was the meaning of it? Why didn't he speak? He did nothing but
+look, and there were unutterable things in his eyes. Was he angry with
+her because she had married Wenham, or was he blaming her because Wenham
+had gone? There was passion in his face, but such passion! Desire,
+perhaps, but what else? She caught up a telegram which lay upon her
+writing desk, and tore it open. It was an escape for a moment. She read
+the words, stared, and read them aloud incredulously. It was from her
+father.
+
+“Jerry Gardner sailed for New York to-day.”
+
+She looked up at the man, and as she looked her face grew gray and the
+thin sheet went quivering from her lifeless fingers to the floor. Then
+he began to laugh, and she knew.
+
+“Wenham!” she shrieked. “Wenham!”
+
+There was murder in his face, murder almost in his laugh.
+
+“Your loving husband!” he answered.
+
+She sprang for the door but even as she moved she heard the click of the
+bolt shot back. He touched the electric switch and the room was suddenly
+in darkness. She heard him coming towards her, she felt his hot breath
+upon her cheek.
+
+“My loving wife!” he whispered. “At last!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV. THE MADMAN TALKS
+
+
+Tavernake turned on the light. Pritchard, with a quick leap forward,
+seized Wenham around the waist and dragged him away. Elizabeth had
+fainted; she lay upon the floor, her face the color of marble.
+
+“Get some water and throw over her,” Pritchard ordered.
+
+Tavernake obeyed. He threw open the window and let in a current of air.
+In a moment or two the woman stirred and raised her head.
+
+“Look after her for a minute,” Pritchard said. “I Il lock this fierce
+little person up in the bathroom.”
+
+Pritchard carried his prisoner out. Tavernake leaned over the woman who
+was slowly coming back to consciousness.
+
+“Tell me about it,” she asked, hoarsely. “Where is he?”
+
+“Locked up in the bathroom,” Tavernake answered. “Pritchard is taking
+care of him. He won't be able to get out.”
+
+“You know who it was?” she faltered.
+
+“I do not,” Tavernake replied. “It isn't my business. I'm only here
+because Pritchard begged me to come. He thought he might want help.”
+
+She held his fingers tightly.
+
+“Where were you?” she asked.
+
+“In the bathroom when you arrived. Then he bolted the door behind and we
+had to come round through your bedroom.”
+
+“How did Pritchard find out?”
+
+“I know nothing about it,” Tavernake replied. “I only know that he
+peered through the latticework and saw you sitting there at supper.”
+
+She smiled weakly.
+
+“It must have been rather a shock to him,” she said. “He has been
+convinced for the last six months that I murdered Wenham, or got rid of
+him by some means or other. Help me up.”
+
+She staggered to her feet. Tavernake assisted her to an easy chair. Then
+Pritchard came in.
+
+“He is quite safe,” he announced, “sitting on the edge of the bath
+playing with a doll.”
+
+She shivered.
+
+“What is he doing with it?” she asked.
+
+“Showing me exactly, with a shawl pin, where he meant to have stabbed
+you,” Pritchard answered, drily. “Now, my dear lady,” he continued, “it
+seems to me that I have done you one injustice, at any rate. I certainly
+thought you'd helped to relieve the world of that young person. Where
+did he come from? Perhaps you can tell me that.”
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+“I suppose I may as well,” she said. “Listen, you have seen what he was
+like to-night, but you don't know what it was to live with him. It was
+Hell!”--she sobbed--“absolute Hell! He drank, he took drugs, it was
+all his servant could do to force him even to make his toilet. It was
+impossible. It was crushing the life out of me.”
+
+“Go on,” Pritchard directed.
+
+“There isn't much more to tell,” she continued. “I found an old
+farmhouse--the loneliest spot in Cornwall. We moved there and I left
+him--with Mathers. I promised Mathers that he should have twenty pounds
+a week for every week he kept his master away from me. He has kept him
+away for seven months.”
+
+“What about that story of yours--about his having gone in swimming?”
+ Pritchard asked.
+
+“I wanted people to believe that he was dead,” she declared defiantly.
+“I was afraid that if you or his relations found him, I should have to
+live with him or give up the money.”
+
+Pritchard nodded.
+
+“And to-night you thought--”
+
+“I thought he was his brother Jerry,” she went on. “The likeness was
+always amazing, you know that. I was told that Jerry was in town. I felt
+nervous, somehow, and wired to Mathers. I had his reply only last night.
+He wired that Wenham was quite safe and contented, not even restless.”
+
+“That telegram was sent by Wenham himself,” Pritchard remarked. “I think
+you had better hear what he has to say.”
+
+She shrank back.
+
+“No. I couldn't bear the sight of him again!”
+
+“I think you had better,” Pritchard insisted. “I can assure you that he
+is quite harmless. I will guarantee that.”
+
+He left the room. Soon he returned, his arm locked in the arm of Wenham
+Gardner. The latter had the look of a spoilt child who is in disgrace.
+He sat sullenly upon a chair and glared at every one. Then he produced a
+small crumpled doll, with a thread of black cotton around its neck, and
+began swinging it in front of him, laughing at Elizabeth all the time.
+
+“Tell us,” Pritchard asked, “what has become of Mathers?”
+
+He stopped swinging the doll, shivered for a moment, and then laughed.
+
+“I don't mind,” he declared. “I guess I don't mind telling. You see,
+whatever I was when I did it, I am mad now--quite mad. My friend
+Pritchard here says I am mad. I must have been mad or I shouldn't have
+tried to hurt that dear beautiful lady over there.”
+
+He leered at Elizabeth, who shrank back.
+
+“She ran away from me some time ago,” he went on, “sick to death of me
+she was. She thought she'd got all my money. She hadn't. There's plenty
+more, plenty more. She ran away and left me with Mathers. She was paying
+him so much a week to keep me quiet, not to let me go anywhere where I
+should talk, to keep me away from her so that she could live up here and
+see all her friends and spend my money. And at first I didn't mind, and
+then I did mind, and I got angry with Mathers, and Mathers wouldn't let
+me come away, and three nights ago I killed Mathers.”
+
+There was a little thrill of horror. He looked from one to the other. By
+degrees their fear seemed to become communicated to him.
+
+“What do you mean by looking like that, all of you?” he exclaimed.
+“What does it matter? He was only my man-servant. I am Wenham Gardner,
+millionaire. No one will put me in prison for that. Besides, he
+shouldn't have tried to keep me away from my wife. Anyway, it don't
+matter. I am quite mad. Mad people can do what they like. They have to
+stop in an asylum for six months, and then they're quite cured and
+they start again. I don't mind being mad for six months. Elizabeth,”
+ he whined, “come and be mad, too. You haven't been kind to me. There's
+plenty more money--plenty more. Come back for a little time and I'll
+show you.”
+
+“How did you kill Mathers?” Pritchard asked.
+
+“I stabbed him when he was stooping down,” Wenham Gardner explained.
+“You see, when I left college my father thought it would be good for me
+to do something. I dare say it would have been but I didn't want to. I
+studied surgery for six months. The only thing I remember was just where
+to kill a man behind the left shoulder. I remembered that. Mathers was
+a fat man, and he stooped so that his coat almost burst. I just leaned
+over, picked out the exact spot, and he crumpled all up. I expect,” he
+went on, “you'll find him there still. No one comes near the place
+for days and days. Mathers used to leave me locked up and do all the
+shopping himself. I expect he's lying there now. Some one ought to go
+and see.”
+
+Elizabeth was sobbing quietly to herself. Tavernake felt the
+perspiration break out upon his forehead. There was something appalling
+in the way this young man talked.
+
+“I don't understand why you all look so serious,” he continued. “No one
+is going to hurt me for this. I am quite mad now. You see, I am playing
+with this doll. Sane men don't play with dolls. I hope they'll try me
+in New York, though. I am well-known in New York. I know all the lawyers
+and the jurymen. Oh, they're up to all sorts of tricks in New York!
+Say, you don't suppose they'll try me over here?” he broke off suddenly,
+turning to Pritchard. “I shouldn't feel so much at home here.”
+
+“Take him away,” Elizabeth begged. “Take him away.” Pritchard nodded.
+
+“I thought you'd better hear,” he said. “I am going to take him away
+now. I shall send a telegram to the police-station at St. Catherine's.
+They had better go up and see what's happened.”
+
+Pritchard took his captive once more by the arm. The young man struggled
+violently.
+
+“I don't like you, Pritchard,” he shrieked. “I don't want to go with
+you. I want to stay with Elizabeth. I am not really afraid of her. She'd
+like to kill me, I know, but she's too clever--oh, she's too clever! I'd
+like to stay with her.”
+
+Pritchard led him away.
+
+“We'll see about it later on,” he said. “You'd better come with me just
+now.”
+
+The door closed behind them. Tavernake staggered up.
+
+“I must go,” he declared. “I must go, too.”
+
+Elizabeth was sobbing quietly to herself. She seemed scarcely to hear
+him. On the threshold Tavernake turned back.
+
+“That money,” he asked, “the money you were going to lend me--was that
+his?”
+
+She looked up and nodded. Tavernake went slowly out.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI. A CRISIS
+
+
+Pritchard was the first visitor who had ever found his way into
+Tavernake's lodgings. It was barely eight o'clock on the same morning.
+Tavernake, hollow-eyed and bewildered, sat up upon the sofa and gazed
+across the room.
+
+“Pritchard!” he exclaimed. “Why, what do you want?”
+
+Pritchard laid his hat and gloves upon the table. Already his first
+swift glance had taken in the details of the little apartment. The
+overcoat and hat which Tavernake had worn the night before lay by his
+side. The table was still arranged for some meal of the previous day.
+Apart from these things, a single glance assured him that Tavernake had
+not been to bed.
+
+Pritchard drew up an easy-chair and seated himself deliberately.
+
+“My young friend,” he announced, “I have come to the conclusion that you
+need some more advice.”
+
+Tavernake rose to his feet. His own reflection in the looking-glass
+startled him. His hair was crumpled, his tie undone, the marks of his
+night of agony were all too apparent. He felt himself at a disadvantage.
+
+“How did you find me out?” he asked. “I never gave you my address.”
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+“Even in this country, with a little help,” he said, “those things are
+easy enough. I made up my mind that this morning would be to some extent
+a crisis with you. You know, Tavernake, I am not a man who says much,
+but you are the right sort. You've been in with me twice when I should
+have missed you if you hadn't been there.”
+
+Tavernake seemed to have lost the power of speech. He had relapsed again
+into his place upon the sofa. He simply waited.
+
+“How in the name of mischief,” Pritchard continued, impressively, “you
+came to be mixed up in the lives of this amiable trio, I cannot imagine!
+I am not saying a word against Miss Beatrice, mind. All that surprises
+me is that you and she should ever have come together, or, having come
+together, that you should ever have exchanged a word. You see, I am here
+to speak plain truths. You are, I take it, a good sample of the hard,
+stubborn, middle-class Briton. These three people of whom I have spoken,
+belong--Miss Beatrice, perhaps, by force of circumstances--but still
+they do belong to the land of Bohemia. However, when one has got over
+the surprise of finding you on intimate terms with Miss Beatrice,
+there comes a more amazing thing. You, with hard common sense written
+everywhere in your face, have been prepared at any moment, for all I
+know are prepared now, to make an utter and complete idiot of yourself
+over Elizabeth Gardner.”
+
+Still Tavernake did not speak. Pritchard looked at him curiously.
+
+“Say,” he went on, “I have come here to do you a service, if I can. So
+far as I know at present, this very wonderful young lady has kept on the
+right side of the law. But see here, Tavernake, she's been on the wrong
+side of everything that's decent and straight all her days. She married
+that poor creature for his money, and set herself deliberately to drive
+him off his head. Last night's tragedy was her doing, not his, though
+he, poor devil, will have to end his days in an asylum, and the lady
+will have his money to make herself more beautiful than ever with. Now I
+am going to let you behind the scenes, my young friend.”
+
+Then Tavernake rose to his feet. In the shabby little room he seemed to
+have grown suddenly taller. He struck the crazy table with his clenched
+fist so that the crockery upon it rattled. Pritchard was used to seeing
+men--strong men, too--moved by various passions, but in Tavernake's face
+he seemed to see new things.
+
+“Pritchard,” Tavernake exclaimed, “I don't want to hear another word!”
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+“Look here,” he said, “what I am going to tell you is the truth. What
+I am going to tell you I'd as soon say in the presence of the lady as
+here.”
+
+Tavernake took a step forward and Pritchard suddenly realized the man
+who had thrown himself through that little opening in the wall, one
+against three, without a thought of danger.
+
+“If you say a single word more against her,” Tavernake shouted hoarsely,
+“I shall throw you out of the room!”
+
+Pritchard stared at him. There was something amazing about this young
+man's attitude, something which he could not wholly grasp. He could see,
+too, that Tavernake's words were so few simply because he was trembling
+under the influence of an immense passion.
+
+“If you won't listen,” Pritchard declared, slowly, “I can't talk.
+Still, you've got common sense, I take it. You've the ordinary powers
+of judging between right and wrong, and knowing when a man or a woman's
+honest. I want to save you--”
+
+“Silence!” Tavernake exclaimed. “Look here, Pritchard,” he went on,
+breathing a little more naturally now, “you came here meaning to do the
+right thing--I know that. You're all right, only you don't understand.
+You don't understand the sort of person I am. I am twenty-four years
+old, I have worked for my own living up here in London since I was
+twelve. I was a man, so far as work and independence went, at fifteen.
+Since then I have had my shoulder to the wheel; I have lived on nothing;
+I have made a little money where it didn't seem possible. I have worried
+my way into posts which it seemed that no one could think of giving
+me, but all the time I have lived in a little corner of the world--like
+that.”
+
+His finger suddenly described a circle in the air.
+
+“You don't understand--you can't,” he went on, “but there it is. I never
+spoke to a woman until I spoke to Beatrice. Chance made me her friend.
+I began to understand the outside of some of those things which I had
+never even dreamed of before. She set me right in many ways. I began to
+read, think, absorb little bits of the real world. It was all wonderful.
+Then Elizabeth came. I met her, too, by accident--she came to my office
+for a house--Elizabeth!”
+
+Pritchard found something almost pathetic in the sudden dropping of
+Tavernake's voice, the softening of his face.
+
+“I don't know how to talk about these things,” Tavernake said, simply.
+“There's a literature that's reached from before the Bible to now, full
+of nothing else. It's all as old as the hills. I suppose I am about
+the only sane man in this city who knew nothing of it; but I did know
+nothing of it, and she was the first woman. Now you understand. I can't
+hear a word against her--I won't! She may be what you say. If so, she's
+got to tell me so herself!”
+
+“You mean that you are going to believe any story she likes to put up?”
+
+“I mean that I am going to her,” Tavernake answered, “and I have no idea
+in the world what will happen--whether I shall believe her or not. I can
+see what you think of me,” he went on, becoming a little more himself
+as the stress of unaccustomed speech passed him by. “I will tell you
+something that will show you that I realize a good deal. I know the
+difference between Beatrice and Elizabeth. Less than a week ago, I asked
+Beatrice to marry me. It was the only way I could think of, the only way
+I could kill the fever.”
+
+“And Beatrice?” Pritchard asked, curiously.
+
+“She wouldn't,” Tavernake replied. “After all, why should she? I have my
+way to make yet. I can't expect others to believe in me as I believe in
+myself. She was kind but she wouldn't.”
+
+Pritchard lit a cigar.
+
+“Look here, Tavernake,” he said, “you are a young man, you've got your
+life before you and life's a biggish thing. Empty out those romantic
+thoughts of yours, roll up your shirt sleeves and get at it. You are
+not one of these weaklings that need a woman's whispers in their ears
+to spur them on. You can work without that. It's only a chapter in your
+life--the passing of these three people. A few months ago, you knew
+nothing of them. Let them go. Get back to where you were.”
+
+Then Tavernake for the first time laughed--a laugh that sounded even
+natural.
+
+“Have you ever found a man who could do that?” he asked. “The candle
+gives a good light sometimes, but you'll never think it the finest
+illumination in the world when you've seen the sun. Never mind me,
+Pritchard. I'm going to do my best still, but there's one thing that
+nothing will alter. I am going to make that woman tell me her story, I
+am going to listen to the way she tells it to me. You think that where
+women are concerned I am a fool. I am, but there is one great boon which
+has been vouchsafed to fools--they can tell the true from the false.
+Some sort of instinct, I suppose. Elizabeth shall tell me her story and
+I shall know, when she tells it, whether she is what you say or what she
+has seemed to me.”
+
+Pritchard held out his hand.
+
+“You're a queer sort, Tavernake,” he declared. “You take life plaguy
+seriously. I only hope you 'll get all out of it you expect to. So
+long!”
+
+Tavernake opened the window after his visitor had gone, and leaned out
+for some few minutes, letting the fresh air into the close, stifling
+room. Then he went upstairs, bathed and changed his clothes, made
+some pretense at breakfast, went through his letters with methodical
+exactness. At eleven o'clock he set out upon his pilgrimage.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII. TAVERNAKE CHOOSES
+
+
+Tavernake was kept waiting in the hall of the Milan Court for at least
+half an hour before Elizabeth was prepared to see him. He wandered
+aimlessly about watching the people come and go, looking out into the
+flower-hung courtyard, curiously unconscious of himself and of his
+errand, unable to concentrate his thoughts for a moment, yet filled all
+the time with the dull and uneasy sensation of one who moves in a dream.
+Every now and then he heard scraps of conversation from the servants and
+passers-by, referring to the last night's incident. He picked up a paper
+but threw it down after only a casual glance at the paragraph. He saw
+enough to convince him that for the present, at any rate, Elizabeth
+seemed assured of a certain amount of sympathy. The career of poor
+Wenham Gardner was set down in black and white, with little extenuation,
+little mercy. His misdeeds in Paris, his career in New York, spoke for
+themselves. He was quoted as a type, a decadent of the most debauched
+instincts, to whom crime was a relaxation and vice a habit. Tavernake
+would read no more. He might have been all these things, and yet she had
+become his wife!
+
+At last came the message for which he was waiting. As usual, her maid
+met him at the door of her suite and ushered him in. Elizabeth was
+dressed for the part very simply, with a suggestion even of mourning in
+her gray gown. She welcomed him with a pathetic smile.
+
+“Once more, my dear friend,” she said, “I have to thank you.”
+
+Her fingers closed upon his and she smiled into his face. Tavernake
+found himself curiously unresponsive. It was the same smile, and he knew
+very well that he himself had not changed, yet it seemed as though life
+itself were in a state of suspense for him.
+
+“You, too, are looking grave this morning, my friend,” she continued.
+“Oh, how horrible it has all been! Within the last two hours I have had
+at least five reporters, a gentleman from Scotland Yard, another from
+the American Ambassador to see me. It is too terrible, of course,” she
+went on. “Wenham's people are doing all they can to make it worse. They
+want to know why we were not together, why he was living in the country
+and I in town. They are trying to show that he was under restraint
+there, as if such a thing were possible! Mathers was his own
+servant--poor Mathers!”
+
+She sighed and wiped her eyes. Still Tavernake said nothing. She looked
+at him, a little surprised.
+
+“You are not very sympathetic,” she observed. “Please come and sit down
+by my side and I will show you something.”
+
+He moved towards her but he did not sit down. She stretched out her
+hand and picked something up from the table, holding it towards him.
+Tavernake took it mechanically and held it in his fingers. It was a
+cheque for twelve thousand pounds.
+
+“You see,” she said, “I have not forgotten. This is the day, isn't it?
+If you like, you can stay and have lunch with me up here and we will
+drink to the success of our speculation.”
+
+Tavernake held the cheque in his fingers; he made no motion to put it in
+his pocket. She looked at him with a puzzled frown upon her face.
+
+“Do talk or say something, please!” she exclaimed. “You look at me like
+some grim figure. Say something. Sit down and be natural.”
+
+“May I ask you some questions?”
+
+“Of course you may,” she replied. “You may do anything sooner than stand
+there looking so grim and unbending. What is it you want to know?”
+
+“Did you understand that Wenham Gardner was this sort of man when you
+married him?”
+
+She shrugged her shoulders slightly.
+
+“I suppose I did,” she admitted.
+
+“You married him, then, only because he was rich?”
+
+She smiled.
+
+“What else do women marry for, my dear moralist?” she demanded. “It
+isn't my fault if it doesn't sound pretty. One must have money!”
+
+Tavernake inclined his head gravely; he made no sign of dissent.
+
+“You two came over to England,” he went on, “with Beatrice and your
+father. Beatrice left you because she disapproved of certain things.”
+
+Elizabeth nodded.
+
+“You may as well know the truth,” she said. “Beatrice has the most
+absurd ideas. After a week with Wenham, I knew that he was not a person
+with whom any woman could possibly live. His valet was really only his
+keeper; he was subject to such mad fits that he needed some one always
+with him. I was obliged to leave him in Cornwall. I can't tell you
+everything, but it was absolutely impossible for me to go on living with
+him.”
+
+“Beatrice,” Tavernake remarked, “thought otherwise.”
+
+Elizabeth looked at him quickly from below her eyelids. It was hard,
+however, to gather anything from his face.
+
+“Beatrice thought otherwise,” Elizabeth admitted. “She thought that I
+ought to nurse him, put up with him, give up all my friends, and try and
+keep him alive. Why, it would have been absolute martyrdom, misery for
+me,” she declared. “How could I be expected to do such a thing?”
+
+Tavernake nodded gravely.
+
+“And the money?” he asked.
+
+“Well, perhaps there I was a trifle calculating,” she confessed. “But
+you,” she added, nodding at the cheque in his hand, “shouldn't grumble
+at that. I knew when we were married that I should have trouble. His
+people hated me, and I knew that in the event of anything happening
+like this thing which has happened, they would try to get as little as
+possible allowed me. So before we left New York, I got Wenham to turn as
+much as ever he could into cash. That we brought away with us.”
+
+“And who took care of it?”
+
+Elizabeth smiled.
+
+“I did,” she answered, “naturally.”
+
+“Tell me about last night,” Tavernake said. “I suppose I am stupid but I
+don't quite understand.”
+
+“How should you?” she answered. “Listen, then. Wenham, I suppose got
+tired of being shut up with Mathers, although I am sure I don't see what
+else was possible. So he waited for his opportunity, and when the man
+wasn't looking--well, you know what happened,” she added, with a shiver.
+“He got up to London somehow and made his way to Dover Street.”
+
+“Why Dover Street?”
+
+“I suppose you know,” Elizabeth explained, “that Wenham has a
+brother--Jerry--who is exactly like him. These two had rooms in Dover
+Street always, where they kept some English clothes and a servant. Jerry
+Gardner was over in London. I knew that, and was expecting to see him
+every day. Wenham found his way to the rooms, dressed himself in his
+brother's clothes, even wore his ring and some of his jewelry, which he
+knew I should recognize, and came here. I believed--yes, I believed all
+the time,” she went on, her voice trembling, “that it was Jerry who was
+sitting with me. Once or twice I had a sort of terrible shiver. Then I
+remembered how much they were alike and it seemed to me ridiculous to be
+afraid. It was not till we got upstairs, till the door was closed behind
+me, that he turned round and I knew!”
+
+Her head fell suddenly into her hands. It was almost the first sign of
+emotion. Tavernake analyzed it mercilessly. He knew very well that it
+was fear, the coward's fear of that terrible moment.
+
+“And now?”
+
+“Now,” she went on, more cheerfully, “no one will venture to deny that
+Wenham is mad. He will be placed under restraint, of course, and the
+courts will make me an allowance. One thing is absolutely certain, and
+that is that he will not live a year.”
+
+Tavernake half closed his eyes. Was there no sign of his suffering, no
+warning note of the things which were passing out of his life! The woman
+who smiled upon him seemed to see nothing. The twitching of his fingers,
+the slight quivering of his face, she thought was because of his fear
+for her.
+
+“And now,” she declared, in a suddenly altered tone, “this is all over
+and done with. Now you know everything. There are no more mysteries,”
+ she added, smiling at him delightfully. “It is all very terrible, of
+course, but I feel as though a great weight had passed away. You and I
+are going to be friends, are we not?”
+
+She rose slowly to her feet and came towards him. His eyes watched her
+slow, graceful movements as though fascinated. He remembered on that
+first visit of his how wonderful he had thought her walk. She was still
+smiling up at him; her fingers fell upon his shoulders.
+
+“You are such a strange person,” she murmured. “You aren't a little bit
+like any of the men I've ever known, any of the men I have ever cared
+to have as friends. There is something about you altogether different. I
+suppose that is why I rather like you. Are you glad?”
+
+For a single wild moment Tavernake hesitated. She was so close to him
+that her hair touched his forehead, the breath from her upturned lips
+fell upon his cheeks. Her blue eyes were half pleading, half inviting.
+
+“You are going to be my very dear friend, are you not--Leonard?” she
+whispered. “I do feel that I need some one strong like you to help me
+through these days.”
+
+Tavernake suddenly seized the hands that were upon his shoulders, and
+forced them back. She felt herself gripped as though by a vice, and a
+sudden terror seized her. He lifted her up and she caught a glimpse of
+his wild, set face. Then the breath came through his teeth. He shook all
+over but the fit had passed. He simply thrust her away from him.
+
+“No,” he said, “we cannot be friends! You are a woman without a heart,
+you are a murderess!”
+
+He tore her cheque calmly in pieces and flung them scornfully away. She
+stood looking at him, breathing quickly, white to the lips though the
+murder had gone from his eyes.
+
+“Beatrice warned me,” he went on; “Pritchard warned me. Some things I
+saw for myself, but I suppose I was mad. Now I know!”
+
+He turned away. Her eyes followed him wonderingly.
+
+“Leonard,” she cried out, “you are not going like this? You don't mean
+it!”
+
+Ever afterwards his restraint amazed him. He did not reply. He closed
+both doors firmly behind him and walked to the lift. She came even to
+the outside door and called down the corridor.
+
+“Leonard, come back for one moment!”
+
+He turned his head and looked at her, looked at her from the corner of
+the corridor, steadfastly and without speech. Her fingers dropped from
+the handle of the door. She went back into her room with shaking knees,
+and began to cry softly. Afterwards she wondered at herself. It was the
+first time she had cried for many years.
+
+
+Tavernake walked to the city and in less than half an hour's time found
+himself in Mr. Martin's office. The lawyer welcomed him warmly.
+
+“I'm jolly glad to see you, Tavernake,” he declared. “I hope you've got
+the money. Sit down.”
+
+Tavernake did not sit down; he had forgotten, indeed, to take of his
+hat.
+
+“Martin,” he said, “I am sorry for you. I have been fooled and you have
+to pay as well as I have. I can't take up the option on the property.
+I haven't a penny toward it except my own money, and you know how much
+that is. You can sell my plots, if you like, and call the money your
+costs. I've finished.”
+
+The lawyer looked at him with wide-open mouth.
+
+“What on earth are you talking about, Tavernake?” he exclaimed. “Are you
+drunk, by any chance?”
+
+“No, I am quite sober,” Tavernake answered. “I have made one or two bad
+mistakes, that's all. You have a power of attorney for me. You can do
+what you like with my land, make any terms you please. Good-day!”
+
+“But, Tavernake, look here!” the lawyer protested, springing to his
+feet. “I say, Tavernake!” he called out.
+
+But Tavernake heard nothing, or, if he heard, he took no notice. He
+walked out into the street and was lost among the hurrying throngs upon
+the pavements.
+
+
+
+
+BOOK TWO
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I. NEW HORIZONS
+
+
+Towards the sky-line, across the level country, stumbling and crawling
+over the deep-hewn dikes, wading sometimes through the mud-oozing swamp,
+Tavernake, who had left the small railway terminus on foot, made his
+way that night steadily seawards, as one pursued by some relentless
+and indefatigable enemy. Twilight had fallen like a mantle around him,
+fallen over that great flat region of fens and pastureland and bog.
+Little patches of mist, harbingers of the coming obscurity, were being
+drawn now into the gradual darkness. Lights twinkled out from the
+far-scattered homesteads. Here and there a dog barked, some lonely bird
+seeking shelter called to its mate, but of human beings there seemed to
+be no one in sight save the solitary traveler.
+
+Tavernake was in grievous straits. His clothes were caked with mud,
+his hair tossed with the wind, his cheeks pale, his eyes set with the
+despair of that fierce upheaval through which he had passed. For many
+hours the torture which had driven him back towards his birthplace had
+triumphed over his physical exhaustion. Now came the time, however, when
+the latter asserted itself. With a half-stifled moan he collapsed. Sheer
+fatigue induced a brief but merciful spell of uneasy slumber. He lay
+upon his back near one of the broader dikes, his arms outstretched, his
+unseeing eyes turned toward the sky. The darkness deepened and passed
+away again before the light of the moon. When at last he sat up, it was
+a new world upon which he looked, a strange land, moonlit in places, yet
+full of shadowy somberness. He gazed wonderingly around--for the moment
+he had forgotten. Then memory came, and with memory once more the stab
+at his heart. He rose to his feet and went resolutely on his way.
+
+Almost until the dawn he walked, keeping as near as he could to that
+long monotonous line of telegraph posts, yet avoiding the road as much
+as possible. With the rising of the sun, he crept into a wayside hovel
+and lay there hidden for hours. Hunger and thirst seemed like things
+which had passed him by. It was sleep only which he craved, sleep and
+forgetfulness.
+
+Dusk was falling again before he found himself upon his feet, starting
+out once more upon this strangely thought-of pilgrimage. This time he
+kept to the road, plodding along with tired, dejected footsteps, which
+had in them still something of that restless haste which drove him
+ceaselessly onward as though he were indeed possessed of some unquiet
+spirit. He was recovering now, however, a little of his natural common
+sense. He remembered that he must have food and drink, and he sought
+them from the wayside public-house like an ordinary traveler, conquering
+without any apparent effort that first invincible repugnance of his
+toward the face of any human being. Then on again across this strange
+land of windmills and spreading plains, until the darkness forced him
+to take shelter once more. That night he slept like a child. With the
+morning, the fever had passed from his blood. A great wind blew in his
+face even as he opened his eyes, touched to wakefulness by the morning
+sun, a wind that came booming over the level places, salt with the touch
+of the ocean and fragrant with the perfume of many marsh plants. He was
+coming toward the sea now, and within a very short distance from where
+he had spent the night, he found a broad, shining river stealing into
+the land. With eager fingers he stripped himself and plunged in, diving
+again and again below the surface, swimming with long, lazy strokes
+backwards and forwards. Afterwards he lay down in the warm, dry grass,
+dressed himself slowly, and went on his way. The wind, which had
+increased now since the early morning, came thundering across the level
+land, bending the tops of the few scattered trees, sending the sails of
+the windmills spinning, bringing on its bosom now stronger than ever the
+flavor of the sea itself, salt and stimulating. Tavernake told himself
+that this was a new world into which he was coming. He would pass into
+its embrace and life would become a new thing.
+
+Towards evening with many a thrill of reminiscence, he descended a steep
+hill and walked into a queer time-forgotten village, whose scattered
+red-tiled cottages were built around an arm of the sea. Boldly enough
+now he entered the one inn which flaunted its sign upon the cobbled
+street, and, taking a seat in the stone-floored kitchen, ate and drank
+and bespoke a bed. Later on, he strolled down to the quay and made
+friends with the few fishermen who were loitering there. They answered
+his questions readily, although he found it hard at first to pick up
+again the dialect of which he himself had once made use. The little
+place was scarcely changed. All progress, indeed, seemed to have
+passed it by. There were a handful of fishermen, a boat-builder and a
+fish-curer in the village. There was no other industry save a couple of
+small farmhouses on the outskirts of the place, no railway within twelve
+miles. Tourists came seldom, excursionists never. In the half contented,
+half animal-like expression which seemed common to all the inhabitants,
+Tavernake read easily enough the history of their uneventful days. It
+was such a shelter as this, indeed, for which he had been searching.
+
+On the second night after his arrival, he walked with the boatbuilder
+upon the wooden quay. The boatbuilder's name was Nicholls, and he was
+a man of some means, deacon of the chapel, with a fair connection as
+a jobbing carpenter, and possessor of the only horse and cart in the
+place.
+
+“Nicholls,” Tavernake said, “you don't remember me, do you?”
+
+The boat-builder shook his head slowly and ponderously.
+
+“There was Richard Tavernake who farmed the low fields,” he remarked,
+reminiscently. “Maybe you're a son of his. Now I come to think of it, he
+had a boy apprenticed to the carpentering.”
+
+“I was the boy,” Tavernake answered. “I soon had enough of it and went
+to London.”
+
+“You'm grown out of all knowledge,” Nicholls declared, “but I mind you
+now. So you've been in London all these years?”
+
+“I've been in London,” Tavernake admitted, “and I think, of the two,
+that Sprey-by-the-Sea is the better place.”
+
+“Sprey is well enough,” the boat-builder confessed, “well enough for a
+man who isn't set on change.”
+
+“Change,” Tavernake asserted, grimly, “is an overrated joy. I have had
+too much of it in my life. I think that I should like to stay here for
+some time.”
+
+The boat-builder was surprised, but he was a man of heavy and deliberate
+turn of mind and he did not commit himself to speech. Tavernake
+continued.
+
+“I used to know something of carpentering in my younger days,” he said,
+“and I don't think that I have forgotten it all. I wonder if I could
+find anything to do down here?”
+
+Matthew Nicholls stroked his beard thoughtfully.
+
+“The folk round about are not over partial to strangers,” he observed,
+“and you'm been away so long I reckon there's not many as'd recollect
+you. And as for carpentering jobs, there's Tom Lake over at Lesser
+Blakeney and his brother down at Brancaster, besides me on the spot,
+as you might say. It's a poor sort of opening there'd be, if you ask my
+opinion, especially for one like yourself, as 'as got education.”
+
+“I should be satisfied with very little,” Tavernake persisted. “I want
+to work with my hands. I should like to forget for a time that I have
+had any education at all.”
+
+“That do seem mightily queer to me,” Nicholls remarked, thoughtfully.
+
+Tavernake smiled.
+
+“Come,” he said, “it isn't altogether unnatural. I want to make
+something with my hands. I think that I could build boats. Why do you
+not take me into your yard? I could do no harm and I should not want
+much pay.”
+
+Matthew Nicholls stroked his beard once more and this time he counted
+fifty, as was his custom when confronted with a difficult matter. He had
+no need to do anything of the sort, for nothing in the world would have
+induced him to make up his mind on the spot as to so weighty a proposal.
+
+“It's not likely that you're serious,” he objected. “You are a young man
+and strong-limbed, I should imagine, but you've education--one can tell
+it by the way you pronounce your words. It's but a poor living, after
+all, to be made here.”
+
+“I like the place,” Tavernake declared doggedly. “I am a man of small
+needs. I want to work all through the day, work till I am tired enough
+to sleep at night, work till my bones ache and my arms are sore. I
+suppose you could give me enough to live on in a humble way?”
+
+“Take a bite of supper with me,” Nicholls answered. “In these serious
+affairs, my daughter has always her say. We will put the matter before
+her and see what she thinks of it.”
+
+They lingered about the quay until the light from Wells Lighthouse
+flashed across the sea, and until in the distance they could hear the
+moaning of the incoming tide as it rippled over the bar and began to
+fill the tidal way which stretched to the wooden pier itself. Then the
+two men made their way along the village street, through a field, and
+into the little yard over which stood the sign of “Matthew Nicholls,
+Boat-Builder.” At one corner of the yard was the cottage in which he
+lived.
+
+“You'll come right in, Mr. Tavernake,” he said, the instincts of
+hospitality stirring within him as soon as they had passed through
+the gate. “We will talk of this matter together, you and me and the
+daughter.”
+
+Tavernake seemed, on his introduction to the household, like a man
+unused to feminine society. Perhaps he did not expect to find such a
+type of her sex as Ruth Nicholls in such a remote neighborhood. She was
+thin, and her cheeks were paler than those of any of the other young
+women whom he had seen about the village. Her eyes, too, were darker,
+and her speech different. There was nothing about her which reminded him
+in the least of the child with whom he had played. Tavernake watched
+her intently. Presently the idea came to him that she, too, was seeking
+shelter.
+
+Supper was a simple meal, but it was well and deftly served. The girl
+had the gift of moving noiselessly. She was quick without giving
+the impression of haste. To their guest she was courteous, but her
+recollection of him appeared to be slight, and his coming but a matter
+of slight interest. After she had cleared the cloth, however, and
+produced a jar of tobacco, her father bade her sit down with them.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake,” he began, ponderously, “is thinking some of settling
+down in these parts, Ruth.”
+
+She inclined her head gravely.
+
+“It appears,” her father continued, “that he is sick and tired of the
+city and of head-work. He is wishful to come into the yard with me, if
+so be that we could find enough work for two.”
+
+The girl looked at their visitor, and for the first time there was a
+measure of curiosity in her earnest gaze. Tavernake was, in his way,
+good enough to look upon. He was well-built, his shoulders and physique
+all spoke of strength. His features were firmly cut, although his
+general expression was gloomy. But for a certain moroseness, an
+uncouthness which he seemed to cultivate, he might even have been deemed
+good-looking.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake would make a great mistake,” she said, hesitatingly. “It
+is not well for those who have brains to work with their hands. It is
+not a place for those to live who have been out in the world. At most
+seasons of the year it is but a wilderness. Sometimes there is little
+enough to do, even for father.”
+
+“I am not ambitious for over-much work or for over-much money, Miss
+Nicholls,” Tavernake replied. “I will be frank with you both. Things out
+in the world there went ill with me; it was not my fault, but they went
+ill with me. What ambitions I had are finished--for the present, at any
+rate. I want to rest, I want to work with my hands, to grow my muscles
+again, to feel my strength, to believe that there is something effective
+in the world I can do. I have had a shock, a disappointment,--call it
+what you like.”
+
+The old man Nicholls nodded deliberately.
+
+“Well,” he pronounced, “it's a big change to make. I never thought of
+help in the yard before. When there's been more than I could do, I've
+just let it go. Come for a week on trial, Leonard Tavernake. If we are
+of any use to one another, we shall soon know of it.”
+
+The girl, who had been looking out into the night, came back.
+
+“You are making a mistake, Mr. Tavernake,” she said. “You are too young
+and strong to have finished your battle.”
+
+He looked at her steadily and sighed. It was only too obvious that hers
+had been fought and lost.
+
+“Perhaps,” he replied softly, “you are right. Perhaps it is only the
+rest I want. We shall see.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II. THE SIMPLE LIFE
+
+
+So Tavernake became a boat-builder. Summer passed into winter and this
+hamlet by the sea seemed, indeed, as though it might have been one of
+the forgotten spots upon the earth. Save for that handful of cottages,
+the two farmhouses a few hundred yards inland, and the deserted Hall
+half-hidden in its grove of pine trees, there was no dwelling-place
+nor any sign of human habitation for many miles. For eight hours a day
+Tavernake worked, mostly out of doors, in the little yard which hung
+over the beach. Sometimes he rested from his labors and looked seaward,
+looked around him as though rejoicing in that unbroken solitude, the
+emptiness of the gray ocean, the loneliness of the land behind. What
+things there were which lay back in the cells of his memory, no person
+there knew, for he spoke of his past to no one, not even to Ruth. He
+was a good workman, and he lived the simple life of those others without
+complaint or weariness. There was nothing in his manner to denote that
+he had been used to anything else. The village had accepted him without
+question. It was only Ruth who still, gravely but kindly enough,
+disapproved of his presence.
+
+One day she came and sat with him as he smoked his after-dinner pipe,
+leaning against an overturned boat, with his eyes fixed upon that line
+of gray breakers.
+
+“You spend a good deal of your time thinking, Mr. Tavernake,” she
+remarked quietly.
+
+“Too much,” he admitted at once, “too much, Miss Nicholls. I should be
+better employed planing down that mast there.”
+
+“You know that I did not mean that,” she said, reprovingly, “only
+sometimes you make me--shall I confess it?--almost angry with you.”
+
+He took his pipe from his mouth and knocked out the ashes. As they fell
+on the ground so he looked at them.
+
+“All thought is wasted time,” he declared, grimly, “all thought of the
+past. The past is like those ashes; it is dead and finished.”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“Not always,” she replied. “Sometimes the past comes to life again.
+Sometimes the bravest of us quit the fight too soon.”
+
+He looked at her questioningly, almost fiercely. Her words, however,
+seemed spoken without intent.
+
+“So far as mine is concerned,” he pronounced, “it is finished. There is
+a memorial stone laid upon it, and no resurrection is possible.”
+
+“You cannot tell,” she answered. “No one can tell.”
+
+He turned back to his work almost rudely, but she stayed by his side.
+
+“Once,” she remarked, reflectively, “I, too, went a little way into the
+world. I was a school-teacher at Norwich. I was very fond of some one
+there; we were engaged. Then my mother died and I had to come back to
+look after father.”
+
+He nodded.
+
+“Well?”
+
+“We are a long way from Norwich,” she continued, quietly. “Soon after I
+left, the man whom I was fond of grew lonely. He found some one else.”
+
+“You have forgotten him?” Tavernake asked, quickly.
+
+“I shall never forget him,” she replied. “That part of life is finished,
+but if ever my father can spare me, I shall go back to my work again.
+Sometimes those work the best and accomplish the most who carry the
+scars of a great wound.”
+
+She turned away to the house, and after that it seemed to him that she
+avoided him for a time. At any rate, she made no further attempt to win
+his confidence. Propinquity, however, was too much for both of them. He
+was a lodger under her father's roof. It was scarcely possible for them
+to keep apart. Saturdays and Sundays they walked sometimes for miles
+across the frost-bound marshes, in the quickening atmosphere of the
+darkening afternoons, when the red sun sank early behind the hills, and
+the twilight grew shorter every day. They watched the sea-birds together
+and saw the wild duck come down to the pools; felt the glow of exercise
+burn their cheeks; felt, too, that common and nameless exultation
+engendered by their loneliness in the solitude of these beautiful empty
+places. In the evenings they often read together, for Nicholls, although
+no drinker, never missed his hour or so at the village inn. Tavernake,
+in time, began to find a sort of comfort in her calm, sexless
+companionship. He knew very well that he was to her as she was to him,
+something human, something that filled an empty place, yet something
+without direct personality. Little by little he felt the bitterness
+in his heart grow less. Then a late spring--late, at any rate, in this
+quaint corner of the world--stole like some wonderful enchantment across
+the face of the moors and the marshes. Yellow gorse starred with golden
+clumps the brown hillside; wild lavender gleamed in patches across the
+silver-streaked marshes; the dead hedges came blossoming into life.
+Crocuses, long lines of yellow and purple crocuses, broke from waxy buds
+into starlike blossoms along the front of Matthew Nicholls's garden. And
+with the coming o spring, Tavernake found himself suddenly able to thin
+of the past. It was a new phase of life. He could sit down and think of
+those things that had happened to him, without fearing to be wrecked by
+the storm. Often he sat out looking seaward, thinking of the days
+when he had first met Beatrice, of those early days of pleasant
+companionship, of the marvelous avidity with which he had learned from
+her. Only when Elizabeth's face stole into the foreground did he spring
+from his place and turn back to his work.
+
+One day Tavernake sat poring over the weekly local paper, reading it
+more out of curiosity than from any real interest. Suddenly a familiar
+name caught his eye. His heart seemed to stop beating for a moment, and
+the page swam before his eyes. Quickly he recovered himself and read:
+
+      THE QUEEN'S HALL, UNTHANK ROAD,
+                  NORWICH
+
+                TWICE DAILY.
+             PROFESSOR FRANKLIN
+          assisted by his daughter,
+           MISS BEATRICE FRANKLIN,
+     will give his REFINED and MARVELOUS
+     ENTERTAINMENT, comprising HYPNOTISM, feats
+     Of SECOND SIGHT never before attempted on
+     any stage, THOUGHT-READING, and a BRIEF
+     LECTURE upon the connection between ANCIENT
+     SUPERSTITIONS and the EXTRAORDINARY
+     DEVELOPMENTS OF THE NEW SCIENCE.
+
+     PROFESSOR FRANKLIN Can be CONSULTED PRIVATELY,
+     by letter or by appointment.  Address for this
+     week--The Golden Cow, Bell's Lane, Norwich.
+
+Twice Tavernake read the announcement. Then he went out and found Ruth.
+
+“Ruth,” he told her, “there is something calling me back, perhaps for
+good.”
+
+For the first time she gave him her hand.
+
+“Now you are talking like a man once more,” she declared. “Go and seek
+it. Comeback and say good-bye to us, if you will, but throw your tools
+into the sea.”
+
+Tavernake laughed and looked across at his workshop.
+
+“I don't believe,” he said, “that you've any confidence in my boat.”
+
+“I'm not sure that I would sail with you,” she answered, “even if you
+ever finished it. A laborer's work for a laborer's hand. You must go
+back to the other things.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III. OLD FRIENDS MEET
+
+
+The professor set down his tumbler upon the zinc-rimmed counter. He was
+very little changed except that he had grown a shade stouter, and there
+was perhaps more color in his cheeks. He carried himself, too, like a
+man who believes in himself. In the small public-house he was, without
+doubt, an impressive figure.
+
+“My friends,” he remarked, “our host's whiskey is good. At the same
+time, I must not forget--”
+
+“You'll have one with me, Professor,” a youth at his elbow interrupted.
+“Two special whiskies, miss, if you please.”
+
+The professor shrugged his shoulders--it was a gesture which he
+wished every one to understand. He was suffering now the penalty for a
+popularity which would not be denied!
+
+“You are very kind, sir,” he said, “very kind, indeed. As I was about to
+say, I must not forget that in less than half an hour I am due upon the
+stage. It does not do to disappoint one's audience, sir. It is a poor
+place, this music-hall, but it is full, they tell me packed from floor
+to ceiling. At eight-thirty I must show myself.”
+
+“A marvelous turn, too, Professor,” declared one of the young men by
+whom he was surrounded.
+
+“I thank you, sir,” the professor replied, turning towards the speaker,
+glass in hand. “There have been others who have paid me a similar
+compliment; others, I may say, not unconnected with the aristocracy of
+your country--not unconnected either, I might add,” he went on, “with
+the very highest in the land, those who from their exalted position
+have never failed to shower favors upon the more fortunate sons of our
+profession. The science of which I am to some extent the pioneer--not a
+drop more, my young friend. Say, I'm in dead earnest this time! No more,
+indeed.”
+
+The young man in knickerbockers who had just come in banged the head of
+his cane upon the counter.
+
+“You'll never refuse me, Professor,” he asserted, confidently. “I'm
+an old supporter, I am. I've seen you in Blackburn and Manchester, and
+twice here. Just as wonderful as ever! And that young lady of yours,
+Professor, begging your pardon if she is your daughter, as no doubt she
+is, why, she's a nut and no mistake.”
+
+The professor sighed. He was in his element but he was getting uneasy at
+the flight of time.
+
+“My young friend,” he said, “your face is not familiar to me but
+I cannot refuse your kindly offer. It must be the last, however,
+absolutely the last.”
+
+Then Tavernake, directed here from the music-hall, pushed open the swing
+door and entered. The professor set down his glass untasted. Tavernake
+came slowly across the room.
+
+“You haven't forgotten me, then, Professor?” he remarked, holding out
+his hand.
+
+The professor welcomed him a little limply; something of the bombast had
+gone out of his manner. Tavernake's arrival had reminded him of things
+which he had only too easily forgotten.
+
+“This is very surprising,” he faltered, “very surprising indeed. Do you
+live in these parts?”
+
+“Not far away,” Tavernake answered. “I saw your announcement in the
+papers.”
+
+The professor nodded.
+
+“Yes,” he said, “I am on the war-path again. I tried resting but I
+got fat and lazy, and the people wouldn't have it, sir,” he continued,
+recovering very quickly something of his former manner. “The number
+of offers I got through my agents by every post was simply
+astounding--astounding!”
+
+“I am looking forward to seeing your performance this evening,”
+ Tavernake said politely. “In the meantime--”
+
+“I know what you are thinking of,” the professor interrupted. “Well,
+well, give me your arm and we will walk down to the hall together.
+My friends,” the professor added, turning round, “I wish you all a
+good-night!”
+
+Then the door was pushed half-way open and Tavernake's heart gave a
+jump. It was Beatrice who stood there, very pale, very tired, and much
+thinner even than the Beatrice of the boardinghouse, but still Beatrice.
+
+“Father,” she exclaimed, “do you know that it is nearly--”
+
+Then she saw Tavernake and said no more. She seemed to sway a little,
+and Tavernake, taking a quick step forward, grasped her by the hands.
+
+“Dear sister,” he cried, “you have been ill!”
+
+She was herself again almost in a moment.
+
+“Ill? Never in my life,” she replied. “Only I have been hurrying--we
+are late already for the performance--and seeing you there, well, it was
+quite a shock, you know. Walk down with us and tell me all about it.
+Tell us what you are doing here--or rather, don't talk for a moment! It
+is all so amazing.”
+
+They turned down the narrow cobbled street, the professor walking in the
+middle of the roadway, swinging his cane, a very imposing and wonderful
+figure, with the tails of his frock-coat streaming in the wind, his
+long hair only half-hidden by his hat. He hummed a tune to himself
+and affected not to take any notice of the other two. Then Tavernake
+suddenly realized that he had done a cowardly action in leaving her
+without a word.
+
+“There is so much to ask,” she began at last, “but you have come back.”
+
+She looked at his workman's clothes.
+
+“What have you been doing?” she asked, sharply.
+
+“Working,” Tavernake answered, “good work, too. I am the better for it.
+Don't mind my clothes, Beatrice. I have been mad for a time, but after
+all it has been a healthy madness.”
+
+“It was a strange thing that you did,” she said,--“you disappeared.”
+
+He nodded.
+
+“Some day,” he told her, “I may, perhaps, be able to make you
+understand. Just now I don't think that I could.”
+
+“It was Elizabeth?” she whispered, softly.
+
+“It was Elizabeth,” he admitted.
+
+They said no more then till they reached the hall. She stopped at the
+door and put out her hand timidly.
+
+“I shall see you afterwards?” she ventured.
+
+“Do you mind my coming to the performance?” he asked.
+
+She hesitated.
+
+“A few moments ago,” she remarked, smiling, “I was dreading your coming.
+Now I think that you had better. It will be all over at ten o'clock, and
+I shall look for you outside. You are living in Norwich?”
+
+“I shall be here for to-night, at any rate,” he answered.
+
+“Very well, then,” she said, “afterwards we will have a talk.”
+
+Tavernake passed through the scattered knot of loiterers at the door
+and bought a seat for himself in the little music-hall, which,
+notwithstanding the professor's boast, was none too well filled. It was
+a place of the old-fashioned sort, with small tables in the front, and
+waiters hurrying about serving drinks. The people were of the lowest
+order, and the atmosphere of the room was thick with tobacco smoke.
+A young woman in a flaxen wig and boy's clothes was singing a popular
+ditty, marching up and down the stage, and interspersing the words o f
+her song with grimaces and appropriate action. Tavernake sat down with
+a barely-smothered groan. He was beginning to realize the tragedy upon
+which he had stumbled. A comic singer followed, who in a dress suit
+several sizes too large for him gave an imitation of a popular Irish
+comedian. Then the curtain went up and the professor was seen, standing
+in front of the curtain and bowing solemnly to a somewhat unresponsive
+audience. A minute later Beatrice came quietly in and sat by his side.
+There was nothing new about the show. Tavernake had seen the same thing
+before, with the exception that the professor was perhaps a little
+behind the majority of his fellow-craftsmen. The performance was
+finished in dead silence, and after it was over, Beatrice came to the
+front and sang. She was a very unusual figure in such a place, in a
+plain black evening gown, with black gloves and no jewelry, but they
+encored her heartily, and she sang a song from the musical comedy
+in which Tavernake had first seen her. A sudden wave of reminiscence
+stirred within him. His thoughts seemed to go back to the night when
+he had waited for her outside the theatre and they had had supper at
+Imano's, to the day when he had left the boarding-house and entered upon
+his new life. It was more like a dream than ever now.
+
+He rose and quitted the place immediately she had finished, waiting in
+the street until she appeared. She came out in a few minutes.
+
+“Father is going to a supper,” she announced, “at the inn where he has a
+room for receiving people. Will you come home with me for an hour? Then
+we can go round and fetch him.”
+
+“I should like to,” Tavernake answered.
+
+Her lodgings were only a few steps away--a strange little house in a
+narrow street. She opened the front door and ushered him in.
+
+“You understand, of course,” she said, smiling, “that we have abandoned
+the haunts of luxury altogether.”
+
+He looked around at the tiny room with its struggling fire and horsehair
+sofa, linoleum for carpet, oleographs for pictures, and he shivered,
+not for his own sake but for hers. On the sideboard were some bread and
+cheese and a bottle of ginger beer.
+
+“Please imagine,” she begged, taking the pins from her hat, “that you
+are in those dear comfortable rooms of ours down at Chelsea. Draw
+that easy-chair up to what there is of the fire, and listen. You smoke
+still?”
+
+“I have taken to a pipe,” he admitted.
+
+“Then light it and listen,” she went on, smoothing her hair for a minute
+in front of the looking-glass. “You want to know about Elizabeth, of
+course.”
+
+“Yes,” he said, “I want to know.”
+
+“Elizabeth, on the whole,” Beatrice continued, “got out of all her
+troubles very well. Her husband's people were wild with her, but
+Elizabeth was very clever. They were never able to prove that she had
+exercised more than proper control over poor Wenham. He died two months
+after they took him to the asylum. They offered Elizabeth a lump sum to
+waive all claims to his estate, and she accepted it. I think that she is
+now somewhere on the Continent.”
+
+“And you?” he asked. “Why did you leave the theatre?”
+
+“It was a matter of looking after my father,” she explained. “You see,
+while he was there with Elizabeth he had too much money and nothing to
+do. The consequence was that he was always--well, I suppose I had better
+say it--drinking too much, and he was losing all his desire for work. I
+made him promise that if I could get some engagements he would come away
+with me, so I went to an agent and we have been touring like this for
+quite a long time.”
+
+“But what a life for you!” Tavernake exclaimed. “Couldn't you have
+stayed on at the theatre and found him something in London?”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“In London,” she said, “he would never have got out of his old habits.
+And then,” she went on, hesitatingly, “you understand that the public
+want something else besides the hypnotism--”
+
+Tavernake interrupted her ruthlessly.
+
+“Of course I understand,” he declared, “I was there to-night. I
+understood at once why you were not very anxious for me to go. The
+people cared nothing at all about your father's performance. They simply
+waited for you. You would get the same money if you went round without
+him.”
+
+She nodded, a trifle shamefacedly.
+
+“I am so afraid some one will tell him,” she confessed. “They nearly
+always ask me to leave out his part of the performance. They have even
+offered me more money if I would come alone. But you see how it is. He
+believes in himself, he thinks he is very clever and he believes that
+the public like his show. It is the only thing which helps him to keep a
+little self-respect. He thinks that my singing is almost unnecessary.”
+
+Tavernake looked into that faint glimmer of miserable fire. He was
+conscious of a curious feeling in his throat. How little he knew of
+life! The pathos of what she had told him, the thought of her bravely
+traveling the country and singing at third-rate music-halls, never
+taking any credit to herself, simply that her father might still believe
+himself a man of talent, appealed to him irresistibly. He suddenly held
+out his hand.
+
+“Poor little Beatrice!” he exclaimed. “Dear little sister!”
+
+The hand he gripped was cold, she avoided his eyes.
+
+“You--you mustn't,” she murmured. “Please don't!”
+
+He held out his other hand and half rose, but her lips suddenly ceased
+to quiver and she waved him back.
+
+“No, Leonard,” she begged, “please don't do or say anything foolish.
+Since we do meet again, though, like this, I am going to ask you one
+question. What made you come to me and ask me to marry you that day?”
+
+He looked away; something in her eyes accused him.
+
+“Beatrice,” he confessed, “I was a thick-headed ignorant fool, without
+understanding. I came to you for safety. I was afraid of Elizabeth, I
+was afraid of what I felt for her. I wanted to escape from it.”
+
+She smiled piteously.
+
+“It wasn't a very brave thing to do, was it?” she faltered.
+
+“It was mean,” he admitted. “It was worse than that. But, Beatrice,” he
+went on, “I was missing you horribly. You did leave a big empty place
+when you went away. I am not going to excuse myself about Elizabeth. I
+lived through a time of the strangest, most marvelous emotions one could
+dream of. Then the thing came to an end and I felt as though the
+bottom had gone out of life. I suppose--I loved her,” he continued
+hesitatingly. “I don't know. I only know that she filled every thought
+of my brain, that she lived in every beat of my heart, that I would have
+gone down into Hell to help her. And then I understood. That morning
+she told me something of the truth about herself, not meaning
+to--unconsciously--justifying herself all the time, not realizing that
+every word she said was damnable. And then there didn't seem to be
+anything else left, and I had only one desire. I turned my back upon
+everything and I went back to the place where I was born, a little
+fishing village. For the last thirty miles I walked. I shall never
+forget it. When I got there, what I wanted was work, work with my hands.
+I wanted to build something, to create anything that I could labor upon.
+I became a boat builder--I have been a boatbuilder ever since.”
+
+“And now?” she asked.
+
+“Beatrice!”
+
+She turned and faced him. She looked into his eyes very searchingly,
+very wistfully.
+
+“Beatrice,” he said, “I ask you once more, only differently. Will you
+marry me now? I'll find some work, I'll make enough money for us. Do you
+remember,” he went on, “how I used to talk, how I used to feel that I
+had only to put forth my strength and I could win anything? I'll feel
+like that again, Beatrice, if you'll come to me.”
+
+She shook her head slowly. She looked away from him with a sigh. She
+had the air of one who has sought for something which she has failed to
+find.
+
+“You mustn't think of that again, Leonard,” she told him. “It would be
+quite impossible. This is the only way I can save my father. We have a
+tour that will take us the best part of another year.”
+
+“But you are sacrificing yourself!” he declared. “I will keep your
+father.”
+
+“It isn't that only,” she replied. “For one thing, I couldn't let you;
+and for another, it isn't only the money, it's the work. As long as
+he's made to think that the public expect him every night, he keeps off
+drinking too much. There is nothing else in the whole world which would
+keep him steady. Don't look as though you didn't understand, Leonard. He
+is my father, you know, and there isn't anything more terrible than to
+see any one who has a claim on us give way to anything like that. You
+mayn't quite approve, but please believe that I am doing what I feel to
+be right.”
+
+The little fire had gone out. Beatrice glanced at the clock and put on
+her jacket again.
+
+“I am sorry, Leonard,” she said, “but I think I must go and fetch father
+now. You can walk with me there, if you will. It has been very good
+to see you again. For the rest I don't know what to say to you. Do you
+think that it is quite what you were meant for--to build boats?”
+
+“I don't seem to have any other ambition,” he answered, wearily. “When
+I read in the paper this morning that you and your father were here,
+things seemed suddenly different. I came at once. I didn't know what I
+wanted until I saw you, but I know now, and it isn't any good.”
+
+“No good at all,” she declared cheerfully. “It won't be very long,
+Leonard, before something else comes along to stir you. I don't think
+you were meant to build boats all your life.”
+
+He rose and took up his hat. She was waiting for him at the door. Again
+they passed down the narrow street.
+
+“Tell, me, Beatrice,” he begged, “is it because you don't like me well
+enough that you won't listen to what I ask?”
+
+For a moment she half closed her eyes as though in pain. Then she
+laughed, not perhaps very naturally. They were standing now by the door
+of the public house.
+
+“Leonard,” she said, “you are very young in years but you are a baby
+in experience. Mind, there are other reasons why I could not--would not
+dream of marrying you, other reasons which are absolutely sufficient,
+but--do you know that you have asked me twice and you have never once
+said that you cared, that you have never once looked as though you
+cared? No, don't, please,” she interrupted, “don't explain anything. You
+see, a woman always knows--too well, sometimes.”
+
+She nodded, and passed in through the swinging-doors. Standing out there
+in the narrow, crooked street, Tavernake heard the clapping and applause
+which greeted her entrance, he heard her father's voice. Some one struck
+a note at the piano--she was going to sing. Very slowly he turned away
+and walked down the cobbled hill.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV. PRITCHARD'S GOOD NEWS
+
+
+Late in the afternoon of the following day, Ruth came home from the
+village and found Tavernake hard at work on his boat. She put down her
+basket and stopped by his side.
+
+“So you are back again,” she remarked.
+
+“Yes, I am back again.”
+
+“And nothing has happened?”
+
+“Nothing has happened,” he assented, wearily. “Nothing ever will happen
+now.”
+
+She smiled.
+
+“You mean that you will stay here and build boats all your life?”
+
+“That is what I mean to do,” he announced.
+
+She laid her hand upon his shoulder.
+
+“Don't believe it, Leonard,” she said. “There is other work for you in
+the world somewhere, just as there is for me.”
+
+He shook his head and she picked up her basket again, smiling.
+
+“Your time will come as it comes to the rest of us,” she declared,
+cheerfully. “You won't want to sit here and bury your talents in the
+sands all your days. Have you heard what is going to happen to me?”
+
+“No! Something good, I hope.”
+
+“My father's favorite niece is coming to live with us--there are seven
+of them altogether, and farming doesn't pay like it used to, so Margaret
+is coming here. Father says that if she is as handy as she used to be I
+may go back to the schools almost at once.”
+
+Tavernake was silent for a moment. Then he got up and threw down his
+tools.
+
+“Great Heavens!” he exclaimed. “If I am not becoming the most selfish
+brute that ever breathed! Do you know, the first thought I had was that
+I should miss you? You are right, young woman, I must get out of this.”
+
+She disappeared into the house, smiling, and Tavernake called out to
+Nicholls, who was sitting on the wall.
+
+“Mr. Nicholls,” he asked, “how much notice do you want?”
+
+Matthew Nicholls removed his pipe from his mouth.
+
+“Why, I don't know that I'm particular,” he replied, “being as you want
+to go. Between you and me, I'm gettin' fat and lazy since you came.
+There ain't enough work for two, and that's all there is to it, and
+being as you're young and active, why, I've left it to you, and look at
+my arms.”
+
+He held them up.
+
+“Used to be all muscle, now they're nothin' but bloomin' pap. And no'
+but two glasses of beer a day extra have I drunk, just to pass the time.
+You can stay if you will, young man, but you can go out fishin' and
+leave me the work, and I'll pay you just the same, for I'm not saying
+that I don't like your company. Or you can go when you please, and
+that's the end of it.”
+
+Matthew Nicholls spat upon the stones and replaced his pipe in his
+mouth. Tavernake came in and sat down by his side.
+
+“Look here,” he said, “I believe you are right. I'll stay another week
+but I'll take things easy. You get on with the boat now. I'll sit here
+and have a smoke.”
+
+Nicholls grunted but obeyed, and for the next few days Tavernake loafed.
+On his return one afternoon from a long walk, he saw a familiar figure
+sitting upon the sea wall in front of the workshop, a familiar figure
+but a strange one in these parts. It was Mr. Pritchard, in an American
+felt hat, and smoking a very black cigar. He leaned over and nodded to
+Tavernake, who was staring at him aghast.
+
+“Hallo, old man!” he called out. “Run you to earth, you see!”
+
+“Yes, I see!” Tavernake exclaimed.
+
+“Come right along up here and let's talk,” Pritchard continued.
+
+Tavernake obeyed. Pritchard looked him over approvingly. Tavernake was
+roughly dressed in those days, but as a man he had certainly developed.
+
+“Say, you're looking fine,” his visitor remarked. “What wouldn't I give
+for that color and those shoulders!”
+
+“It is a healthy life,” Tavernake admitted. “Do you mean that you've
+come down here to see me?”
+
+“That's so,” Pritchard announced; “down here to see you, and for no
+other reason. Not but that the scenery isn't all it should be, and that
+sort of thing,” he went on, “but I am not putting up any bluff about
+it. It's you I am here to talk to. Are you ready? Shall I go straight
+ahead?”
+
+“If you please,” Tavernake said, slowly filling his pipe.
+
+“You dropped out of things pretty sudden,” Pritchard continued. “It
+didn't take me much guessing to reckon up why. Between you and me, you
+are not the first man who's been up against it on account of that young
+woman. Don't stop me,” he begged. “I know how you've been feeling. It
+was a right good idea of yours to come here. Others before you
+have tried the shady side of New York and Paris, and it's the wrong
+treatment. It's Hell, that's what it is, for them. Now that young
+woman--we got to speak of her--is about the most beautiful and the most
+fascinating of her sex--I'll grant that to start with--but she isn't
+worth the life of a snail, much less the life of a strong man.”
+
+“You are, quite right,” Tavernake confessed, shortly. “I know I was
+a fool--a fool! If I could think of any adjective that would meet the
+case, I'd use it, but there it is. I chucked things and I came here. You
+haven't come down to tell me your opinion of me, I suppose?”
+
+“Not by any manner of means,” Pritchard admitted. “I came down first to
+tell you that you were a fool, if it was necessary. Since you know it,
+it isn't. We'll pass on to the next stage, and that is, what are you
+going to do about it?”
+
+“It is in my mind at the present moment,” Tavernake announced, “to leave
+here. The only trouble is, I am not very keen about London.”
+
+Pritchard nodded thoughtfully.
+
+“That's all right,” he agreed. “London's no place for a man, anyway. You
+don't want to learn the usual tricks of money-making. Money that's made
+in the cities is mostly made with stained fingers. I have a different
+sort of proposal to make.”
+
+“Go ahead,” Tavernake said. “What is it?”
+
+“A new country,” Pritchard declared, altering the angle of his cigar,
+“a virgin land, mountains and valleys, great rivers to be crossed, all
+sorts of cold and heat to be borne with, a land rich with minerals--some
+say gold, but never mind that. There is oil in parts, there's tin,
+there's coal, and there's thousands and thousands of miles of forest.
+You're a surveyor?”
+
+“Passed all my exams,” Tavernake agreed tersely.
+
+“You are the man for out yonder,” Pritchard insisted. “I've two years'
+vacation--dead sick of this city life I am--and I am going to put you on
+the track of it. You don't know much about prospecting yet, I reckon?”
+
+“Nothing at all!”
+
+“You soon shall,” Pritchard went on. “We'll start from Winnipeg. A few
+horses, some guides, and a couple of tents. We'll spend twenty weeks, my
+friend, without seeing a town. What do you think of that?”
+
+“Gorgeous!” Tavernake muttered.
+
+“Twenty weeks we'll strike westward. I know the way to set about the
+whole job. I know one or two of the capitalists, too, and if we don't
+map out some of the grandest estates in British Columbia, why, my name
+ain't Pritchard.”
+
+“But I haven't a penny in the world,” Tavernake objected.
+
+“That's where you're lying,” Pritchard remarked, pulling a newspaper
+from his pocket. “See the advertisement for yourself: 'Leonard
+Tavernake, something to his advantage.' Well, down I went to those
+lawyers--your old lawyer it was--Martin. I told him I was on your track,
+and he said--'For Heaven's sake, send the fellow along!' Say, Tavernake,
+he made me laugh the way he described your bursting in upon him and
+telling him to take your land for his costs, and walking out of the room
+like something almighty. Why, he worked that thing so that they had to
+buy your land, and they took him into partnership. He's made a pot of
+money, and needs no costs from you, and there's the money for your land
+and what he had of yours besides, waiting for you.”
+
+Tavernake smoked stolidly at his pipe. His eyes were out seaward, but
+his heart was beating to a new and splendid music. To start life again,
+a man's life, out in the solitudes, out in the great open spaces! It was
+gorgeous, this! He turned round and grasped Pritchard by the shoulder.
+
+“I say,” he exclaimed, “why are you doing all this for me, Pritchard?”
+
+Pritchard laughed.
+
+“You did me a good turn,” he said, “and you're a man. You've the
+pluck--that's what I like. You knew nothing, you were as green and
+ignorant as a young man from behind the counter of a country shop, but,
+my God! you'd got the right stuff, and I meant getting even with you
+if I could. You'll leave here with me to-morrow, and in three weeks we
+sail.”
+
+Ruth came smiling out from the house.
+
+“Won't you bring your friend in to supper, Mr. Tavernake?” she begged.
+“It's good news, I hope?” she added, lowering her voice a little.
+
+“It's the best,” Tavernake declared, “the best!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V. BEATRICE REFUSES
+
+
+A week later Tavernake was in London. A visit to his friend Mr. Martin
+had easily proved the truth of Pritchard's words, and he found himself
+in possession of a sum of money at least twice as great as he had
+anticipated. He stayed at a cheap hotel in the Strand and made purchases
+under Pritchard's supervision. For the first few days he was too busy
+for reflection. Then Pritchard let him alone while he ran over to Paris,
+and Tavernake suddenly realized that he was in the city to which he had
+thought never to return. He passed the back of the theatre where he had
+waited for Beatrice, he looked up at the entrance of the Milan Court;
+he lunched alone, and with a curious mixture of feelings, at the little
+restaurant where he had supped with Beatrice. It was over, that part
+of his life, over and finished. Yet, with his natural truthfulness, he
+never attempted to disguise from himself the pain at his heart. Three
+times in one day he found himself, under some pretext or another, in
+Imano's Restaurant. Once, in the middle of the street, he burst into a
+fit of laughter. It was while Pritchard was in London, and he asked him
+a question.
+
+“Pritchard,” he remarked, “you area man of experience. Did any one ever
+care for two women at the same time?”
+
+Pritchard removed his cigar from his teeth and stared at his companion.
+
+“Why, my young friend,” he replied, “I've found no trouble myself in
+being fond of a dozen.”
+
+Tavernake smiled and said no more. Pritchard was one of the good fellows
+of the world, but there were things which were hidden from him.
+Yet Tavernake, who had fallen into a habit, during his solitude, of
+analyzing his sensations, was puzzled by this one circumstance, that
+when he thought of Elizabeth, though his heart never failed to beat
+more quickly, the sense of shame generally stole over him; and when he
+thought of Beatrice, a curious loneliness, a loneliness that brought
+with it a pain, seemed suddenly to make the hours drag and his pleasures
+flavorless. For two days he was puzzled. Then his habit of taking long
+walks helped him toward a solution. In a small outlying music-hall in
+the east-end of London, he saw the same announcement that he had noticed
+in the Norfolk newspaper,--“Professor Franklin” in large type, and “Miss
+Beatrice Franklin” in small.
+
+That night he attended the music-hall. The scene was practically a
+repetition of the one in Norwich, only with additions. The professor's
+bombastic performance met with scarcely any applause. Its termination
+was, indeed, interrupted by catcalls and whistles from the gallery.
+Beatrice's songs, on the other hand, were applauded more vociferously
+than ever. She had hard work to avoid a third encore.
+
+At the end of the performance, Tavernake made his way to the stage-door
+and waited. The neighborhood was an unsavory one, and the building
+itself seemed crowded in among a row of shops of the worst order,
+fish stalls, and a glaring gin palace. Long before Beatrice came out,
+Tavernake could hear the professor's voice down the covered passage, the
+professor's voice apparently raised in anger.
+
+“Undutiful behavior, that's what I call it--undutiful!”
+
+They emerged into the street, the professor very much the same as usual;
+Beatrice paler, with a pathetic droop about her mouth. Tavernake came
+eagerly forward.
+
+“Beatrice!” he cried, holding out his hand.
+
+The professor drew back. Beatrice stood still,--for a moment it seemed
+as though she were about to faint. Tavernake grasped her hands.
+
+“I am so sorry!” he exclaimed, clumsily. “I ought not to have come up
+like that.”
+
+She smiled a little wan smile.
+
+“I am quite all right,” she replied, “only the heat inside was rather
+trying, and even out here the atmosphere isn't too good, is it? How did
+you find us out?”
+
+“By chance again,” Tavernake answered. “I have news. May I walk with you
+a few steps?”
+
+She glanced timidly toward her father. The professor was holding aloof
+in dignified silence.
+
+“Perhaps,” Tavernake said quickly, “you would take supper with me? I am
+going abroad, and I should like to say good-bye properly. A bottle of
+champagne and some supper. What do you say, Professor?”
+
+The professor suffered his features to relax.
+
+“A very admirable idea,” he declared. “Where shall we go?”
+
+“Is it too late to get to Imano's?” Tavernake suggested.
+
+The professor hesitated.
+
+“A taxicab,” he remarked, “would do it, if--”
+
+He paused, and Tavernake smiled.
+
+“A taxicab it shall be,” he decided. “I am in funds just for the moment.
+Come along, both of you, and I'll tell you all about it.”
+
+He made her take his arm, although her fingers did no more than touch
+his coat sleeve.
+
+“Pritchard came and dug me out,” he continued. “I am going abroad with
+him. It's sort of prospecting in some new country at the back of British
+Columbia. We see what we can find and then go to a financier's and start
+companies, mining companies and oil fields--anything. I am off in a
+week.”
+
+Beatrice half closed her eyes. They had hailed a passing cab and she
+sank back among the cushions with a sigh of relief.
+
+“Dear Leonard,” she murmured, “I am so glad, so very happy for your
+sake. This is the sort of thing which I hoped would happen.”
+
+“And now tell me about yourselves,” he went on.
+
+There was a sudden silence. Tavernake was conscious that Beatrice's
+clothes were distinctly shabbier, that the professor's hat was shiny.
+The professor cleared his throat.
+
+“I do not wish,” he said, “to intrude our private matters upon one who,
+although I will not call him a stranger, is assuredly not one of our
+old friends. At the same time, I admit that a little trouble has arisen
+between Beatrice and myself, and we were discussing it at the moment
+you arrived. I shall appeal to you now. As an unprejudiced member of the
+audience to-night, Mr. Tavernake, you will give me your honest opinion?”
+
+“Certainly,” Tavernake promised, with a sinking premonition of what was
+to come.
+
+“What I complain of,” the professor began, speaking with elaborate and
+impressive slowness, “is that my performance is hurried over and that
+too long a time is taken up by Beatrice's songs. The management remark
+upon the applause which her efforts occasionally ensure, but, as I would
+point out to you, sir,” he continued, “a performance such as mine makes
+too deep an impression for the audience to show their appreciation of it
+by such vulgar methods as hand-clapping and whistling. You follow me, I
+trust, Mr. Tavernake?”
+
+“Why, yes, of course,” Tavernake admitted.
+
+“I take a sincere and earnest interest in my work,” the professor
+declared, “and I feel that when it has to be scamped that my daughter
+may sing a music-hall ditty, the result is, to say the least of it,
+undignified. For some reason or other, I have been unable to induce the
+management to see entirely with me, but my point is that Beatrice
+should sing one song only, and that the additional ten minutes should be
+occupied by me in either a further exposition of my extraordinary powers
+as a hypnotist, or in a little address to the audience upon the hidden
+sciences. Now I appeal to you, Mr. Tavernake, as a young man of common
+sense. What is your opinion?”
+
+Tavernake, much too honest to be capable in a general way of duplicity,
+was on the point of giving it, but he caught Beatrice's imploring gaze.
+Her lips were moving. He hesitated.
+
+“Of course,” he began, slowly, “you have to try and put yourself into
+the position of the major part of the audience, who are exceedingly
+uneducated people. It is very hard to give an opinion, Professor. I
+must say that your entertainment this evening was listened to with rapt
+interest.”
+
+The professor turned solemnly towards his daughter.
+
+“You hear that, Beatrice?” he said severely. “You hear what Mr.
+Tavernake says? 'With rapt interest!'”
+
+“At the same time,” Tavernake went on, “without a doubt Miss Beatrice's
+songs were also extremely popular. It is rather a pity that the
+management could not give you a little more time.”
+
+“Failing that, sir,” the professor declared, “my point is, as I
+explained before, that Beatrice should give up one of her songs. What
+you have said this evening more than ever confirms me in my view.”
+
+Beatrice smiled thankfully at Tavernake.
+
+“Well,” she suggested, “at any rate we will leave it for the present.
+Sometimes I think, though, father, that you frighten them with some of
+your work, and you must remember that they come to be amused.”
+
+“That,” the professor admitted, “is the most sensible remark you have
+made, Beatrice. There is indeed something terrifying in some of my
+manifestations, terrifying even to myself, who understand so thoroughly
+my subject. However, as you say, we will dismiss the matter for the
+present. The thought of this supper party is a pleasant one. Do you
+remember, Mr. Tavernake, the night when you and I met in the balcony at
+Imano's?”
+
+“Perfectly well,” Tavernake answered.
+
+“Now I shall test your memory,” the professor continued, with a knowing
+smile. “Can you remember, sir, the brand of champagne which I was then
+drinking, and which I declared, if you recollect, was the one which best
+agreed with me, the one brand worth drinking?”
+
+“I am afraid I don't remember that,” Tavernake confessed. “Restaurant
+life is a thing I know so little of, and I have only drunk champagne
+once or twice in my life.”
+
+“Dear, dear me!” the professor exclaimed. “You do astonish me, sir.
+Well, that brand was Veuve Clicquot, and you may take my word for it,
+Mr. Tavernake, and you may find this knowledge useful to you when you
+have made a fortune in America and have become a man of pleasure; there
+is no wine equal to it. Veuve Clicquot, sir, if possible of the year
+1899, though the year 1900 is quite drinkable.”
+
+“Veuve Clicquot,” Tavernake repeated. “I'll remember it for this
+evening.”
+
+The professor beamed.
+
+“My dear,” he said to Beatrice, “Mr. Tavernake will think that I had a
+purpose in testing his memory.”
+
+Beatrice smiled.
+
+“And hadn't you, father?” she asked.
+
+They all laughed together.
+
+“Well, it is pleasant,” the professor admitted, “to have one's
+weaknesses ministered to, especially when one is getting on in life,”
+ he added, with a ponderous sigh. “Never mind, we will think only of
+pleasant subjects this evening. It will be quite interesting, Mr.
+Tavernake, to hear you order the supper.”
+
+“I sha'n't attempt it,” Tavernake answered. “I shall pass it on to you.”
+
+“This reminds me,” the professor declared, “of the old days. I feel sure
+that this is going to be a thoroughly enjoyable evening. We shall think
+of it often, Mr. Tavernake, when you lie sleeping under the stars. Why,
+what a wonderful thing these taxicabs are! You see, we have arrived.”
+
+They secured a small table in a corner at Imano's, and Tavernake found
+himself curiously moved as he watched Beatrice take off her worn and
+much mended gloves and look around uneasily at the other guests. Her
+clothes were indeed shabby, and there were hollows now in her cheeks.
+
+Again he felt that pain, a pain for which he could not account. Suddenly
+America seemed so far away, the loneliness of the great continent became
+an actual and appreciable thing. The professor was very much occupied
+ordering the supper. Tavernake leaned across the table.
+
+“Do you remember our first supper here, Beatrice?” he asked.
+
+She nodded, with an attempt at brightness which was a little pitiful.
+
+“Yes,” she replied, “I remember it quite well. And now, please, Leonard,
+don't talk to me again until I have had a glass of wine. I am tired and
+worn out, that is all.”
+
+Even Tavernake knew that she was struggling against the tears which
+already dimmed her eyes. He filled her glass himself. The professor set
+his own down empty with the satisfied smile of a connoisseur.
+
+“I think,” he said, “that you will agree with me about this vintage.
+Beatrice, this is what will bring color into your cheeks. My little
+girl,” he continued, turning to Tavernake, “will soon need a holiday. I
+am hoping presently to be able to arrange a short tour by myself, and if
+so, I shall send her to the seaside. Now I want you particularly to try
+the fish salad--the second dish there. Beatrice, let me help you.”
+
+Presently the orchestra began to play. The warmth of the room, the wine
+and the food--Tavernake had a horrible idea once that she had eaten
+nothing that day--brought back some of the color to Beatrice's cheeks
+and a little of the light to her eyes. She began to talk something in
+the old fashion. She avoided, however, any mention of that other supper
+they had had together. As time went on, the professor, who had drunk the
+best part of two bottles of wine and was talking now to a friend, became
+almost negligible. Tavernake leaned across the table.
+
+“Beatrice,” he whispered, “you are not looking well. I am afraid that
+life is getting harder with you.”
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“I am doing what I must,” she answered. “Please don't sympathize with
+me. I am hysterical, I think, tonight. It will pass off.”
+
+“But, Beatrice,” he ventured, timidly, “could one do nothing for you?
+I don't like these performances, and between you and me, we know they
+won't stand your father's show much longer. It will certainly come to an
+end soon. Why don't you try and get back your place at the theatre? You
+could still earn enough to keep him.”
+
+“Already I have tried,” she replied, sorrowfully. “My place is filled
+up. You see,” she added, with a forced laugh, “I have lost some of
+my looks, Leonard. I am thinner, too. Of course, I shall be all right
+presently, but it's rather against me at these west-end places.”
+
+Again he felt that pain at his heart. He was sure now that he was
+beginning to understand!
+
+“Beatrice,” he whispered, “give it up--marry me I will take care of
+him.”
+
+The flush of color faded from her cheeks. She shivered a little and
+looked at him piteously.
+
+“Leonard,” she pleaded, “you mustn't. I really am not very strong just
+now. We have finished with all that--it distresses me.”
+
+“But I mean it,” he begged. “Somehow, I have felt all sorts of things
+since we came in here. I think of that night, and I believe--I do
+believe that what came to me before was madness. It was not the same.”
+
+She was trembling now.
+
+“Leonard,” she implored, “if you care for me at all, be quiet. Father
+will turn round directly and I can't bear it. I shall be your very
+faithful friend; I shall think of you through the long days before we
+meet again, but don't--don't spoil this last evening.”
+
+The professor turned round, his face mottled, his eyes moist, a great
+good-humor apparent in his tone.
+
+“Well, I must say,” he declared, “that this has been a most delightful
+evening. I feel immensely better, and you, too, I hope, Beatrice?”
+
+She nodded, smiling.
+
+“I trust that when Mr. Tavernake returns,” the professor continued,
+“he will give us the opportunity of entertaining him in much the same
+manner. It will give me very much pleasure, also Beatrice. And if, sir,”
+ he proceeded, “during your stay in New York you will mention my name at
+the Goat's Club, or the Mosquito Club, you will, I think, find yourself
+received with a hospitality which will surprise you.”
+
+Tavernake thanked him and paid the bill. They walked slowly down the
+room, and Tavernake was curiously reluctant to release the little hand
+which clasped his.
+
+“I have kept this to the last,” Beatrice said, in a low tone. “Elizabeth
+is in London.”
+
+He was curiously unmoved.
+
+“Yes?” he murmured.
+
+“I should like you--I think it would be well for you to go and see her,”
+ she went on. “You know, Leonard, you were such a strange person in those
+days. You may imagine things. You may not realize where you are. I think
+that you ought to go and see her now, now that you have lived through
+some suffering, now that you understand things better. Will you?”
+
+“Yes, I will go,” Tavernake promised.
+
+Beatrice glanced round towards where her father was standing.
+
+“I don't want him to know,” she whispered. “I don't want either him
+or myself to be tempted to take any of her money. She is living at
+Claridge's Hotel. Go there and see her before you leave for your new
+life.”
+
+He stood at the door and watched them go down the Strand, the professor,
+flamboyant, walking erect with flying coat-tails, and his big cigar held
+firmly between his teeth; Beatrice, a wan figure in her black clothes,
+clinging to his arm. Tavernake watched them until they disappeared,
+conscious of a curious excitement, a strange pain, a sense of
+revelation. When at last they were out of sight and he turned back for
+his coat and hat, his feet were suddenly leaden. The band was playing
+the last selection--it was the air which Beatrice had sung only that
+night at the east-end music-hall. With a sudden overpowering impulse
+he turned and strode down the Strand in the direction where they had
+vanished. It was too late. There was no sign of them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI. UNDERSTANDING COMES TOO LATE
+
+
+Tavernake's first impression of Elizabeth was that he had never, even
+in his wildest thoughts, done her justice. He had never imagined her so
+wonderfully, so alluringly beautiful. She had received him, after a very
+long delay, in her sitting-room at Claridge's Hotel--a large apartment
+furnished more like a drawing-room. She was standing, when he entered,
+almost in the center of the room, dressed in a long lace cloak and a hat
+with a drooping black feather. She looked at him, as the door opened, as
+though for a moment half puzzled. Then she laughed softly and held out
+her hands.
+
+“Why, of course I remember you!” she exclaimed. “And to think that when
+I had your card I couldn't imagine where I had heard the name before!
+You are my dear estate agent's clerk, who wouldn't take my money, and
+who was so wretchedly rude to me twelve months ago.”
+
+Tavernake was quite cool. He found himself wondering whether this was
+a pose, or whether she had indeed forgotten. He decided that it was a
+pose.
+
+“I was also,” he reminded her, “one night in your rooms at the Milan
+Court when your husband--”
+
+She stopped him with an imperative gesture.
+
+“Spare me, please,” she begged. “Those were such terrible days--so dull,
+too! I remember that you were quite one of the brightest spots. You
+were absolutely different from every one I had ever met before, and you
+interested me immensely.”
+
+She looked at him and slowly shook her head.
+
+“You look very nice,” she said. “Your clothes fit you and you are most
+becomingly tanned, but you don't look half so awkward and so adorable.”
+
+“I am sorry,” he replied, shortly.
+
+“And you came to see me!” she went on. “That was really nice of you. You
+were quite fond of me, once, you know. Tell me, has it lasted?”
+
+“That is exactly what I came to find out,” he answered deliberately. “So
+far, I am inclined to think that it has not lasted.”
+
+She made a little wry face and drew his arm through hers.
+
+“Come and sit down and tell me why,” she insisted. “Be honest, now. Is
+it because you think I am looking older?”
+
+“I have thought of you for many hours a day for months,” Tavernake said,
+slowly, “and I never imagined you so beautiful as you seem now.”
+
+She clapped her hands.
+
+“And you mean it, too!” she exclaimed. “There is just the same
+delightfully convincing note in your tone. I am sure that you mean it.
+Please go on adoring me, Mr. Tavernake. I have no one who interests me
+at all just now. There is an Italian Count who wants to marry me, but he
+is terribly poor; and a young Australian, who follows me everywhere, but
+I am not sure about him. There is an English boy, too, who is going to
+commit suicide if I don't say 'yes' to him this week. On the whole,
+I think I am rather sorry that people know I am a widow. Tell me, Mr.
+Tavernake, are you going to adore me, too?”
+
+“I don't think so,” Tavernake answered. “I rather believe that I am
+cured.”
+
+She shrugged her shoulders and laughed musically.
+
+“But you say that you still think I am beautiful,” she went on, “and I
+am sure my clothes are perfect--they came straight from Paris. I hope
+you appreciate this lace,” she added, drawing it through her fingers.
+“My figure is just as good, too, isn't it?”
+
+She stood up and turned slowly round. Then she sat down suddenly, taking
+his hand in hers.
+
+“Please don't say that you think I have grown less attractive,” she
+begged.
+
+“As regards your personal attractions,” Tavernake replied, “I imagine
+that they are at least as great as ever. If you want the truth, I think
+that the reason I do not adore you any longer is because I saw your
+sister last night.”
+
+“Saw Beatrice!” she exclaimed. “Where?”
+
+“She was singing at a miserable east-end music-hall so that her father
+might find some sort of employment,” Tavernake said. “The people only
+forbore to hiss her father's turn for her sake. She goes about the
+country with him. Heaven knows what they earn, but it must be little
+enough! Beatrice is shabby and thin and pale. She is devoting the best
+years of her life to what she imagines to be her duty.”
+
+“And how does this affect me?” Elizabeth asked, coldly.
+
+“Only in this way,” Tavernake answered. “You asked me how it was that I
+could find you as beautiful as ever and adore you no longer. The reason
+is because I know you to be wretchedly selfish. I believed in you
+before. Everything that you did seemed right. That was because I was a
+fool, because you had filled my brain with impossible fancies, because I
+saw you and everything that you did through a distorted mirror.”
+
+“Have you come here to be rude?” she asked him.
+
+“Not in the least,” he replied. “I came here to see whether I was
+cured.”
+
+She began to laugh, very softly at first, but soon she threw herself
+back among the cushions and laid her hand caressingly upon his shoulder.
+
+“Oh, you are just the same!” she cried. “Just the same dear, truthful
+bundle of honesty and awkwardness and ignorance. So you are going to be
+victim of Beatrice's bow and spear, after all.”
+
+“I have asked your sister to marry me,” Tavernake admitted. “She will
+not.”
+
+“She was very wise,” Elizabeth declared, wiping the tears from her eyes.
+“As an experience you are delightful. As a husband you would be terribly
+impossible. Are you going to stay and take me out to dinner this
+evening? I'm sure you have a dress suit now.”
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+“I am sorry,” he said. “I have already an engagement.”
+
+She looked at him curiously. Was it really true that he had become
+indifferent? She was not used to men who escaped.
+
+“Tell me,” she asked, abruptly, “why did you come? I don't understand.
+You are here, and you pass your time being rude to me. I ask you to take
+me to dinner and you refuse. Do you know that scarcely a man in London
+would not have jumped at such a chance?”
+
+“Very likely,” Tavernake answered. “I have no experience in such
+matters. I only know that I am going to do something else.”
+
+“Something you want to do very much?” she whispered.
+
+“I am going down to a little music-hall in Whitechapel,” Tavernake said,
+“and I am going to meet your sister and I am going to put her in a cab
+and take her to have some supper, and I am going to worry her until she
+promises to be my wife.”
+
+“You are certainly a devoted admirer of the family,” she laughed.
+“Perhaps you were in love with her all the time.”
+
+“Perhaps I was,” he admitted.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+“I don't believe it,” she said. “I think you were quite fond of me once.
+You have such absurdly old-fashioned ideas or I think that you would be
+fond of me now.”
+
+Tavernake rose to his feet.
+
+“I am going,” he declared. “This will be good-bye. To-morrow I am going
+to British Columbia.”
+
+The laughter faded for a moment from her face. She was suddenly serious.
+
+“Don't go,” she begged. “Listen. I know I am not good like Beatrice, but
+I do like you--I always did. I suppose it is that wonderful truthfulness
+of yours. You are a different type from the men one meets. I am rather
+a reckless person. It is such a comfort sometimes to meet any one like
+you. You seem such an anchorage. Stay and talk to me for a little time.
+Take me out to-night. You asked me to go with you once, you know, and I
+would not. To-night it is I who ask you.”
+
+He shook his head slowly.
+
+“This is good-bye!” he said, firmly. “I suppose, after all, you were not
+unkind to me in those days, but you taught me a very bitter lesson. I
+came to you to-day in fear and trembling. I was afraid, perhaps, that
+the worst was not over, that there was more yet to come. Now I know that
+I am free.”
+
+She stamped her foot.
+
+“You shall not go away like that,” she declared.
+
+He smiled.
+
+“Do you think I do not understand?” he continued. “It is only because
+I am able to go, because the touch of your fingers, that look in your
+eyes, do not drive me half mad now, that you want me to stay. You would
+like to try your powers once more. I think not. I am satisfied that I am
+cured indeed, but perhaps it is safer to risk nothing.”
+
+She pointed to the door.
+
+“Very well, then,” she ordered, “you can go.”
+
+He bowed, and already his fingers were on the handle. Suddenly she
+called to him.
+
+“Leonard! Leonard!”
+
+He turned round. She was coming towards him with her arms outstretched,
+her eyes were full of tears, there were sobs in her voice.
+
+“I am so lonely,” she begged. “I have thought of you so much. Don't go
+away unkindly. Stay with me for this evening, at any rate. You can see
+Beatrice at any time. It is I who need you most now.”
+
+He looked around at the splendid apartment; he looked at the woman whose
+fingers, glittering with jewels, rested upon his shoulders. Then he
+thought of Beatrice in her shabby black gown and wan little face, and
+very gently he removed her hands.
+
+“No,” he said, “I do not think that you need me any more than I need
+you. This is a caprice of yours. You know it and I know it. Is it worth
+while to play with one another?”
+
+Her hands fell to her sides. She turned half away but she said
+nothing. Tavernake, with a sudden impulse which had in it nothing of
+passion--very little, indeed, of affection--lifted her fingers to his
+lips and passed out of the room. He descended the stairs, filled with
+a wonderful sense of elation, a buoyancy of spirit which he could not
+understand. As he walked blithely to his hotel, however, he began to
+realize how much he had dreaded this interview. He was a free man, after
+all. The spell was broken. He could think of her now as she deserved to
+be thought of, as a consummate woman of the world, selfish, heartless,
+conscienceless. He was well out of her toils. It was nothing to him if
+even he had known that at that moment she was lying upon the sofa to
+which she had staggered as he left the room, weeping bitterly.
+
+For over an hour Tavernake endured the smells and the bad atmosphere of
+that miserable little music-hall, watching eagerly each time the numbers
+were changed. Then at last, towards the end of the program, the manager
+appeared in front.
+
+“Ladies and gentlemen,” he announced, “I regret very much to inform
+you that owing to the indisposition of the young lady, Miss Beatrice
+Franklin and her father are unable to appear to-night. I have pleasure
+in announcing an extra turn, namely the Sisters De Vere in their
+wonderful burlesque act.”
+
+There was a murmur of disapprobation mingled with some cheering.
+Tavernake left his place and walked around to the back of the hall.
+Presently the manager came out to him.
+
+“I am sorry to trouble you, sir,” Tavernake said, “but I heard your
+announcement just now from the front. Can you give me the address of
+Professor Franklin? I am a friend, and I should like to go and see
+them.”
+
+The manager pointed to the stage-doorkeeper.
+
+“This man will give it you,” he announced, shortly. “It's quite close. I
+shall look in myself after the show to know how the young lady is.”
+
+Tavernake procured the address and set out in the taxicab which he had
+kept waiting. The driver listened to the direction doubtfully.
+
+“It's a poor sort of neighborhood, sir,” he remarked.
+
+“We've got to go there,” Tavernake told him.
+
+They reached it in a few minutes, a miserable street indeed. Tavernake
+knocked at the door of the house to which he was directed, with sinking
+heart. A man, collarless and half dressed, in carpet slippers, opened
+the door after a few moments' waiting.
+
+“Well, what is it?” he asked, gruffly.
+
+“Is Professor Franklin here?” Tavernake inquired.
+
+The man seemed as though he were about to slam the door, but thought
+better of it.
+
+“If you're a friend of the professor's, as he calls himself,” he said,
+“and you've any money to shell out, why, you're welcome, but if you're
+only asking out of curiosity, let me tell you that he used to lodge here
+but he's gone, and if I'd had my way he'd have gone a week ago, him and
+his daughter, too.”
+
+“I don't understand,” Tavernake protested. “I thought the young lady was
+ill.”
+
+“She may be ill or she may not,” the man replied, sulkily. “All I know
+is that they couldn't pay their rent, couldn't pay their food bill,
+couldn't pay for the drinks the old man was always sending out for. So
+tonight I spoke up and they've gone.”
+
+“At least you know where to!” Tavernake exclaimed.
+
+“I ain't no sort of an idea,” the man declared. “Take my word for it
+straight, guvnor, I know no more about where they went to than the man
+in the moon, except that I'm well shut of them, and there's a matter of
+eighteen and sixpence, if you care to pay it.”
+
+“I'll give you a sovereign,” Tavernake promised, “if you will tell me
+where they are now.”
+
+“What's the good of making silly conditions like that!” the man
+grumbled. “If I knew where they were, I'd earn the quid soon enough, but
+I don't, and that's the long and the short of it! And if you ain't going
+to pay the eighteen and six, well, I've answered all the questions I
+feel inclined to.”
+
+“I'll make it two pounds,” Tavernake promised. “I'm going to sail for
+America to-morrow morning early, and I must see them first.”
+
+The man leaned forward.
+
+“Look here,” he said, “if I knew where they was, a quid would be quite
+good enough for me, but I don't, and that's straight. If you want to
+look for them, I should try one of the doss houses. As likely there as
+anywhere.”
+
+He slammed the door and Tavernake turned away. A sudden despair had
+seized him. He looked up and down the street, he looked away beyond and
+thought of the miles and miles of streets, the myriads of chimneys,
+the huge branches of the great city stretching far and wide. At eight
+o'clock the next morning, he must leave for Southampton. Was it too
+late, after all, that he had discovered the truth?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII. IN A VIRGIN COUNTRY
+
+
+One night Tavernake began to laugh. He had grown a long brown beard
+and the hair was over his ears. He was wearing a gray flannel shirt, a
+handkerchief tied around his neck, and a pair of worn riding breeches
+held up by a belt. He had kicked his boots off at the end of a long day,
+and was lying in the moonlight before a fire of pine logs, whose smoke
+went straight to the star-hung sky. No word had been spoken for the last
+hour. Tavernake's fit of mirth came with as little apparent reason as
+the puffs of wind which every now and then stole down from the mountain
+side and made faint music in the virgin forests.
+
+Pritchard turned over on his side and looked at him. Cigars had for many
+weeks been an unknown thing, and he was smoking a corn-cob pipe full of
+coarse tobacco.
+
+“Stumbled across a joke anywhere?” he asked.
+
+“I'm afraid no one but myself would see the humor of it,” Tavernake
+answered. “I was thinking of those days in London; I was thinking of
+Beatrice's horror when she discovered that I was wearing ready-made
+clothes, and the amazement of Elizabeth when she found that I hadn't a
+dress suit. It's odd how cramped life gets back there.”
+
+Pritchard nodded, pressing the tobacco down into the bowl of his pipe
+with his forefinger.
+
+“You're right, Tavernake,” he agreed. “One loses one's sense of
+proportion. Men in the cities are all alike. They go about in disguise.”
+
+“I should like,” Tavernake said, inconsequently, “to have Mr. Dowling
+out here.”
+
+“Amusing fellow?” Pritchard inquired.
+
+Tavernake shook his head, smiling.
+
+“Not in the least,” he answered, “only he was a very small man. Out
+here it is difficult to keep small. Don't you feel it, Pritchard? These
+mountains make our hills at home seem like dust-heaps. The skies seem
+loftier. Look down into that valley. It's gigantic, immense.”
+
+Pritchard yawned.
+
+“There's a little place in the Bowery,” he began,--
+
+“Oh, I don't want to know any more about New York,” Tavernake
+interrupted. “Lean back and close your eyes, smell the cinnamon trees,
+listen to that night bird calling every now and then across the ravine.
+There's blackness, if you like; there's depth. It's like a cloak of
+velvet to look into. But you can't see the bottom--no, not in the
+daytime. Listen!”
+
+Pritchard sat up. For a few moments neither spoke. A dozen yards or so
+off, a scattered group--the rest of the party--were playing cards around
+a fire. The green wood crackled, an occasional murmur of voices, a laugh
+or an exclamation, came to their ears, but for the rest, an immense, a
+wonderful silence, a silence which seemed to spread far away over that
+weird, half-invisible world! Tavernake listened reverently.
+
+“Isn't it marvelous!” he exclaimed. “We haven't seen a human being
+except our own party, for three days. There probably isn't one within
+hearing of us now. Very likely no living person has ever set foot in
+this precise spot.”
+
+“Oh, it's big,” Pritchard admitted, “it's big and it's restful, but it
+isn't satisfying. It does for you for a time because you started life
+wrong and you needed a reaction. But for me--ah, well!” he added, “I
+hear the call right across these thousands of miles of forests and
+valley and swamp. I hear the electric cars and the clash of the overhead
+railway, I see the flaring lights of Broadway and I hear the babel of
+tongues. I am going back to it, Tavernake. There's plenty to go on with.
+We've done more than carry out our program.”
+
+“Back to New York!” Tavernake muttered, disconsolately.
+
+“So you're not ready yet?” Pritchard demanded.
+
+“Heavens, no!” Tavernake answered. “Who would be? What is there in New
+York to make up for this?”
+
+Pritchard was silent for a moment.
+
+“Well,” he said, “one of us must be getting back near civilization.
+The syndicate will be expecting to hear from us. Besides, we've reports
+enough already. It's time something was decided about that oil country.
+We've done some grand work there, Tavernake.”
+
+Tavernake nodded. He was lying on his side and his eyes were fixed
+wistfully southward, over the glimmering moonlit valley, over the great
+wilderness of virgin pine woods which hung from the mountains on the
+other side, away through the cleft in the hills to the plains beyond,
+chaotic, a world unseen.
+
+“If you like to go on for a bit,” Pritchard suggested, slowly, “there's
+no reason why you shouldn't take McCleod and Richardson with you, and
+Pete and half the horses, and strike for the tin country on the other
+side of the Yolite Hills. So long as we are here, it's quite worth it,
+if you can stick it out.”
+
+Tavernake drew a long breath.
+
+“I'd like to go,” he admitted, simply. “I know McCleod is keen about
+prospecting further south. You see, most of our finds so far have been
+among the oil fields.”
+
+“Settled,” Pritchard declared. “To-morrow, then, we part. I'm for the
+valley, and I reckon I'll strike the railway to Chicago in a week. Gee
+whiz! New York will seem good!”
+
+“You think that the syndicate will be satisfied with what we have done
+so far?” Tavernake asked.
+
+His companion smiled.
+
+“If they aren't, they'll be fools. I reckon there's enough oil fields
+here for seven companies. There'll be a bit for us, too, Tavernake, I
+guess. Don't you want to come back to New York and spend it?”
+
+Tavernake laughed once more, but this time his laugh was not wholly
+natural.
+
+“Spend it!” he repeated. “What is there to spend it on? Uncomfortable
+clothes, false plays, drinks that are bad for you, food that's half
+poisoned, atmosphere that stifles. My God, Pritchard, is there anything
+in the world like this! Stretch out your arms, man. Lie on your back,
+look up at the stars, let that wind blow over your face. Listen.”
+
+They listened, and again they heard nothing, yet again there seemed to
+be that peculiar quality about the silence which spoke of the vastness
+of space.
+
+Pritchard rose to his feet.
+
+“New York and the fleshpots for me,” he declared. “Keep in touch, and
+good luck old man!”
+
+Next day at dawn they parted, and Tavernake, with his three companions,
+set his face towards an almost undiscovered tract of land. Their
+progress was slow, for they were all the time in a country rich with
+possibilities. For weeks they climbed, climbed till they reached the
+snows and the wind stung their faces and they shivered in their rugs at
+night. They came to a land of sparser vegetation, of fewer and wilder
+animals, where they heard the baying of wolves at night, and saw the
+eyes of strange animals glisten through the thicket as the flames of
+their evening fire shot up toward the sky. Then the long descent began,
+the long descent to the great plain. Now their faces were bronzed with
+a sun ever hotter, ever more powerful. No longer the snow flakes
+beat their cheeks. They came slowly down into a land which seemed to
+Tavernake like the biblical land of Canaan. Three times in ten days they
+had to halt and make a camp, while Tavernake prepared a geographical
+survey of likely-looking land.
+
+McCleod came up to Tavernake one day with a dull-looking lump in his
+hand, glistening in places.
+
+“Copper,” he announced, shortly. “It's what I've been looking for all
+the time. No end to it. There's something bigger than oil here.”
+
+They spent a month in the locality, and every day McCleod became more
+enthusiastic. After that it was hard work to keep him from heading
+homeward at once.
+
+“I tell you, sir,” he explained to Tavernake, “there's millions there,
+millions between those four stakes of yours. What's the good of more
+prospecting? There's enough there in a square acre to pay the expenses
+of our expedition a thousand times over. Let's get back and make
+reports. We can strike the railway in ten days from here--perhaps
+sooner.”
+
+“You go,” Tavernake said. “Leave me Pete and two of the horses.”
+
+The man stared at him in surprise.
+
+“What's the good of going on alone?” he asked. “You're not a mining
+expert or an oil man. You can't go prospecting by yourself.”
+
+“I can't help it,” Tavernake answered. “It's something in my blood, I
+suppose. I am going on. Think! You'll strike that railway and in a month
+you will be back in New York. Don't you imagine, when you're there, when
+you hear the clatter and turmoil of it, when you see the pale crowds
+chivvying one another about to pick the dollars from each other's
+pockets,--don't you believe you'll long for these solitudes, the big
+empty places, great possibilities, the silence? Think of it, man. What
+is there beyond those mountains, I wonder?”
+
+McCleod sighed.
+
+“You're right,” he said. “One may never get so far out again. Our
+fortunes will keep, I suppose, and anyhow we ought to strike a telegraph
+station in about a fortnight. We'll go right ahead, then.”
+
+In ten days they dropped ten thousand feet. They came to a land where
+their throats were always dry, where the trees and shrubs seemed like
+property affairs from a theatre, where they plunged their heads into
+every pool that came to wash their noses and mouths from the red dust
+that seemed to choke them up. They found tin and oil and more copper.
+Then, by slow stages, they passed on to a land of great grassy plains,
+of blue grass, miles and miles of it, and suddenly one day they came to
+the telegraph posts, rough pine trees unstripped of their bark, with
+a few sagging wires. Tavernake looked at them as Robinson Crusoe might
+have looked at Man Friday's footsteps. It was the first sign of human
+life which they had seen for months.
+
+“It's a real world we are in, after all!” he sighed. “Somehow or other,
+I thought--I thought we'd escaped.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII. BACK TO CIVILIZATION
+
+
+Pritchard, trim and neat, a New Yorker from the careful arrangement
+of his tie to the tips of his patent boots, gazed with something like
+amazement at the man whom he had come to meet at the Grand Central
+Station. Tavernake looked, indeed, like some splendid bushman whose life
+has been spent in the kingdom of the winds and the sun and the rain.
+He was inches broader round the chest, and carried himself with a new
+freedom. His face was bronzed right down to the neck. His beard was
+fullgrown, his clothes travel-stained and worn. He seemed like a breath
+of real life in the great New York depot, surrounded by streams of
+black-coated, pale-cheeked men.
+
+Pritchard laughed softly as he passed his arm through his friend's.
+
+“Come, my Briton,” he said, “my primitive man, I have rooms for you in
+a hotel close here. A bath and a mint julep, then I'll take you to
+a tailor's. What about the big country? It's better than your salt
+marshes, eh? Better than your little fishing village? Better than
+building boats?”
+
+“You know it,” Tavernake answered. “I feel as though I'd been drawing
+in life for month after month. Have I got to wear boots like
+yours--patent?”
+
+“Got to be done,” Pritchard declared.
+
+“And the hat--oh, my Heavens!” Tavernake groaned. “I'll never become
+civilized again.”
+
+“We'll see,” Pritchard laughed. “Say, Tavernake, it was a great trip of
+ours. Everything's turning out marvelously. The oil and the copper are
+big, man--big, I tell you. I reckon your five thousand dollars will be
+well on the way to half a million. I'm pretty near there myself.”
+
+It was not until later on, when he was alone, that Tavernake realized
+with how little interest he listened to his companion's talk of their
+success. It was so short a time ago since the building up of a fortune
+had been the one aim upon which every nerve of his body was centered.
+Curiously enough, now he seemed to take it as a matter of course.
+
+“On second thoughts, I'll send a tailor round to the hotel,” Pritchard
+declared. “I've rooms myself next yours. We can go out and buy boots and
+the other things afterwards.”
+
+By nightfall, Tavernake's wardrobe was complete. Even Pritchard regarded
+him with a certain surprise. He seemed, somehow, to have gained a new
+dignity.
+
+“Say, but you look great!” he exclaimed. “They won't believe it at the
+meeting to-morrow that you are the man who crossed the Yolite Mountains
+and swam the Peraneek River. That's a wonderful country you were in,
+Tavernake, after you left the tracks.”
+
+They were in Broadway, with the roar of the city in their ears, and
+Tavernake, lifting his face starwards, suddenly seemed to feel the
+silence once more, the perfume of the pine woods, the scent of nature
+herself, freed through all these generations of any presence of man.
+
+“I'll never keep away from it,” he said, softly. “I'll have to go back.”
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+“When your report's in shape and the dollars are being scooped in,
+they'll send you back fast enough--that is, if you still want to go,” he
+remarked. “I tell you, Leonard Tavernake, our city men here are out for
+the dollars. Over on your side, a man makes a million or so and he's
+had enough. One fortune here only seems to whet the appetite of a New
+Yorker. By the way,” he added, after a moment's hesitation, “does it
+interest you to know that an old friend of yours is in New York?”
+
+Tavernake's head went round swiftly.
+
+“Who is it?” he asked.
+
+“Mrs. Wenham Gardner.”
+
+Tavernake set his teeth.
+
+“No,” he said, slowly, “I don't know that that interests me.”
+
+“Glad of it,” Pritchard went on. “I can tell you I don't think things
+have been going extra well with the lady. She's spent most of what she
+got from the Gardner family, and she doesn't seem to have had the best
+of luck with it, either. I came across her by accident. She is staying
+at a flashy hotel, but it's in the wrong quarter--second-rate--quite
+second-rate.”
+
+“I wonder whether we shall see anything of her,” Tavernake remarked.
+
+“Do you want to?” Pritchard asked. “She'll probably be at Martin's for
+lunch, at the Plaza for tea, and Rector's for supper. She's not exactly
+the lady to remain hidden, you know.”
+
+“We'll avoid those places, then, if you are taking me around,” Tavernake
+said.
+
+“You're cured, are you?” Pritchard inquired.
+
+“Yes, I am cured,” Tavernake answered, “cured of that and a great many
+other things, thanks to you. You found me the right tonic.”
+
+“Tonic,” Pritchard repeated, meditatively. “That reminds me. This way
+for the best cocktail in New York.”...
+
+The night was not to pass, however, without its own especial thrill for
+Tavernake. The two men dined together at Delmonico's and went afterwards
+to a roof garden, a new form of entertainment for Tavernake, and one
+which interested him vastly. They secured one of the outside tables
+near the parapets, and below them New York stretched, a flaming
+phantasmagoria of lights and crude buildings. Down the broad avenues
+with their towering blocks, their street cars striking fire all the time
+like toys below, the people streamed like insects away to the Hudson,
+where the great ferry boats, ablaze with lights, went screaming across
+the dark waters. Tavernake leaned over and forgot. There was so much
+that was amazing in this marvelous city for a man who had only just
+begun to find himself.
+
+The orchestra, stationed within a few yards of him, commenced to play
+a popular waltz, and Pritchard to talk. Tavernake turned his fascinated
+eyes from the prospect below.
+
+“My young friend,” Pritchard said, “you are up against it to-night. Take
+a drink of your wine and then brace yourself.”
+
+Tavernake did as he was told.
+
+“What is this danger?” he asked. “What's wrong, anyway?”
+
+Pritchard had no need to answer. As Tavernake set his glass down, his
+eyes fell upon the little party who had just taken the table almost next
+to theirs. There were Walter Crease, Major Post, two men whom he had
+never seen before in his life--heavy of cheek, both, dull-eyed, but
+dressed with a rigid observance of the fashion of the city, in short
+dinner coats and black ties. And between them was Elizabeth. Tavernake
+gripped the sides of his chair and looked. Yes, she had altered. Her
+eyebrows were a trifle made up, there was a tinge in her hair which he
+did not recognize, a touch of color in her cheeks which he doubted. Yet
+her figure and her wonderful presence remained, that art of wearing
+her clothes as no other woman could. She was easily the most
+noticeable-looking of her sex among all the people there. Tavernake
+heard the sound of her voice and once more the thrill came and passed.
+She was the same Elizabeth. Thank God, he thought, that he was not the
+same Tavernake!
+
+“Do you wish to go?” Pritchard asked.
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+“Not I!” he answered. “This place is far too fascinating. Can't we have
+some more wine? This is my treat. And, Pritchard, why do you look at
+me like that? You are not supposing for a moment that I am capable of
+making an ass of myself again?”
+
+Pritchard smiled in a relieved fashion.
+
+“My young friend,” he said, “I have lived in the world so long and seen
+so many strange things, especially between men and women, that I am
+never surprised at anything. I thought you'd shed your follies as your
+grip upon life had tightened, but one is never sure.”
+
+Tavernake sighed.
+
+“Oh, I have shed the worst of my follies!” he answered. “I only wish--”
+
+He never finished his sentence. Elizabeth had suddenly seen him. For a
+moment she leaned forward as though to assure herself that she was not
+mistaken. Then she half sprang to her feet and sat down again. Her lips
+were parted--she was once more bewilderingly beautiful.
+
+“Mr. Tavernake,” she cried, “come and speak to me at once.”
+
+Tavernake rose without hesitation, and walked firmly across the few
+yards which separated them. She held out both her hands.
+
+“This is wonderful!” she exclaimed. “You in New York! And I have
+wondered so often what became of you.”
+
+Tavernake smiled.
+
+“It is my first night here,” he said. “For two years I have been
+prospecting in the far west.”
+
+“Then I saw your name in the papers,” she declared. “It was for the
+Manhattan Syndicate, wasn't it?”
+
+Tavernake nodded, and one of the men of the party leaned forward with
+interest.
+
+“You're going to make millions and millions,” she assured him. “You
+always knew you would, didn't you?”
+
+“I am afraid that I was almost too confident,” he answered. “But
+certainly we have been quite fortunate.”
+
+One of Elizabeth's companions intervened--he was the one who had pricked
+up his ears at the mention of the Manhattan Syndicate.
+
+“Say, Elizabeth,” he remarked, “I'd like to meet your friend.”
+
+Elizabeth, with a frown, performed the introduction.
+
+“Mr. Anthony Cruxhall--Mr. Tavernake!”
+
+Mr. Cruxhall held out a fat white hand, on the little finger of which
+glittered a big diamond ring.
+
+“Say, are you the Mr. Tavernake that was surveyor to the prospecting
+party sent out by the Manhattan Syndicate?” he inquired.
+
+“I was,” Tavernake admitted, briefly. “I still am, I hope.”
+
+“Then you're just the man I was hoping to meet,” Mr. Cruxhall declared.
+“Won't you sit down with us right here? I'd like to talk some about that
+trip. I'm interested in the Syndicate.”
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+“I've had enough of work for a time,” he said. “Besides, I couldn't talk
+about it till after my report to the meeting to-morrow.”
+
+“Just a few words,” Mr. Cruxhall persisted. “We'll have a bottle of
+champagne, eh?”
+
+“You will excuse me, I am sure,” Tavernake replied, “when I tell you
+that it would not be correct on my part to discuss my trip until after I
+have handed in my report to the company. I am very glad to have seen you
+again, Mrs. Gardner.”
+
+“But you are not going!” she exclaimed, in dismay.
+
+“I have left Mr. Pritchard alone,” Tavernake answered.
+
+Elizabeth smiled, and waved her hand to the solitary figure.
+
+“Our friend Mr. Pritchard again,” she remarked. “Well, it is really a
+curious meeting, isn't it? I wonder,”--she lifted her head to his and
+her eyes called him closer to hers--“have you forgotten everything?”
+
+He pointed over the roofs of the houses. His back was to the river and
+he pointed westward.
+
+“I have been in a country where one forgets,” he answered. “I think
+that I have thrown the knapsack of my follies away. I think that it
+is buried. There are some things which I do not forget, but they are
+scarcely to be spoken of.”
+
+“You are a strange young man,” she said. “Was I wrong, or were you not
+once in love with me?”
+
+“I was terribly in love with you,” Tavernake confessed.
+
+“Yet you tore up my cheque and flung yourself away when you found out
+that my standard of morals was not quite what you had expected,” she
+murmured. “Haven't you got over that quixoticism a little, Leonard?”
+
+He drew a deep sigh.
+
+“I am thankful to say,” he declared, earnestly, “that I have not got
+over it, that, if anything, my prejudices are stronger than ever.”
+
+She sat for a moment quite still, and her face had become hard and
+expressionless. She was looking past him, past the line of lights, out
+into the blue darkness.
+
+“Somehow,” she said, softly, “I always prayed that you might remember.
+You were the one true thing I had ever met, you were in earnest. It is
+past, then?”
+
+“It is past,” Tavernake answered, bravely.
+
+The music of a Hungarian waltz came floating down to them. She half
+closed her eyes. Her head moved slowly with the melody. Tavernake looked
+away.
+
+“Will you come and see me just once?” she asked, suddenly. “I am staying
+at the Delvedere, in Forty-Second Street.”
+
+“Thank you very much,” Tavernake replied. “I do not know how long I
+shall be in New York. If I am here for a few days, I shall take my
+chance at finding you at home.”
+
+He bowed, and returned to Pritchard, who welcomed him with a quiet
+smile.
+
+“You're wise, Tavernake,” he said, softly. “I could hear no words, but I
+know that you have been wise. Between you and me,” he added, in a lower
+tone, “she is going downhill. She is in with the wrong lot here. She
+can't seem to keep away from them. They are on the very fringe
+of Bohemia, a great deal nearer the arm of the law than makes for
+respectable society. The man to whom I saw you introduced is a
+millionaire one day and a thief the next. They're none of them any good.
+Did you notice, too, that she is wearing sham jewelry? That always looks
+bad.”
+
+“No, I didn't notice,” Tavernake answered.
+
+He was silent for a moment. Then he leaned a little forward.
+
+“I wonder,” he asked, “do you know anything about her sister?”
+
+Pritchard finished his wine and knocked the ash from his cigar.
+
+“Not much,” he replied. “I believe she had a very hard time. She took
+on the father, you know, the old professor, and did her best to keep him
+straight. He died about a year ago and Miss Beatrice tried to get back
+into the theatre, but she'd missed her chance. Theatrical business has
+been shocking in London. I heard she'd come out here. Wherever she is,
+she keeps right away from that sort of set,” he wound up, moving his
+head towards Elizabeth's friends.
+
+“I wonder if she is in New York,” Tavernake said, with a strange thrill
+at his heart.
+
+Pritchard made no reply. His eyes were fixed upon the little group at
+the next table. Elizabeth was leaning back in her chair. She seemed
+to have abandoned the conversation. Her eyes were always seeking
+Tavernake's. Pritchard rose to his feet abruptly.
+
+“It's time we were in bed,” he declared. “Remember the meeting
+to-morrow.”
+
+Tavernake rose to his feet. As they passed the next table, Elizabeth
+leaned over to him. Her eyes pleaded with his almost passionately.
+
+“Dear Leonard,” she whispered, “you must--you must come and see me.
+I shall stay in between four and six every evening this week. The
+Delvedere, remember.”
+
+“Thank you very much,” Tavernake answered. “I shall not forget.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX. FOR ALWAYS
+
+
+Once again it seemed to Beatrice that history was repeating itself.
+The dingy, oblong dining-room, with its mosquito netting, stained
+tablecloth, and hard cane chairs, expanded until she fancied herself
+in the drawing-room of Blenheim House. Between the landladies there
+was little enough to choose. Mrs. Raithby Lawrence, notwithstanding her
+caustic tongue and suspicious nature, had at least made some pretense
+at gentility. The woman who faced her now--hard-featured, with narrow,
+suspicious eyes and a mass of florid hair--was unmistakably and brutally
+vulgar.
+
+“What's the good of your keeping on saying you hope to get an engagement
+next week?” she demanded, with a sneer. “Who's likely to engage you?
+Why, you've lost your color and your looks and your weight since you
+came to stay here. They don't want such as you in the chorus. And for
+the rest, you're too high and mighty, that's my opinion of you. Take
+what you can get, and how you can get it, and be thankful,--that's my
+motto. Day after day you tramp about the streets with your head in the
+air, and won't take this and won't take that, and meanwhile my bill gets
+bigger and bigger. Now where have you been to this morning, I should
+like to know?”
+
+Beatrice, who was faint and tired, shaking in every limb, tried to pass
+out of the room, but her questioner barred the way.
+
+“I have been up town,” she answered, nervously.
+
+“Hear of anything?”
+
+Beatrice shook her head.
+
+“Not yet. Please let me go upstairs and lie down. I am tired and I need
+to rest.”
+
+“And I need my money,” Mrs. Selina P. Watkins declared, without quitting
+her position, “and it's no good your going up to your room because the
+door's locked.”
+
+“What do you mean?” Beatrice faltered.
+
+“I mean that I've done with you,” the lodging-house keeper announced.
+“Your room's locked up and the key's in my pocket, and the sooner you
+get out of this, the better I shall be pleased.”
+
+“But my box--my clothes,” Beatrice cried.
+
+“I'll keep 'em a week for you,” the woman answered. “Bring me the
+money by then and you shall have them. If I don't hear anything of you,
+they'll go to the auction mart.”
+
+Something of her old spirit fired the girl for a moment. She was angry,
+and she forgot that her knees were trembling with fatigue, that she was
+weak and aching with hunger.
+
+“How dare you talk like that!” she exclaimed. “You shall have your money
+shortly, but I must have my clothes. I cannot go anywhere without them.”
+
+The woman laughed harshly.
+
+“Look here, my young lady,” she said, “you'll see your box again when
+I see the color of your money, and not before. And now out you go,
+please,--out you go! If you're going to make any trouble, Solly will
+have to show you the way down the steps.”
+
+The woman had opened the door, and a colored servant, half dressed, with
+a broom in her hand, came slouching down the passage. Beatrice turned
+and fled out of the greasy, noisome atmosphere, down the wooden, uneven
+steps, out into the ugly street. She turned toward the nearest elevated
+as though by instinct, but when she came to the bottom of the stairs she
+stopped short with a little groan. She knew very well that she had not
+a nickel to pay the fare. Her pockets were empty. All day she had eaten
+nothing, and her last coin had gone for the car which had brought her
+back from Broadway. And here she was on the other side of New York, in
+the region of low-class lodging houses, with the Bowery between her and
+Broadway. She had neither the strength nor the courage to walk. With
+a half-stifled sob she took off her one remaining ornament, a cheap
+enameled brooch, and entered a pawnbroker's shop close to where she had
+been standing.
+
+“Will you give me something on this, please?” she asked, desperately.
+
+A man who seemed to be sorting a pile of ready-made coats, paused in
+his task for a moment, took the ornament into his hand, and threw it
+contemptuously upon the counter.
+
+“Not worth anything,” he answered.
+
+“But it must be worth something,” Beatrice protested. “I only want a
+very little.”
+
+Something in her voice compelled the man's attention. He looked at her
+white face.
+
+“What's the trouble?” he inquired.
+
+“I must get up to Fifth Avenue somehow,” she declared. “I can't walk and
+I haven't a nickel.”
+
+He pushed the brooch back to her and threw a dime upon the counter.
+
+“Well,” he said, “you don't look fit to walk, and that's a fact, but the
+brooch isn't worth entering up. There's a dime for you. Now git, please,
+I'm busy.”
+
+Beatrice clutched the coin and, almost forgetting to thank him, found
+her way up the iron stairs on to the platform of the elevated. Soon she
+was seated in the train, rattling and shaking on its way through the
+slums into the heart of the wonderful city. There was only one thing
+left for her to try, a thing which she had had in her mind for days. Yet
+she found herself, even now she was committed to it, thinking of
+what lay before her with something like black horror. It was her last
+resource, indeed. Strong though she was, she knew by many small
+signs that her strength was almost at an end. The days and weeks of
+disappointments, the long fruitless trudges from office to office, the
+heart-sickness of constant refusals, poor food, the long fasts, had all
+told their tale. She was attractive enough still. Her pallor seemed to
+have given her a wonderful delicacy. The curve of her lips and the soft
+light in her gray eyes, were still as potent as ever. When she thought,
+though, what a poor asset her appearance had been, the color flamed in
+her cheeks.
+
+In Broadway she made her way to a very magnificent block of buildings,
+and passing inside took the lift to the seventh floor. Here she got out
+and knocked timidly at a glass-paneled door, on which was inscribed the
+name of Mr. Anthony Cruxhall. A very superior young man bade her enter
+and inquired her business.
+
+“I wish to see Mr. Cruxhall for a moment, privately,” she said. “I
+shall not detain him for more than a minute. My name is Franklin--Miss
+Beatrice Franklin.”
+
+The young man's lips seemed about to shape themselves into a whistle,
+but something in the girl's face made him change his mind.
+
+“I guess the boss is in,” he admitted. “He's just got back from a big
+meeting, but I am not sure about his seeing any one to-day. However,
+I'll tell him that you're here.”
+
+He disappeared into an inner room. Presently he came out again and held
+the door open.
+
+“Will you walk right in, Miss Franklin?” he invited.
+
+Beatrice went in bravely enough, but her knees began to tremble when
+she found herself in the presence of the man she had come to visit. Mr.
+Anthony Cruxhall was not a pleasant-looking person. His cheeks were fat
+and puffy, he wore a diamond ring upon the finger of his too-white hand,
+and a diamond pin in his somewhat flashily arranged necktie. He was
+smoking a black cigar, which he omitted to remove from between his teeth
+as he welcomed his visitor.
+
+“So you've come to see me at last, little Miss Beatrice!” he said, with
+a particularly unpleasant smile. “Come and sit down here by the side of
+me. That's right, eh? Now what can I do for you?”
+
+Beatrice was trembling all over. The man's eyes were hateful, his smile
+was hideous.
+
+“I have not a cent in the world, Mr. Cruxhall,” she faltered, “I cannot
+get an engagement, I have been turned out of my rooms, and I am hungry.
+My father always told me that you would be a friend if at any time it
+happened that I needed help. I am very sorry to have to come and beg,
+yet that is what I am doing. Will you lend or give me ten or twenty
+dollars, so that I can go on for a little longer? Or will you help me to
+get a place among some of your theatrical people?”
+
+Mr. Cruxhall puffed steadily at his cigar for a moment, and leaning back
+in his chair thrust his hand into his trousers' pocket.
+
+“So bad as that, is it?” he remarked. “So bad as that, eh?”
+
+“It is very bad indeed,” she answered, looking at him quietly, “or you
+know that I should not have come to you.”
+
+Mr. Cruxhall smiled.
+
+“I remember the last time we talked together,” he said, “we didn't
+get on very well. Too high and mighty in those days, weren't you,
+Miss Beatrice? Wouldn't have anything to say to a bad lot like Anthony
+Cruxhall. You're having to come to it, eh?”
+
+She began to tremble again, but she held herself in.
+
+“I must live,” she murmured. “Give me a little money and let me go
+away.”
+
+He laughed.
+
+“Oh, I'll do better than that for you,” he answered, thrusting his hand
+into his waistcoat pocket and drawing out a pile of dollar bills. “Let's
+look at you. Gee whiz! Yes, you're shabby, aren't you? Take this,” he
+went on, slamming some notes down before her. “Go and get yourself a
+new frock and a hat fit to wear, and meet me at the Madison Square roof
+garden at eight o'clock. We'll have some dinner and I guess we can fix
+matters up.”
+
+Then he smiled at her again, and Beatrice, whose hand was already upon
+the bills, suddenly felt her knees shake. A great black horror was upon
+her. She turned and fled out of the room, past the astonished clerk,
+into the lift, and was downstairs on the main floor before she
+remembered where she was, what she had done. The clerk, after gazing at
+her retreating form, hurried into the inner office.
+
+“Young woman hasn't bolted with anything, eh?” he asked.
+
+Mr. Cruxhall smiled wickedly.
+
+“Why, no,” he replied, “I guess she'll come back!”
+
+Tavernake left the meeting on that same afternoon with his future
+practically assured for life. He had been appointed surveyor to the
+company at a salary of ten thousand dollars a year, and the mine in
+which his savings were invested was likely to return him his small
+capital a hundredfold. Very kind things had been said of him and to him.
+
+Pritchard and he had left the place together. When they had reached the
+street, they paused for a moment.
+
+“I am going to make a call near here,” Pritchard said. “Don't forget
+that we are dining together, unless you find something better to do,
+and in the meantime”--he took a card from his pocket and handed it to
+Tavernake--“I don't know whether I am a fool or not to give you this,”
+ he added. “However, there it is. Do as you choose about it.”
+
+He walked away a little abruptly. Tavernake glanced at the address upon
+the card: 1134, East Third Street. For a moment he was puzzled. Then the
+light broke in upon him suddenly. His heart gave a leap. He turned back
+into the place to ask for some directions and once more stopped short.
+Down the stone corridor, like one who flies from some hideous fate, came
+a slim black figure, with white face and set, horrified stare. Tavernake
+held out his hands and she came to him with a great wondering sob.
+
+“Leonard!” she cried. “Leonard!”
+
+“There's no doubt about me,” he answered, quickly. “Am I such a very
+terrifying object?”
+
+She stood quite still and struggled hard. By and by the giddiness
+passed.
+
+“Leonard,” she murmured, “I am ill.”
+
+Then she began to smile.
+
+“It is too absurd,” she faltered, “but you've got to do it all over
+again.”'
+
+“What do you mean?” he asked.
+
+“Get me something to eat at once,” she begged. “I am starving. Somewhere
+where it's cool. Leonard, how wonderful! I never even knew that you were
+in New York.”
+
+He called a carriage and took her off to a roof garden. There, as it was
+early, they got a seat near the parapet. Tavernake talked clumsily about
+himself most of the time. There was a lump in his throat. He felt all
+the while that tragedy was very near. By degrees, though, as she ate and
+drank, the color came back to her cheeks, the fear of a breakdown seemed
+to pass away. She became even cheerful.
+
+“We are really the most amazing people, Leonard,” she declared. “You
+stumbled into my life once before when I was on the point of being
+turned out of my rooms. You've come into it again and you find me once
+more homeless. Don't spend too much money upon our dinner, for I warn
+you that I am going to borrow from you.”
+
+He laughed.
+
+“That's good news,” he remarked, “but I'm not sure that I'm going to
+lend anything.”
+
+He leaned across the table. Their dinner had taken long in preparing and
+the dusk was falling now. Over them were the stars, the band was playing
+soft music, the hubbub of the streets lay far below. Almost they were in
+a little world by themselves.
+
+“Dear Beatrice,” he said, “three times I asked you to marry me and you
+would not, and I asked you because I was a selfish brute, and because
+I knew that it was good for me and that it would save me from things of
+which I was afraid. And now I am asking you the same thing again, but I
+have a bigger reason, Beatrice. I have been alone most of the last two
+years, I have lived the sort of life which brings a man face to face
+with the truth, helps him to know himself and others, and I have found
+out something.”
+
+“Yes?” she faltered. “Tell me, Leonard.”
+
+“I found out that it was you I cared for always,” he continued, “and
+that is why I am asking you to marry me now, Beatrice, only this time I
+ask you because I love you, and because no one else in the world could
+ever take your place or be anything at all to me.”
+
+“Leonard!” she murmured.
+
+“You are not sorry that I have said this?” he begged.
+
+She opened her eyes again.
+
+“I always prayed that I might hear you say it,” she answered, “but it
+seems--oh, it seems so one-sided! Here am I starving and penniless,
+and you--you, I suppose, are well on the way towards the success you
+worshiped.”
+
+“I am well on the way,” he said, earnestly, “towards something greater,
+Beatrice. I am well on the way towards understanding what success
+really is, what things count and what don't. I have even found out,” he
+whispered, “the thing which counts for more than anything else in the
+world, and now that I have found it out, I shall never let it go again.”
+
+He pressed her hand and she looked across the table at him with swimming
+eyes. The waiter, who had been approaching, turned discreetly away. The
+band started to play a fresh tune. From down in the streets came the
+clanging of the cars. A curious, cosmopolitan murmur of sounds, but
+between those two there was the wonderful silence.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Tempting of Tavernake, by E. Phillips Oppenheim
+
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+   "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" >
+
+<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en">
+  <head>
+    <title>
+      The Tempting of Tavernake, by E. Phillips Oppenheim
+    </title>
+    <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve">
+
+    body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify}
+    P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; }
+    H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; }
+    hr  { width: 50%; text-align: center;}
+    .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; }
+    blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;}
+    .mynote    {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;}
+    .toc       { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;}
+    .toc2      { margin-left: 20%;}
+    div.fig    { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; }
+    div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; }
+    .figleft   {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;}
+    .figright  {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;}
+    .pagenum   {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal;
+               margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%;
+               text-align: right;}
+    pre        { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;}
+
+</style>
+  </head>
+  <body>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+
+Project Gutenberg's The Tempting of Tavernake, by E. Phillips Oppenheim
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Tempting of Tavernake
+
+Author: E. Phillips Oppenheim
+
+Release Date: June 12, 2009 [EBook #5091]
+Last Updated: March 9, 2018
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TEMPTING OF TAVERNAKE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Polly Stratton, and David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      <br /><br />
+    </p>
+    <h1>
+      THE TEMPTING OF TAVERNAKE
+    </h1>
+    <p>
+      <br /><br />
+    </p>
+    <h2>
+      By E. Phillips Oppenheim
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <hr />
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <blockquote>
+      <p class="toc">
+        <big><b>CONTENTS</b></big>
+      </p>
+      <p>
+        <br /> <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> <b>BOOK ONE</b>. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;DESPAIR
+        AND INTEREST <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER II. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;A
+        TETE-A-TETE SUPPER <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;AN
+        UNPLEASANT MEETING <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;BREAKFAST
+        WITH BEATRICE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;INTRODUCING
+        Mrs. WENHAM GARDNER <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;QUESTIONS
+        AND ANSWERS <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER VII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;Mr.
+        PRITCHARD OF NEW YORK <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII.
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;WOMAN'S WILES <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0009">
+        CHAPTER IX. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE PLOT THICKENS <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE JOY OF BATTLE <br /><br />
+        <a href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER XI. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;A BEWILDERING OFFER
+        <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER XII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;TAVERNAKE
+        BLUNDERS <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER XIII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;AN
+        EVENING CALL <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER XIV. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;A
+        WARNING FROM Mr. PRITCHARD <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER,
+        XV. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;GENERAL DISCONTENT <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0016">
+        CHAPTER XVI. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;AN OFFER OF MARRIAGE <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0017"> CHAPTER XVII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE BALCONY AT
+        IMANO'S <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0018"> CHAPTER XVIII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;A
+        MIDNIGHT ADVENTURE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0019"> CHAPTER XIX. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;TAVERNAKE
+        INTERVENES <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0020"> CHAPTER XX. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;A
+        PLEASANT REUNION <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0021"> CHAPTER XXI. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;SOME
+        EXCELLENT ADVICE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0022"> CHAPTER XXII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;DINNER
+        WITH ELIZABETH <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0023"> CHAPTER XXIII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;ON
+        AN ERRAND OF CHIVALRY <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0024"> CHAPTER XXIV.
+        </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;CLOSE TO TRAGEDY <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0025">
+        CHAPTER XXV. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE MADMAN TALKS <br /><br /> <a
+        href="#link2HCH0026"> CHAPTER XXVI. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;A CRISIS <br /><br />
+        <a href="#link2HCH0027"> CHAPTER XXVII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;TAVERNAKE
+        CHOOSES <br /><br /> <br /> <a href="#link2H_4_0029"> <b>BOOK TWO.</b></a>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
+        <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0028"> CHAPTER I. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;NEW
+        HORIZONS <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0029"> CHAPTER II. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;THE
+        SIMPLE LIFE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0030"> CHAPTER III. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;OLD
+        FRIENDS MEET <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0031"> CHAPTER IV. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;PRITCHARD'S
+        GOOD NEWS <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0032"> CHAPTER V. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;BEATRICE
+        REFUSES <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0033"> CHAPTER VI. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;UNDERSTANDING
+        COMES TOO LATE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0034"> CHAPTER VII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;IN
+        A VIRGIN COUNTRY <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0035"> CHAPTER VIII. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;BACK
+        TO CIVILIZATION <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0036"> CHAPTER IX. </a>&nbsp;&nbsp;FOR
+        ALWAYS <br /><br />
+      </p>
+    </blockquote>
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br />
+    </p>
+    <hr />
+    <p>
+      <br /> <br /> <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <h1>
+      BOOK ONE
+    </h1>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER I. DESPAIR AND INTEREST
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      They stood upon the roof of a London boarding-house in the neighborhood of
+      Russell Square&mdash;one of those grim shelters, the refuge of
+      Transatlantic curiosity and British penury. The girl&mdash;she represented
+      the former race was leaning against the frail palisading, with gloomy
+      expression and eyes set as though in fixed contemplation of the
+      uninspiring panorama. The young man&mdash;unmistakably, uncompromisingly
+      English&mdash;stood with his back to the chimney a few feet away, watching
+      his companion. The silence between them was as yet unbroken, had lasted,
+      indeed, since she had stolen away from the shabby drawing-room below,
+      where a florid lady with a raucous voice had been shouting a music-hall
+      ditty. Close upon her heels, but without speech of any sort, he had
+      followed. They were almost strangers, except for the occasional word or
+      two of greeting which the etiquette of the establishment demanded. Yet she
+      had accepted his espionage without any protest of word or look. He had
+      followed her with a very definite object. Had she surmised it, he
+      wondered? She had not turned her head or vouchsafed even a single question
+      or remark to him since he had pushed his way through the trap-door almost
+      at her heels and stepped out on to the leads. Yet it seemed to him that
+      she must guess.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Below them, what seemed to be the phantasm of a painted city, a wilderness
+      of housetops, of smoke-wreathed spires and chimneys, stretched away to a
+      murky, blood-red horizon. Even as they stood there, a deeper color stained
+      the sky, an angry sun began to sink into the piled up masses of thick,
+      vaporous clouds. The girl watched with an air of sullen yet absorbed
+      interest. Her companion's eyes were still fixed wholly and critically upon
+      her. Who was she, he wondered? Why had she left her own country to come to
+      a city where she seemed to have no friends, no manner of interest? In that
+      caravansary of the world's stricken ones she had been an almost unnoticed
+      figure, silent, indisposed for conversation, not in any obvious manner
+      attractive. Her clothes, notwithstanding their air of having come from a
+      first-class dressmaker, were shabby and out of fashion, their extreme
+      neatness in itself pathetic. She was thin, yet not without a certain
+      buoyant lightness of movement always at variance with her tired eyes, her
+      ceaseless air of dejection. And withal she was a rebel. It was written in
+      her attitude, it was evident in her lowering, militant expression, the
+      smouldering fire in her eyes proclaimed it. Her long, rather narrow face
+      was gripped between her hands; her elbows rested upon the brick parapet.
+      She gazed at that world of blood-red mists, of unshapely, grotesque
+      buildings, of strange, tawdry colors; she listened to the medley of sounds&mdash;crude,
+      shrill, insistent, something like the groaning of a world stripped naked&mdash;and
+      she had all the time the air of one who hates the thing she looks upon.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake, whose curiosity concerning his companion remained unappeased,
+      decided that the moment for speech had arrived. He took a step forward
+      upon the soft, pulpy leads. Even then he hesitated before he finally
+      committed himself. About his appearance little was remarkable save the
+      general air of determination which gave character to his undistinguished
+      features. He was something above the medium height, broad-set, and with
+      rather more thick black hair than he knew how to arrange advantageously.
+      He wore a shirt which was somewhat frayed, and an indifferent tie; his
+      boots were heavy and clumsy; he wore also a suit of ready-made clothes
+      with the air of one who knew that they were ready-made and was satisfied
+      with them. People of a nervous or sensitive disposition would, without
+      doubt, have found him irritating but for a certain nameless gift&mdash;an
+      almost Napoleonic concentration upon the things of the passing moment,
+      which was in itself impressive and which somehow disarmed criticism.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;About that bracelet!&rdquo; he said at last.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She moved her head and looked at him. A young man of less assurance would
+      have turned and fled. Not so Tavernake. Once sure of his ground he was
+      immovable. There was murder in her eyes but he was not even disturbed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I saw you take it from the little table by the piano, you know,&rdquo; he
+      continued. &ldquo;It was rather a rash thing to do. Mrs. Fitzgerald was looking
+      for it before I reached the stairs. I expect she has called the police in
+      by now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Slowly her hand stole into the depths of her pocket and emerged. Something
+      flashed for a moment high over her head. The young man caught her wrist
+      just in time, caught it in a veritable grip of iron. Then, indeed, the
+      evil fires flashed from her eyes, her teeth gleamed white, her bosom rose
+      and fell in a storm of angry, unuttered sobs. She was dry-eyed and still
+      speechless, but for all that she was a tigress. A strangely-cut silhouette
+      they formed there upon the housetops, with a background of empty sky,
+      their feet sinking in the warm leads.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think I had better take it,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Let go.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her fingers yielded the bracelet&mdash;a tawdry, ill-designed affair of
+      rubies and diamonds. He looked at it disapprovingly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That's an ugly thing to go to prison for,&rdquo; he remarked, slipping it into
+      his pocket. &ldquo;It was a stupid thing to do, anyhow, you know. You couldn't
+      have got away with it&mdash;unless,&rdquo; he added, looking over the parapet as
+      though struck with a sudden idea, &ldquo;unless you had a confederate below.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He heard the rush of her skirts and he was only just in time. Nothing, in
+      fact, but a considerable amount of presence of mind and the full exercise
+      of a strength which was continually providing surprises for his
+      acquaintances, was sufficient to save her. Their struggles upon the very
+      edge of the roof dislodged a brick from the palisading, which went
+      hurtling down into the street. They both paused to watch it, his arms
+      still gripping her and one foot pressed against an iron rod. It was
+      immediately after they had seen it pitch harmlessly into the road that a
+      new sensation came to this phlegmatic young man. For the first time in his
+      life, he realized that it was possible to feel a certain pleasurable
+      emotion in the close grasp of a being of the opposite sex. Consequently,
+      although she had now ceased to struggle, he kept his arms locked around
+      her, looking into her face with an interest intense enough, but more
+      analytical than emotional, as though seeking to discover the meaning of
+      this curious throbbing of his pulses. She herself, as though exhausted,
+      remained quite passive, shivering a little in his grasp and breathing like
+      a hunted animal whose last hour has come. Their eyes met; then she tore
+      herself away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are a hateful person,&rdquo; she said deliberately, &ldquo;a hateful, interfering
+      person. I detest you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think that we will go down now,&rdquo; he replied.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He raised the trap-door and glanced at her significantly. She held her
+      skirts closely together and passed through it without looking at him. She
+      stepped lightly down the ladder and without hesitation descended also a
+      flight of uncarpeted attic stairs. Here, however, upon the landing, she
+      awaited him with obvious reluctance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you going to send for the police?&rdquo; she asked without looking at him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I had meant to give you away I should have told Mrs. Fitzgerald at
+      once that I had seen you take her bracelet, instead of following you out
+      on to the roof.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you mind telling me what you do propose to do, then?&rdquo; she continued
+      still without looking at him, still without the slightest note of appeal
+      in her tone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He withdrew the bracelet from his pocket and balanced it upon his finger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am going to say that I took it for a joke,&rdquo; he declared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She hesitated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mrs. Fitzgerald's sense of humor is not elastic,&rdquo; she warned him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She will be very angry, of course,&rdquo; he assented, &ldquo;but she will not
+      believe that I meant to steal it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The girl moved slowly a few steps away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose that I ought to thank you,&rdquo; she said, still with averted face
+      and sullen manner. &ldquo;You have really been very decent. I am much obliged.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you not coming down?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not at present,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;I am going to my room.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked around the landing on which they stood, at the miserable,
+      uncarpeted floor, the ill-painted doors on which the long-forgotten
+      varnish stood out in blisters, the jumble of dilapidated hot-water cans, a
+      mop, and a medley of brooms and rags all thrown down together in a corner.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But these are the servants' quarters, surely,&rdquo; he remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They are good enough for me; my room is here,&rdquo; she told him, turning the
+      handle of one of the doors and disappearing. The prompt turning of the key
+      sounded, he thought, a little ungracious.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      With the bracelet in his hand, Tavernake descended three more flights of
+      stairs and entered the drawing-room of the private hotel conducted by Mrs.
+      Raithby Lawrence, whose husband, one learned from her frequent reiteration
+      of the fact, had once occupied a distinguished post in the Merchant
+      Service of his country. The disturbance following upon the disappearance
+      of the bracelet was evidently at its height. There were at least a dozen
+      people in the room, most of whom were standing up. The central figure of
+      them all was Mrs. Fitzgerald, large and florid, whose yellow hair with its
+      varied shades frankly admitted its indebtedness to peroxide; a lady of the
+      dashing type, who had once made her mark in the music-halls, but was now
+      happily married to a commercial traveler who was seldom visible. Mrs.
+      Fitzgerald was talking.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In respectable boarding-houses, Mrs. Lawrence,&rdquo; she declared with great
+      emphasis, &ldquo;thefts may sometimes take place, I will admit, in the servants'
+      quarters, and with all their temptations, poor things, it's not so much to
+      be wondered at. But no such thing as this has ever happened to me before&mdash;to
+      have jewelry taken almost from my person in the drawing-room of what
+      should be a well-conducted establishment. Not a servant in the room,
+      remember, from the moment I took it off until I got up from the piano and
+      found it missing. It's your guests you've got to look after, Mrs.
+      Lawrence, sorry to say it though I am.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mrs. Lawrence managed here, through sheer loss of breath on the part of
+      her assailant, to interpose a tearful protest.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am quite sure,&rdquo; she protested feebly, &ldquo;that there is not a person in
+      this house who would dream of stealing anything, however valuable it was.
+      I am most particular always about references.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Valuable, indeed!&rdquo; Mrs. Fitzgerald continued with increased volubility.
+      &ldquo;I'd have you understand that I am not one of those who wear trumpery
+      jewelry. Thirty-five guineas that bracelet cost me if it cost a penny, and
+      if my husband were only at home I could show you the receipt.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then there came an interruption of almost tragical interest. Mrs.
+      Fitzgerald, her mouth still open, her stream of eloquence suddenly
+      arrested, stood with her artificially darkened eyes riveted upon the
+      stolid, self-composed figure in the doorway. Every one else was gazing in
+      the same direction. Tavernake was holding the bracelet in the palm of his
+      hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thirty-five guineas!&rdquo; he repeated. &ldquo;If I had known that it was worth as
+      much as that, I do not think that I should have dared to touch it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You&mdash;you took it!&rdquo; Mrs. Fitzgerald gasped.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am afraid,&rdquo; he admitted, &ldquo;that it was rather a clumsy joke. I
+      apologize, Mrs. Fitzgerald. I hope you did not really imagine that it had
+      been stolen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      One was conscious of the little thrill of emotion which marked the
+      termination of the episode. Most of the people not directly concerned were
+      disappointed; they were being robbed of their excitement, their hopes of a
+      tragical denouement were frustrated. Mrs. Lawrence's worn face plainly
+      showed her relief. The lady with the yellow hair, on the other hand, who
+      had now succeeded in working herself up into a towering rage, snatched the
+      bracelet from the young man's fingers and with a purple flush in her
+      cheeks was obviously struggling with an intense desire to box his ears.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That's not good enough for a tale!&rdquo; she exclaimed harshly. &ldquo;I tell you I
+      don't believe a word of it. Took it for a joke, indeed! I only wish my
+      husband were here; he'd know what to do.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your husband couldn't do much more than get your bracelet back, ma'am,&rdquo;
+       Mrs. Lawrence replied with acerbity. &ldquo;Such a fuss and calling every one
+      thieves, too! I'd be ashamed to be so suspicious.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mrs. Fitzgerald glared haughtily at her hostess.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It's all very well for those that don't possess any jewelry and don't
+      know the value of it, to talk,&rdquo; she declared, with her eyes fixed upon a
+      black jet ornament which hung from the other woman's neck. &ldquo;What I say is
+      this, and you may just as well hear it from me now as later. I don't
+      believe this cock-and-bull story of Mr. Tavernake's. Them as took my
+      bracelet from that table meant keeping it, only they hadn't the courage.
+      And I'm not referring to you, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; the lady continued
+      vigorously, &ldquo;because I don't believe you took it, for all your talk about
+      a joke. And whom you may be shielding it wouldn't take me two guesses to
+      name, and your motive must be clear to every one. The common hussy!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are exciting yourself unnecessarily, Mrs. Fitzgerald,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      remarked. &ldquo;Let me assure you that it was I who took your bracelet from
+      that table.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mrs. Fitzgerald regarded him scornfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you expect me to believe a tale like that?&rdquo; she demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why not?&rdquo; Tavernake replied. &ldquo;It is the truth. I am sorry that you have
+      been so upset&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is not the truth!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      More sensation! Another unexpected entrance! Once more interest in the
+      affair was revived. After all, the lookers-on felt that they were not to
+      be robbed of their tragedy. An old lady with yellow cheeks and jet black
+      eyes leaned forward with her hand to her ear, anxious not to miss a
+      syllable of what was coming. Tavernake bit his lip; it was the girl from
+      the roof who had entered the room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have no doubt,&rdquo; she continued in a cool, clear tone, &ldquo;that Mrs.
+      Fitzgerald's first guess would have been correct. I took the bracelet. I
+      did not take it for a joke, I did not take it because I admire it&mdash;I
+      think it is hideously ugly. I took it because I had no money.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She paused and looked around at them all, quietly, yet with something in
+      her face from which they all shrank. She stood where the light fell full
+      upon her shabby black gown and dejected-looking hat. The hollows in her
+      pale cheeks, and the faint rims under her eyes, were clearly manifest; but
+      notwithstanding her fragile appearance, she held herself with composure
+      and even dignity. Twenty&mdash;thirty seconds must have passed whilst she
+      stood there, slowly finishing the buttoning of her gloves. No one
+      attempted to break the silence. She dominated them all&mdash;they felt
+      that she had something more to say. Even Mrs. Fitzgerald felt a weight
+      upon her tongue.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was a clumsy attempt,&rdquo; she went on. &ldquo;I should have had no idea where
+      to raise money upon the thing, but I apologize to you, nevertheless, Mrs.
+      Fitzgerald, for the anxiety which my removal of your valuable property
+      must have caused you,&rdquo; she added, turning to the owner of the bracelet,
+      whose cheeks were once more hot with anger at the contempt in the girl's
+      tone. &ldquo;I suppose I ought to thank you, Mr. Tavernake, also, for your
+      well-meant effort to preserve my character. In future, that shall be my
+      sole charge. Has any one anything more to say to me before I go?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Somehow or other, no one had. Mrs. Fitzgerald was irritated and fuming,
+      but she contented herself with a snort. Her speech was ready enough as a
+      rule, but there was a look in this girl's eyes from which she was glad
+      enough to turn away. Mrs. Lawrence made a weak attempt at a farewell.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sure,&rdquo; she began, &ldquo;we are all sorry for what's occurred and that you
+      must go&mdash;not that perhaps it isn't better, under the circumstances,&rdquo;
+       she added hastily. &ldquo;As regards&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is nothing owing to you,&rdquo; the girl interrupted calmly. &ldquo;You may
+      congratulate yourself upon that, for if there were you would not get it.
+      Nor have I stolen anything else.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;About your luggage?&rdquo; Mrs. Lawrence asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;When I need it, I will send for it,&rdquo; the girl replied.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned her back upon them and before they realized it she was gone.
+      She had, indeed, something of the grand manner. She had come to plead
+      guilty to a theft and she had left them all feeling a little like snubbed
+      children. Mrs. Fitzgerald, as soon as the spell of the girl's presence was
+      removed, was one of the first to recover herself. She felt herself
+      beginning to grow hot with renewed indignation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A thief!&rdquo; she exclaimed looking around the room. &ldquo;Just an ordinary
+      self-convicted thief! That's what I call her, and nothing else. And here
+      we all stood like a lot of ninnies. Why, if I'd done my duty I'd have
+      locked the door and sent for a policeman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Too late now, anyway,&rdquo; Mrs. Lawrence declared. &ldquo;She's gone for good, and
+      no mistake. Walked right out of the house. I heard her slam the front
+      door.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And a good job, too,&rdquo; Mrs. Fitzgerald armed. &ldquo;We don't want any of her
+      sort here&mdash;not those who've got things of value about them. I bet she
+      didn't leave America for nothing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A little gray-haired lady, who had not as yet spoken, and who very seldom
+      took part in any discussion at all, looked up from her knitting. She was
+      desperately poor but she had charitable instincts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wonder what made her want to steal,&rdquo; she remarked quietly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A born thief,&rdquo; Mrs. Fitzgerald declared with conviction,&mdash;&ldquo;a real
+      bad lot. One of your sly-looking ones, I call her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The little lady sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;When I was better off,&rdquo; she continued, &ldquo;I used to help at a soup kitchen
+      in Poplar. I have never forgotten a certain look we used to see
+      occasionally in the faces of some of the men and women. I found out what
+      it meant&mdash;it was hunger. Once or twice lately I have passed the girl
+      who has just gone out, upon the stairs, and she almost frightened me. She
+      had just the same look in her eyes. I noticed it yesterday&mdash;it was
+      just before dinner, too&mdash;but she never came down.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She paid so much for her room and extra for meals,&rdquo; Mrs. Lawrence said
+      thoughtfully. &ldquo;She never would have a meal unless she paid for it at the
+      time. To tell you the truth, I was feeling a bit uneasy about her. She
+      hasn't been in the dining-room for two days, and from what they tell me
+      there's no signs of her having eaten anything in her room. As for getting
+      anything out, why should she? It would be cheaper for her here than
+      anywhere, if she'd got any money at all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was an uncomfortable silence. The little old lady with the knitting
+      looked down the street into the sultry darkness which had swallowed up the
+      girl.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wonder whether Mr. Tavernake knows anything about her,&rdquo; some one
+      suggested.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Tavernake was not in the room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER II. A TETE-A-TETE SUPPER
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake caught her up in New Oxford Street and fell at once into step
+      with her. He wasted no time whatever upon preliminaries.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should be glad,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;if you would tell me your name.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her first glance at him was fierce enough to have terrified a different
+      sort of man. Upon Tavernake it had absolutely no effect.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You need not unless you like, of course,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;but I wish to talk
+      to you for a few moments and I thought that it would be more convenient if
+      I addressed you by name. I do not remember to have heard it mentioned at
+      Blenheim House, and Mrs. Lawrence, as you know, does not introduce her
+      guests.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      By this time they had walked a score or so of paces together. The girl,
+      after her first furious glance, had taken absolutely no notice of him
+      except to quicken her pace a little. Tavernake remained by her side,
+      however, showing not the slightest sense of embarrassment or annoyance. He
+      seemed perfectly content to wait and he had not in the least the
+      appearance of a man who could be easily shaken off. From a fit of furious
+      anger she passed suddenly and without warning to a state of half
+      hysterical amusement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are a foolish, absurd person,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;Please go away. I do
+      not wish you to walk with me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake remained imperturbable. She remembered suddenly his intervention
+      on her behalf.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you insist upon knowing,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;my name at Blenheim House was
+      Beatrice Burnay. I am much obliged to you for what you did for me there,
+      but that is finished. I do not wish to have any conversation with you, and
+      I absolutely object to your company. Please leave me at once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry,&rdquo; he answered, &ldquo;but that is not possible.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not possible?&rdquo; she repeated, wonderingly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have no money, you have eaten no dinner, and I do not believe that
+      you have any idea where you are going,&rdquo; he declared, deliberately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Her face was once more dark with anger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Even if that were the truth,&rdquo; she insisted, &ldquo;tell me what concern it is
+      of yours? Your reminding me of these facts is simply an impertinence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry that you look upon it in that light,&rdquo; he remarked, still
+      without the least sign of discomposure. &ldquo;We will, if you do not mind,
+      waive the discussion for the moment. Do you prefer a small restaurant or a
+      corner in a big one? There is music at Frascati's but there are not so
+      many people in the smaller ones.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned half around upon the pavement and looked at him steadfastly.
+      His personality was at last beginning to interest her. His square jaw and
+      measured speech were indices of a character at least unusual. She
+      recognized certain invincible qualities under an exterior absolutely
+      commonplace.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you as persistent about everything in life?&rdquo; she asked him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why not?&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;I try always to be consistent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is your name?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard Tavernake,&rdquo; he answered, promptly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you well off&mdash;I mean moderately well off?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have a quite sufficient income.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you any one dependent upon you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not a soul,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;I am my own master in every sense of the
+      word.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed in an odd sort of way.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then you shall pay for your persistence,&rdquo; she said,&mdash;&ldquo;I mean that I
+      may as well rob you of a sovereign as the restaurant people.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must tell me now where you would like to go to,&rdquo; he insisted. &ldquo;It is
+      getting late.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not like these foreign places,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;I should prefer to go
+      to the grill-room of a good restaurant.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We will take a taxicab,&rdquo; he announced. &ldquo;You have no objection?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shrugged her shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you have the money and don't mind spending it,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I will
+      admit that I have had all the walking I want. Besides, the toe of my boot
+      is worn through and I find it painful. Yesterday I tramped ten miles
+      trying to find a man who was getting up a concert party for the
+      provinces.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And did you find him?&rdquo; he asked, hailing a cab.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I found him,&rdquo; she answered, indifferently. &ldquo;We went through the
+      usual programme. He heard me sing, tried to kiss me and promised to let me
+      know. Nobody ever refuses anything in my profession, you see. They promise
+      to let you know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you a singer, then, or an actress?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am neither,&rdquo; she told him. &ldquo;I said 'my profession' because it is the
+      only one to which I have ever tried to belong. I have never succeeded in
+      obtaining an engagement in this country. I do not suppose that even if I
+      had persevered I should ever have had one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have given up the idea, then,&rdquo; he remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have given it up,&rdquo; she admitted, a little curtly. &ldquo;Please do not think,
+      because I am allowing you to be my companion for a short time, that you
+      may ask me questions. How fast these taxies go!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They drew up at their destination&mdash;a well-known restaurant in Regent
+      Street. He paid the cabman and they descended a flight of stairs into the
+      grill-room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I hope that this place will suit you,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I have not much
+      experience of restaurants.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked around and nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; she replied, &ldquo;I think that it will do.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She was very shabbily dressed, and he, although his appearance was by no
+      means ordinary, was certainly not of the type which inspires immediate
+      respect in even the grill-room of a fashionable restaurant. Nevertheless,
+      they received prompt and almost officious service. Tavernake, as he
+      watched his companion's air, her manner of seating herself and accepting
+      the attentions of the head waiter, felt that nameless impulse which was
+      responsible for his having followed her from Blenheim House and which he
+      could only call curiosity, becoming stronger. An exceedingly
+      matter-of-fact person, he was also by instinct and habit observant. He
+      never doubted but that she belonged to a class of society from which the
+      guests at the boarding-house where they had both lived were seldom
+      recruited, and of which he himself knew little. He was not in the least a
+      snob, this young man, but he found the fact interesting. Life with him was
+      already very much the same as a ledger account&mdash;a matter of debits
+      and credits, and he had never failed to include among the latter that
+      curious gift of breeding for which he himself, denied it by heritage, had
+      somehow substituted a complete and exceedingly rare naturalness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should like,&rdquo; she announced, laying down the carte, &ldquo;a fried sole, some
+      cutlets, an ice, and black coffee.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The waiter bowed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And for Monsieur?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake glanced at his watch; it was already ten o'clock.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will take the same,&rdquo; he declared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And to drink?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She seemed indifferent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Any light wine,&rdquo; she answered, carelessly, &ldquo;white or red.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake took up the wine list and ordered sauterne. They were left alone
+      in their corner for a few minutes, almost the only occupants of the place.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are sure that you can afford this?&rdquo; she asked, looking at him
+      critically. &ldquo;It may cost you a sovereign or thirty shillings.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He studied the prices on the menu.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I can afford it quite well and I have plenty of money with me,&rdquo; he
+      assured her, &ldquo;but I do not think that it will cost more than eighteen
+      shillings. While we are waiting for the sole, shall we talk? I can tell
+      you, if you choose to hear, why I followed you from the boardinghouse.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't mind listening to you,&rdquo; she told him, &ldquo;or I will talk with you
+      about anything you like. There is only one subject which I cannot discuss;
+      that subject is myself and my own doings.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was silent for a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That makes conversation a bit difficult,&rdquo; he remarked. She leaned back in
+      her chair.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;After this evening,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I go out of your life as completely and
+      finally as though I had never existed. I have a fancy to take my poor
+      secrets with me. If you wish to talk, tell me about yourself. You have
+      gone out of your way to be kind to me. I wonder why. It doesn't seem to be
+      your role.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He smiled slowly. His face was fashioned upon broad lines and the relaxing
+      of his lips lightened it wonderfully. He had good teeth, clear gray eyes,
+      and coarse black hair which he wore a trifle long; his forehead was too
+      massive for good looks.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he admitted, &ldquo;I do not think that benevolence is one of my
+      characteristics.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her dark eyes were turned full upon him; her red lips, redder than ever
+      they seemed against the pallor of her cheeks and her deep brown hair,
+      curled slightly. There was something almost insolent in her tone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You understand, I hope,&rdquo; she continued, &ldquo;that you have nothing whatever
+      to look for from me in return for this sum which you propose to expend for
+      my entertainment?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I understand that,&rdquo; he replied.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not even gratitude,&rdquo; she persisted. &ldquo;I really do not feel grateful to
+      you. You are probably doing this to gratify some selfish interest or
+      curiosity. I warn you that I am quite incapable of any of the proper
+      sentiments of life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your gratitude would be of no value to me whatever,&rdquo; he assured her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She was still not wholly satisfied. His complete stolidity frustrated
+      every effort she made to penetrate beneath the surface.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I believed,&rdquo; she went on, &ldquo;that you were one of those men&mdash;the
+      world is full of them, you know&mdash;who will help a woman with a
+      reasonable appearance so long as it does not seriously interfere with
+      their own comfort&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your sex has nothing whatever to do with it,&rdquo; he interrupted. &ldquo;As to your
+      appearance, I have not even considered it. I could not tell you whether
+      you are beautiful or ugly&mdash;I am no judge of these matters. What I
+      have done, I have done because it pleased me to do it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you always do what pleases you?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nearly always.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked him over again attentively, with an interest obviously
+      impersonal, a trifle supercilious.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose,&rdquo; she remarked, &ldquo;you consider yourself one of the strong people
+      of the world?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not know about that,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;I do not often think about
+      myself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I mean,&rdquo; she explained, &ldquo;that you are one of those people who struggle
+      hard to get just what they want in life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His jaw suddenly tightened and she saw the likeness to Napoleon.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do more than struggle,&rdquo; he affirmed, &ldquo;I succeed. If I make up my mind
+      to do a thing, I do it; if I make up my mind to get a thing, I get it. It
+      means hard work sometimes, but that is all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      For the first time, a really natural interest shone out of her eyes. The
+      half sulky contempt with which she had received his advances passed away.
+      She became at that moment a human being, self-forgetting, the heritage of
+      her charms&mdash;for she really had a curious but very poignant
+      attractiveness&mdash;suddenly evident. It was only a momentary lapse and
+      it was entirely wasted. Not even one of the waiters happened to be looking
+      that way, and Tavernake was thinking wholly of himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a good deal to say&mdash;that,&rdquo; she remarked, reflectively.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a good deal but it is not too much,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;Every man who
+      takes life seriously should say it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then she laughed&mdash;actually laughed&mdash;and he had a vision of
+      flashing white teeth, of a mouth breaking into pleasant curves, of dark
+      mirth-lit eyes, lustreless no longer, provocative, inspiring. A vague
+      impression as of something pleasant warmed his blood. It was a rare thing
+      for him to be so stirred, but even then it was not sufficient to disturb
+      the focus of his thoughts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me,&rdquo; she demanded, &ldquo;what do you do? What is your profession or
+      work?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am with a firm of auctioneers and estate agents,&rdquo; he answered readily,&mdash;&ldquo;Messrs.
+      Dowling, Spence &amp; Company the name is. Our offices are in Waterloo
+      Place.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You find it interesting?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;Interesting? Why not? I work at it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you a partner?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he admitted. &ldquo;Six years ago I was a carpenter; then I became an
+      errand boy in Mr. Dowling's office I had to learn the business, you see.
+      To-day I am a sort of manager. In eighteen months' time&mdash;perhaps
+      before that if they do not offer me a partnership&mdash;I shall start for
+      myself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Once more the subtlest of smiles flickered at the corners of her lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do they know yet?&rdquo; she asked, with faint irony.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not yet,&rdquo; he replied, with absolute seriousness. &ldquo;They might tell me to
+      go, and I have a few things to learn yet. I would rather make experiments
+      for some one else than for myself. I can use the results later; they will
+      help me to make money.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed softly and wiped the tears out of her eyes. They were really
+      very beautiful eyes notwithstanding the dark rims encircling them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If only I had met you before!&rdquo; she murmured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't ask me,&rdquo; she begged. &ldquo;It would not be good for your conceit, if you
+      have any, to tell you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have no conceit and I am not inquisitive,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;but I do not see
+      why you laughed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Their period of waiting came to an end at this point. The fish was brought
+      and their conversation became disjointed. In the silence which followed,
+      the old shadow crept over her face. Once only it lifted. It was while they
+      were waiting for the cutlets. She leaned towards him, her elbows upon the
+      tablecloth, her face supported by her fingers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think that it is time we left these generalities,&rdquo; she insisted, &ldquo;and
+      you told me something rather more personal, something which I am very
+      anxious to know. Tell me exactly why so self-centered a person as yourself
+      should interest himself in a fellow-creature at all. It seems odd to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is odd,&rdquo; he admitted, frankly. &ldquo;I will try to explain it to you but it
+      will sound very bald, and I do not think that you will understand. I
+      watched you a few nights ago out on the roof at Blenheim House. You were
+      looking across the house-tops and you didn't seem to be seeing anything at
+      all really, and yet all the time I knew that you were seeing things I
+      couldn't, you were understanding and appreciating something which I knew
+      nothing of, and it worried me. I tried to talk to you that evening, but
+      you were rude.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You really are a curious person,&rdquo; she remarked. &ldquo;Are you always worried,
+      then, if you find that some one else is seeing things or understanding
+      things which are outside your comprehension?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Always,&rdquo; he replied promptly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are too far-reaching,&rdquo; she affirmed. &ldquo;You want to gather everything
+      into your life. You cannot. You will only be unhappy if you try. No man
+      can do it. You must learn your limitations or suffer all your days.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Limitations!&rdquo; He repeated the words with measureless scorn. &ldquo;If I learn
+      them at all,&rdquo; he declared, with unexpected force, &ldquo;it will be with scars
+      and bruises, for nothing else will content me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We are, I should say, almost the same age,&rdquo; she remarked slowly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am twenty-five,&rdquo; he told her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am twenty-two,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;It seems strange that two people whose ideas
+      of life are as far apart as the Poles should have come together like this
+      even for a moment. I do not understand it at all. Did you expect that I
+      should tell you just what I saw in the clouds that night?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he answered, &ldquo;not exactly. I have spoken of my first interest in you
+      only. There are other things. I told a lie about the bracelet and I
+      followed you out of the boarding-house and I brought you here, for some
+      other for quite a different reason.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me what it was,&rdquo; she demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not know it myself,&rdquo; he declared solemnly. &ldquo;I really and honestly do
+      not know it. It is because I hoped that it might come to me while we were
+      together, that I am here with you at this moment. I do not like impulses
+      which I do not understand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed at him a little scornfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;After all,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;although it may not have dawned upon you yet, it
+      is probably the same wretched reason. You are a man and you have the
+      poison somewhere in your blood. I am really not bad-looking, you know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked at her critically. She was a little over-slim, perhaps, but she
+      was certainly wonderfully graceful. Even the poise of her head, the manner
+      in which she leaned back in her chair, had its individuality. Her
+      features, too, were good, though her mouth had grown a trifle hard. For
+      the first time the dead pallor of her cheeks was relieved by a touch of
+      color. Even Tavernake realized that there were great possibilities about
+      her. Nevertheless, he shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not agree with you in the least,&rdquo; he asserted firmly. &ldquo;Your looks
+      have nothing to do with it. I am sure that it is not that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let me cross-examine you,&rdquo; she suggested. &ldquo;Think carefully now. Does it
+      give you no pleasure at all to be sitting here alone with me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He answered her deliberately; it was obvious that he was speaking the
+      truth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not conscious that it does,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;The only feeling I am
+      aware of at the present moment in connection with you, is the curiosity of
+      which I have already spoken.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She leaned a little towards him, extending her very shapely fingers. Once
+      more the smile at her lips transformed her face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look at my hand,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;Tell me&mdash;wouldn't you like to hold it
+      just for a minute, if I gave it you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her eyes challenged his, softly and yet imperiously. His whole attention,
+      however, seemed to be absorbed by her finger-nails. It seemed strange to
+      him that a girl in her straits should have devoted so much care to her
+      hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he answered deliberately, &ldquo;I have no wish to hold your hand. Why
+      should I?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look at me,&rdquo; she insisted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He did so without embarrassment or hesitation,&mdash;it was more than ever
+      apparent that he was entirely truthful. She leaned back in her chair,
+      laughing softly to herself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, my friend Mr. Leonard Tavernake,&rdquo; she exclaimed, &ldquo;if you were not so
+      crudely, so adorably, so miraculously truthful, what a prig, prig, prig,
+      you would be! The cutlets at last, thank goodness! Your cross-examination
+      is over. I pronounce you 'Not Guilty!&rdquo;'
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      During the progress of the rest of the meal, they talked very little. At
+      its conclusion, Tavernake discharged the bill, having carefully checked
+      each item and tipped the waiter the exact amount which the man had the
+      right to expect. They ascended the stairs together to the street, the girl
+      lingering a few steps behind. On the pavement her fingers touched his arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wonder, would you mind driving me down to the Embankment?&rdquo; she asked
+      almost humbly. &ldquo;It was so close down there and I want some air.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      This was an extravagance which he had scarcely contemplated, but he did
+      not hesitate. He called a taxicab and seated himself by her side. Her
+      manner seemed to have grown quieter and more subdued, her tone was no
+      longer semi-belligerent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will not keep you much longer,&rdquo; she promised. &ldquo;I suppose I am not so
+      strong as I used to be. I have had scarcely anything to eat for two days
+      and conversation has become an unknown luxury. I think&mdash;it seems
+      absurd&mdash;but I think that I am feeling a little faint.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The air will soon revive you,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;As to our conversation, I am
+      disappointed. I think that you are very foolish not to tell me more about
+      yourself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She closed her eyes, ignoring his remark. They turned presently into a
+      narrower thoroughfare. She leaned towards him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have been very good to me,&rdquo; she admitted almost timidly, &ldquo;and I am
+      afraid that I have not been very gracious. We shall not see one another
+      again after this evening. I wonder&mdash;would you care to kiss me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He opened his lips and closed them again. He sat quite still, his eyes
+      fixed upon the road ahead, until he had strangled something absolutely
+      absurd, something unrecognizable.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I would rather not,&rdquo; he decided quietly. &ldquo;I know you mean to be kind but
+      that sort of thing&mdash;well, I don't think I understand it. Besides,&rdquo; he
+      added with a sudden naive relief, as he clutched at a fugitive but
+      plausible thought, &ldquo;if I did you would not believe the things which I have
+      been telling you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He had a curious idea that she was disappointed as she turned her head
+      away, but she said nothing. Arrived at the Embankment, the cab came slowly
+      to a standstill. The girl descended. There was something new in her
+      manner; she looked away from him when she spoke.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You had better leave me here,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;I am going to sit upon that
+      seat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then came those few seconds' hesitation which were to count for a great
+      deal in his life. The impulse which bade him stay with her was
+      unaccountable but it conquered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you do not object,&rdquo; he remarked with some stiffness, &ldquo;I should like to
+      sit here with you for a little time. There is certainly a breeze.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She made no comment but walked on. He paid the man and followed her to the
+      empty seat. Opposite, some illuminated advertisements blazed their
+      unsightly message across the murky sky. Between the two curving rows of
+      yellow lights the river flowed&mdash;black, turgid, hopeless. Even here,
+      though they had escaped from its absolute thrall, the far-away roar of the
+      city beat upon their ears. She listened to it for a moment and then
+      pressed her hands to the side of her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, how I hate it!&rdquo; she moaned. &ldquo;The voices, always the voices, calling,
+      threatening, beating you away! Take my hands, Leonard Tavernake,&mdash;hold
+      me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He did as she bade him, clumsily, as yet without comprehension.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are not well,&rdquo; he muttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Her eyes opened and a flash of her old manner returned. She smiled at him,
+      feebly but derisively.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You foolish boy!&rdquo; she cried. &ldquo;Can't you see that I am dying? Hold my
+      hands tightly and watch&mdash;watch! Here is one more thing you can see&mdash;that
+      you cannot understand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He saw the empty phial slip from her sleeve and fall on to the pavement.
+      With a cry he sprang up and, carrying her in his arms, rushed out into the
+      road.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER III. AN UNPLEASANT MEETING
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      It was a quarter past eleven and the theatres were disgorging their usual
+      nightly crowds. The most human thoroughfare in any of the world's great
+      cities was at its best and brightest. Everywhere commissionaires were
+      blowing their whistles, the streets were thronged with slowly-moving
+      vehicles, the pavements were stirring with life. The little crowd which
+      had gathered in front of the chemist's shop was swept away. After all,
+      none of them knew exactly what they had been waiting for. There was a
+      rumor that a woman had fainted or had met with an accident. Certainly she
+      had been carried into the shop and into the inner room, the door of which
+      was still closed. A few passers-by had gathered together and stared and
+      waited for a few minutes, but had finally lost interest and melted away. A
+      human thoroughfare, this, indeed, one of the pulses of the great city
+      beating time night and day to the tragedies of life. The chemist's
+      assistant, with impassive features, was serving a couple of casual
+      customers from behind the counter. Only a few yards away, beyond the
+      closed door, the chemist himself and a hastily summoned doctor fought with
+      Death for the body of the girl who lay upon the floor, faint moans coming
+      every now and then from her blue lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake, whose forced inaction during that terrible struggle had become
+      a burden to him, slipped softly from the room as soon as the doctor had
+      whispered that the acute crisis was over, and passed through the shop out
+      into the street, a solemn, dazed figure among the light-hearted crowd.
+      Even in those grim moments, the man's individualism spoke up to him. He
+      was puzzled at his own action, He asked himself a question&mdash;not,
+      indeed, with regret, but with something more than curiosity and actual
+      selfprobing&mdash;as though, by concentrating his mind upon his recent
+      course of action, he would be able to understand the motives which had
+      influenced him. Why had he chosen to burden himself with the care of this
+      desperate young woman? Supposing she lived, what was to become of her? He
+      had acquired a certain definite responsibility with regard to her future,
+      for whatever the doctor and his assistant might do, it was his own
+      promptitude and presence of mind which had given her the first chance of
+      life. Without a doubt, he had behaved foolishly. Why not vanish into the
+      crowd and have done with it? What was it to him, after all, whether this
+      girl lived or died? He had done his duty&mdash;more than his duty. Why not
+      disappear now and let her take her chance? His common sense spoke to him
+      loudly; such thoughts as these beat upon his brain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Just for once in his life, however, his common sense exercised an
+      altogether subordinate position. He knew very well, even while he listened
+      to these voices, that he was only counting the minutes until he could
+      return. Having absolutely decided that the only reasonable course left for
+      him to pursue was to return home and leave the girl to her fate, he found
+      himself back inside the shop within a quarter of an hour. The chemist had
+      just come out from the inner room, and looked up at his entrance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She'll do now,&rdquo; he announced.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake nodded. He was amazed at his own sense of relief.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad,&rdquo; he declared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The doctor joined them, his black bag in his hand, prepared for departure.
+      He addressed himself to Tavernake as the responsible person.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The young lady will be all right now,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;but she may be rather
+      queer for a day or two. Fortunately, she made the usual mistake of people
+      who are ignorant of medicine and its effects&mdash;she took enough poison
+      to kill a whole household. You had better take care of her, young man,&rdquo; he
+      added dryly. &ldquo;She'll be getting into trouble if she tries this sort of
+      thing again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will she need any special attention during the next few days?&rdquo; Tavernake
+      asked. &ldquo;The circumstances under which I brought her here are a little
+      unusual, and I am not quite sure&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take her home to bed,&rdquo; the doctor interrupted, &ldquo;and you'll find she'll
+      sleep it off. She seems to have a splendid constitution, although she has
+      let herself run down. If you need any further advice and your own medical
+      man is not available, I will come and see her if you send for me. Camden,
+      my name is; telephone number 734 Gerrard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should be glad to know the amount of your fee, if you please,&rdquo;
+       Tavernake said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My fee is two guineas,&rdquo; the doctor answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake paid him and he went away. Already the shadow of the tragedy was
+      passing. The chemist had joined his assistant and was busy dispensing
+      drugs behind his counter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You can go in to the young lady, if you like,&rdquo; he remarked to Tavernake.
+      &ldquo;I dare say she'll feel better to have some one with her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake passed slowly into the inner room, closing the door behind him.
+      He was scarcely prepared for so piteous a sight. The girl's face was white
+      and drawn as she lay upon the couch to which they had lifted her. The
+      fighting spirit was dead; she was in a state of absolute and complete
+      collapse. She opened her eyes at his coning, but closed them again almost
+      immediately&mdash;less, it seemed, from any consciousness of his presence
+      than from sheer exhaustion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad that you are better,&rdquo; he whispered crossing the room to her
+      side.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; she murmured almost inaudibly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake stood looking down upon her, and his sense of perplexity
+      increased. Stretched on the hard horsehair couch she seemed, indeed,
+      pitifully thin and younger than her years. The scowl, which had passed
+      from her face, had served in some measure as a disguise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We shall have to leave here in a few minutes,&rdquo; he said, softly. &ldquo;They
+      will want to close the shop.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am so sorry,&rdquo; she faltered, &ldquo;to have given you all this trouble. You
+      must send me to a hospital or the workhouse&mdash;anywhere.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are sure that there are no friends to whom I can send?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is no one!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She closed her eyes and Tavernake sat quite still on the end of her couch,
+      his elbow upon his knee, his head resting upon his hand. Presently, the
+      rush of customers having ceased, the chemist came in.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think, if I were you, I should take her home now,&rdquo; he remarked. &ldquo;She'll
+      probably drop off to sleep very soon and wake up much stronger. I have
+      made up a prescription here in case of exhaustion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake stared at the man. Take her home! His sense of humor was faint
+      enough but he found himself trying to imagine the faces of Mrs. Lawrence
+      or Mrs. Fitzgerald if he should return with her to the boardinghouse at
+      such an hour.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose you know where she lives?&rdquo; the chemist inquired curiously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course,&rdquo; Tavernake assented. &ldquo;You are quite right. I dare say she is
+      strong enough now to walk as far as the pavement.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He paid the bill for the medicines, and they lifted her from the couch.
+      Between them she walked slowly into the outer shop. Then she began to drag
+      on their arms and she looked up at the chemist a little piteously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;May I sit down for a moment?&rdquo; she begged. &ldquo;I feel faint.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They placed her in one of the cane chairs facing the door. The chemist
+      mixed her some sal volatile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry,&rdquo; she murmured, &ldquo;so sorry. In a few minutes&mdash;I shall be
+      better.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Outside, the throng of pedestrians had grown less, but from the great
+      restaurant opposite a constant stream of motor-cars and carriages was
+      slowly bringing away the supper guests. Tavernake stood at the door,
+      watching them idly. The traffic was momentarily blocked and almost
+      opposite to him a motor-car, the simple magnificence of which filled him
+      with wonder, had come to a standstill. The chauffeur and footman both wore
+      livery which was almost white. Inside a swinging vase of flowers was
+      suspended from the roof. A man and a woman leaned back in luxurious
+      easy-chairs. The man was dark and had the look of a foreigner. The woman
+      was very fair. She wore a long ermine cloak and a tiara of pearls.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake, whose interest in the passing throngs was entirely superficial,
+      found himself for some reason curiously attracted by this glimpse into a
+      world of luxury of which he knew nothing; attracted, too, by the woman's
+      delicate face with its uncommon type of beauty. Their eyes met as he stood
+      there, stolid and motionless, framed in the doorway. Tavernake continued
+      to stare, unmindful, perhaps unconscious, of the rudeness of his action.
+      The woman, after a moment, glanced away at the shopwindow. A sudden
+      thought seemed to strike her. She spoke through the tube at her side and
+      turned to her companion. Meanwhile, the footman, leaning from his place,
+      held out his arm in warning and the car was slowly backed to the side of
+      the pavement. The lady felt for a moment in a bag of white satin which lay
+      upon the round table in front of her, and handed a slip of paper through
+      the open window to the servant who had already descended and was standing
+      waiting. He came at once towards the shop, passing Tavernake, who remained
+      in the door-way.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you make this up at once, please?&rdquo; he directed, handing the paper
+      across to the chemist.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The chemist took it in his hand and turned away mechanically toward the
+      dispensing room. Suddenly he paused, and, looking back, shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For whom is this prescription required?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For my mistress,&rdquo; the man answered. &ldquo;Her name is there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where is she?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Outside; she is waiting for it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If she really wants this made up to-night,&rdquo; the chemist declared, &ldquo;she
+      must come in and sign the book.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The footman looked across the counter, for a moment, a little blankly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Am I to tell her that?&rdquo; he inquired. &ldquo;It's only a sleeping draught. Her
+      regular chemist makes it up all right.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That may be,&rdquo; the man behind the counter replied, &ldquo;but, you see, I am not
+      her regular chemist. You had better go and tell her so.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The footman departed upon his errand without a glance at the girl who was
+      sitting within a few feet of him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am very sorry, madam,&rdquo; he announced to his mistress, &ldquo;that the chemist
+      declines to make up the prescription unless you sign the book.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well, then, I will come,&rdquo; she declared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The woman, handed from the automobile by her servant, lifted her white
+      satin skirts in both hands and stepped lightly across the pavement.
+      Tavernake stood on one side to let her pass. She seemed to him to be,
+      indeed, a creature of that other world of which he knew nothing. Her slow,
+      graceful movements, the shimmer of her skirt, her silk stockings, the
+      flashing of the diamond buckles upon her shoes, the faint perfume from her
+      clothes, the soft touch of her ermine as she swept by&mdash;all these
+      things were indeed strange to him. His eyes followed her with rapt
+      interest as she approached the counter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You wish me to sign for my prescription?&rdquo; she asked the chemist. &ldquo;I will
+      do so, with pleasure, if it is necessary, only you must not keep me
+      waiting long.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her voice was very low and very musical; the slight smile which had parted
+      her tired lips, was almost pathetic. Even the chemist felt himself to be a
+      human being. He turned at once to his shelves and began to prepare the
+      drug.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry, madam, that it should have been necessary to fetch you in,&rdquo;
+       he said, apologetically. &ldquo;My assistant will give you the book if you will
+      kindly sign it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The assistant dived beneath the counter, reappearing almost immediately
+      with a black volume and a pen and ink. The chemist was engrossed upon his
+      task; Tavernake's eyes were still riveted upon this woman, who seemed to
+      him the most beautiful thing he had ever seen in life. No one was watching
+      the girl. The chemist was the first to see her face, and that only in a
+      looking glass. He stopped in the act of mixing his drug and turned slowly
+      round. His expression was such that they all followed his eyes. The girl
+      was sitting up in her chair, with a sudden spot of color burning in her
+      cheeks, her fingers gripping the counter as though for support, her eyes
+      dilated, unnatural, burning in their white setting with an unholy fire.
+      The lady was the last to turn her head, and the bottle of eau-de-cologne
+      which she had taken up from the counter, slipped with a crash to the
+      floor. All expression seemed to pass from her face; the very life seemed
+      drawn from it. Those who were watching her saw suddenly an old woman
+      looking at something of which she was afraid.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The girl seemed to find an unnatural strength. She dragged herself up and
+      turned wildly to Tavernake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take me away,&rdquo; she cried, in a low voice. &ldquo;Take me away at once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The woman at the counter did not speak. Tavernake stepped quickly forward
+      and then hesitated. The girl was on her feet now and she clutched at his
+      arms. Her eyes besought him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must take me away, please,&rdquo; she begged, hoarsely. &ldquo;I am well now&mdash;quite
+      well. I can walk.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake's lack of imagination stood him in good stead then. He simply
+      did what he was told, did it in perfectly mechanical fashion, without
+      asking any questions. With the girl leaning heavily upon his arm, he
+      stepped into the street and almost immediately into a passing taxicab
+      which he had hailed from the threshold of the shop. As he closed the door,
+      he glanced behind him. The woman was standing there, half turned towards
+      him, still with that strange, stony look upon her lifeless face. The
+      chemist was bending across the counter towards her, wondering, perhaps, if
+      another incident were to be drawn into his night's work. The
+      eau-de-cologne was running in a little stream across the floor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where to, sir?&rdquo; the taxicab driver asked Tavernake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where to?&rdquo; Tavernake repeated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The girl was clinging to his arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell him to drive away from here,&rdquo; she whispered, &ldquo;to drive anywhere, but
+      away from here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Drive straight on,&rdquo; Tavernake directed, &ldquo;along Fleet Street and up
+      Holborn. I will give you the address later on.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man changed his speed and their pace increased. Tavernake sat quite
+      still, dumfounded by these amazing happenings. The girl by his side was
+      clutching his arm, sobbing a little hysterically, holding him all the time
+      as though in terror.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER IV. BREAKFAST WITH BEATRICE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The girl, awakened, perhaps, by the passing of some heavy cart along the
+      street below, or by the touch of the sunbeam which lay across her pillow,
+      first opened her eyes and then, after a preliminary stare around, sat up
+      in bed. The events of the previous night slowly shaped themselves in her
+      mind. She remembered everything up to the commencement of that drive in
+      the taxicab. Sometime after that she must have fainted. And now&mdash;what
+      had become of her? Where was she?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked around her in ever-increasing surprise. Certainly it was the
+      strangest room she had ever been in. The floor was dusty and innocent of
+      any carpet; the window was bare and uncurtained. The walls were unpapered
+      but covered here and there with strange-looking plans, one of them taking
+      up nearly the whole side of the room&mdash;a very rough piece of work with
+      little dabs of blue paint here and there, and shadings and diagrams which
+      were absolutely unintelligible. She herself was lying upon a battered iron
+      bedstead, and she was wearing a very coarse nightdress. Her own clothes
+      were folded up and lay upon a piece of brown paper on the floor by the
+      side of the bed. To all appearance, the room was entirely unfurnished,
+      except that in the middle of it was a hideous papier mache screen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      After her first bewildered inspection of her surroundings, it was upon
+      this screen that her attention was naturally directed. Obviously it must
+      be there to conceal something. Very carefully she leaned out of bed until
+      she was able to see around the corner of it. Then her heart gave a little
+      jump and she was only just able to stifle an exclamation of fear. Some one
+      was sitting there&mdash;a man&mdash;sitting on a battered cane chair,
+      bending over a roll of papers which were stretched upon a rude deal table.
+      She felt her cheeks grow hot. It must be Tavernake! Where had he brought
+      her? What did his presence in the room mean?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The bed creaked heavily as she regained her former position. A voice came
+      to her from behind the screen. She knew it at once. It was Tavernake's.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you awake?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; she answered,&mdash;&ldquo;yes, I am awake. Is that Mr. Tavernake? Where
+      am I, please?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;First of all, are you better?&rdquo; he inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am better,&rdquo; she assured him, sitting up in bed and pulling the clothes
+      to her chin. &ldquo;I am quite well now. Tell me at once where I am and what you
+      are doing over there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is nothing to be terrified about,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;To all
+      effects and purposes, I am in another room. When I move to the door, as I
+      shall do directly, I shall drag the screen with me. I can promise you&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Please explain everything,&rdquo; she begged, &ldquo;quickly. I am most&mdash;uncomfortable.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At half-past twelve this morning,&rdquo; Tavernake said, &ldquo;I found myself alone
+      in a taxicab with you, without any luggage or any idea where to go to. To
+      make matters worse, you fainted. I tried two hotels but they refused to
+      take you in; they were probably afraid that you were going to be ill. Then
+      I thought of this room. I am employed, as you know, by a firm of estate
+      agents. I do a great deal of work on my own account, however, which I
+      prefer to do in secret, and unknown to any one. For that reason, I hired
+      this room a year ago and I come here most evenings to work. Sometimes I
+      stay late, so last month I bought a small bedstead and had it fixed up
+      here. There is a woman who comes in to clean the room. I went to her house
+      last night and persuaded her to come here. She undressed you and put you
+      to bed. I am sorry that my presence here distresses you, but it is a large
+      building and quite empty at night-time. I thought you might wake up and be
+      frightened, so I borrowed this screen from the woman and have been sitting
+      here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What, all night?&rdquo; she gasped.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;The woman could not stop herself and this is
+      not a residential building at all. All the lower floors are let for
+      offices and warehouses, and there is no one else in the place until eight
+      o'clock.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She put her hands to her head and sat quite still for a moment or two. It
+      was really hard to take everything in.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Aren't you very sleepy?&rdquo; she asked, irrelevantly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not very,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;I dozed for an hour, a little time ago. Since
+      then I have been looking through some plans which interest me very much.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can I get up?&rdquo; she inquired, timidly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you feel strong enough, please do,&rdquo; he answered, with manifest relief.
+      &ldquo;I shall move towards the door, dragging the screen in front of me. You
+      will find a brush and comb and some hairpins on your clothes. I could not
+      think of anything else to get for you, but, if you will dress, we will
+      walk to London Bridge Station, which is just across the way, and while I
+      order some breakfast you can go into the ladies' room and do your hair
+      properly. I did my best to get hold of a looking-glass, but it was quite
+      impossible.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The girl's sense of humor was suddenly awake. She had hard work not to
+      scream. He had evidently thought out all these details in painstaking
+      fashion, one by one.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;I will get up immediately, if you will do as you
+      say.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He clutched the screen from the inside and dragged it towards the door. On
+      the threshold, he spoke to her once more.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall sit upon the stairs just outside,&rdquo; he announced.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I sha'n't be more than five minutes,&rdquo; she assured him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She sprang out of bed and dressed quickly. There was nothing beyond where
+      the screen had been except a table covered with plans, and a particularly
+      hard cane chair which she dragged over for her own use. As she dressed,
+      she began to realize how much this matter-of-fact, unimpressionable young
+      man had done for her during the last few hours. The reflection affected
+      her in a curious manner. She became afflicted with a shyness which she had
+      not felt when he was in the room. When at last she had finished her
+      toilette and opened the door, she was almost tongue-tied. He was sitting
+      on the top step, with his back against the landing, and his eyes were
+      closed. He opened them with a little start, however, as soon as he heard
+      her approach.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad you have not been long,&rdquo; he remarked. &ldquo;I want to be at my
+      office at nine o'clock and I must go and have a bath somewhere. These
+      stairs are rather steep. Please walk carefully.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She followed him in silence down three flights of stone steps. On each
+      landing there were names upon the doors&mdash;two firms of hop merchants,
+      a solicitor, and a commission agent. The ground floor was some sort of
+      warehouse, from which came a strong smell of leather.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake opened the outside door with a small key and they passed into
+      the street.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;London Bridge Station is just across the way,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;The refreshment
+      room will be open and we can get some breakfast at once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What time is it?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;About half-past seven.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She walked by his side quite meekly, and although there were many things
+      which she was longing to say, she remained absolutely without the power of
+      speech. Except that he was looking a little crumpled, there was nothing
+      whatever in his appearance to indicate that he had been up all night. He
+      looked exactly as he had done on the previous day, he seemed even quite
+      unconscious that there was anything unusual in their relations. As soon as
+      they arrived at the station, he pointed to the ladies' waiting-room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you will go in and arrange your hair there,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I will go and
+      order breakfast and have a shave. I will be back here in about twenty
+      minutes. You had better take this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He offered her a shilling and she accepted it without hesitation. As soon
+      as he had gone, however, she looked at the coin in her hand in blank
+      wonder. She had accepted it from him with perfect naturalness and without
+      even saying &ldquo;Thank you!&rdquo; With a queer little laugh, she pushed open the
+      swinging doors and made her way into the waiting-room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In hardly more than a quarter of an hour she emerged, to find Tavernake
+      waiting for her. He had retied his tie, bought a fresh collar, had been
+      shaved. She, too, had improved her appearance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Breakfast is waiting this way,&rdquo; he announced.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She followed him obediently and they sat down at a small table in the
+      station refreshment-room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she asked, suddenly, &ldquo;I must ask you something. Has
+      anything like this ever happened to you before?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing,&rdquo; he assured her, with some emphasis.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You seem to take everything so much as a matter of course,&rdquo; she
+      protested.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I don't know,&rdquo; she replied, a little feebly. &ldquo;Only&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She found relief in a sudden and perfectly natural laugh.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;that is better. I am glad that you feel like laughing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As a matter of fact,&rdquo; she declared, &ldquo;I feel much more like crying. Don't
+      you know that you were very foolish last night? You ought to have left me
+      alone. Why didn't you? You would have saved yourself a great deal of
+      trouble.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He nodded, as though that point of view did, in some degree, commend
+      itself to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; he admitted, &ldquo;I suppose I should. I do not, even now, understand
+      why I interfered. I can only remember that it didn't seem possible not to
+      at the time. I suppose one must have impulses,&rdquo; he added, with a little
+      frown.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The reflection,&rdquo; she remarked, helping herself to another roll, &ldquo;seems to
+      annoy you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It does,&rdquo; he confessed. &ldquo;I do not like to feel impelled to do anything
+      the reason for which is not apparent. I like to do just the things which
+      seem likely to work out best for myself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How you must hate me!&rdquo; she murmured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, I do not hate you,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;but, on the other hand, you have
+      certainly been a trouble to me. First of all, I told a falsehood at the
+      boarding-house, and I prefer always to tell the truth when I can. Then I
+      followed you out of the house, which I disliked doing very much, and I
+      seem to have spent a considerable portion of the time since, in your
+      company, under somewhat extraordinary circumstances. I do not understand
+      why I have done this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose it is because you are a very good-hearted person,&rdquo; she
+      remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I am not,&rdquo; he assured her, calmly. &ldquo;I am nothing of the sort. I have
+      very little sympathy with good-hearted people. I think the world goes very
+      much better when every one looks after himself, and the people who are not
+      competent to do so go to the wall.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It sounds a trifle selfish,&rdquo; she murmured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps it is. I have an idea that if I could phrase it differently it
+      would become philosophy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps,&rdquo; she suggested, smiling across the table at him, &ldquo;you have
+      really done all this because you like me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am quite sure that it is not that,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;I feel an interest in
+      you for which I cannot account, but it does not seem to me to be a
+      personal one. Last night,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;when I was sitting there
+      waiting, I tried to puzzle it all out. I came to the conclusion that it
+      was because you represent something which I do not understand. I am very
+      curious and it always interests me to learn. I believe that must be the
+      secret of my interest in you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are very complimentary,&rdquo; she told him, mockingly. &ldquo;I wonder what
+      there is in the world which I could teach so superior a person as Mr.
+      Tavernake?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He took her question quite seriously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wonder what there is myself,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;And yet, in a way, I think
+      I know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your imagination should come to the rescue,&rdquo; she remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have no imagination,&rdquo; he declared, gloomily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They were silent for several minutes; she was still studying him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wonder you don't ask me any questions about myself,&rdquo; she said,
+      abruptly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is only one thing,&rdquo; he answered, &ldquo;concerning which I am in the
+      least curious. Last night in the chemist's shop&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't!&rdquo; she begged him, with suddenly whitening face. &ldquo;Don't speak of
+      that!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; he replied, indifferently. &ldquo;I thought that you were rather
+      inviting my questions. You need not be afraid of any more. I really am not
+      curious about personal matters; I find that my own life absorbs all my
+      interests.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They had finished breakfast and he paid the bill. She began to put on her
+      gloves.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whatever happens to me,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I shall never forget that you have
+      been very kind.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She hesitated for a moment and then she seemed to realize more completely
+      how really kind he had been. There had been a certain crude delicacy about
+      his actions which she had under-appreciated. She leaned towards him. There
+      was nothing left this morning of that disfiguring sullenness. Her mouth
+      was soft; her eyes were bright, almost appealing. If Tavernake had been a
+      judge of woman's looks, he must certainly have found her attractive.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am very, very grateful to you,&rdquo; she continued, holding out her hand. &ldquo;I
+      shall always remember how kind you were. Good-bye!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are not going?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, you didn't imagine that you had taken the care of me upon your
+      shoulders for the rest of your life?&rdquo; she demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, I didn't imagine that,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;At the same time, what plans
+      have you made? Where are you going?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh! I shall think of something,&rdquo; she declared, indifferently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He caught the gleam in her eyes, the sudden hopelessness which fell like a
+      cloud upon her face. He spoke promptly and with decision.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As a matter of fact,&rdquo; he remarked, &ldquo;you do not know yourself. You are
+      just going to drift out of this place and very likely find your way to a
+      seat on the Embankment again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her lips quivered. She had tried to be brave but it was hard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not necessarily,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;Something may turn up.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He leaned a little across the table towards her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Listen,&rdquo; he said, deliberately, &ldquo;I will make a proposition to you. It has
+      come to me during the last few minutes. I am tired of the boarding-house
+      and I wish to leave it. The work which I do at night is becoming more and
+      more important. I should like to take two rooms somewhere. If I take a
+      third, would you care to call yourself what I called you to the charwoman
+      last night&mdash;my sister? I should expect you to look after the meals
+      and my clothes, and help me in certain other ways. I cannot give you much
+      of a salary,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;but you would have an opportunity during the
+      daytime of looking out for some work, if that is what you want, and you
+      would at least have a roof and plenty to eat and drink.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him in blank amazement. It was obvious that his proposition
+      was entirely honest.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she protested, &ldquo;you forget that I am not really your
+      sister.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Does that matter?&rdquo; he asked, without flinching. &ldquo;I think you understand
+      the sort of person I am. You would have nothing to fear from any
+      admiration on my part&mdash;or anything of that sort,&rdquo; he added, with some
+      show of clumsiness. &ldquo;Those things do not come in my life. I am ambitious
+      to get on, to succeed and become wealthy. Other things I do not even think
+      about.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She was speechless. After a short pause, he went on.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am proposing this arrangement as much for my own sake as for yours. I
+      am very well read and I know most of what there is to be known in my
+      profession. But there are other things concerning which I am ignorant.
+      Some of these things I believe you could teach me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Still speechless, she sat and looked at him for several moments. Outside,
+      the station now was filled with a hurrying throng on their way to the
+      day's work. Engines were shrieking, bells ringing, the press of footsteps
+      was unceasing. In the dark, ill-ventilated room itself there was the
+      rattle of crockery, the yawning of discontented-looking young women behind
+      the bar, young women with their hair still in curl-papers, as yet
+      unprepared for their weak little assaults upon the good-nature or
+      susceptibility of their customers. A queer corner of life it seemed. She
+      looked at her companion and realized how fragmentary was her knowledge of
+      him. There was nothing to be gathered from his face. He seemed to have no
+      expression. He was simply waiting for her reply, with his thoughts already
+      half engrossed upon the business of the day.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Really,&rdquo; she began, &ldquo;I&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He came back from his momentary wandering and looked at her. She suddenly
+      altered the manner of her speech. It was a strange proposition, perhaps,
+      but this was one of the strangest of men.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am quite willing to try it,&rdquo; she decided. &ldquo;Will you tell me where I can
+      meet you later on?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have an hour and a half for luncheon at one o'clock,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Meet me
+      exactly at the southeast corner of Trafalgar Square. Would you like a
+      little money?&rdquo; he added, rising.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have plenty, thank you,&rdquo; she answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He laid half-a-crown upon the table and made an entry in a small
+      memorandum book which he drew from his pocket.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You had better keep this,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;in case you want it. I am going to
+      leave you alone here. You can find your way anywhere, I am sure, and I am
+      in a hurry. At one o'clock, remember. I hope you will still be feeling
+      better.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He put on his hat and went away without a backward glance. Beatrice sat in
+      her chair and watched him out of sight.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER V. INTRODUCING Mrs. WENHAM GARDNER
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      A very distinguished client was engaging the attention of Mr. Dowling,
+      Senior, of Messrs. Dowling, Spence &amp; Company, auctioneers and estate
+      agents, whose offices were situated in Waterloo Place, Pall Mall. Mr.
+      Dowling was a fussy little man of between fifty and sixty years, who spent
+      most of his time playing golf, and who, although he studiously contrived
+      to ignore the fact, had long since lost touch with the details of his
+      business. Consequently, in the absence of Mr. Dowling, Junior, who had
+      developed a marked partiality for a certain bar in the locality, Tavernake
+      was hastily summoned to the rescue from another part of the building, by a
+      small boy violently out of breath.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never see the governor in such a fuss,&rdquo; the latter declared,
+      confidentially, &ldquo;She's asking no end of questions and he don't know a
+      thing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who is the lady?&rdquo; Tavernake asked, on the way downstairs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Didn't hear her name,&rdquo; the boy replied. &ldquo;She's all right, though, I can
+      tell you&mdash;a regular slap-up beauty. Such a motor-car, too! Flowers
+      and tables and all sorts of things inside. By Jove, won't the governor
+      tear his hair if she goes before you get there!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake quickened his steps and in a few moments knocked at the door of
+      the private office and entered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His chief welcomed him with a gesture of relief. The distinguished client
+      of the firm, whose attention he was endeavoring to engage, had glanced
+      toward the newcomer, at his first appearance, with an air of somewhat
+      bored unconcern. Her eyes, however, did not immediately leave his face. On
+      the contrary, from the moment of his entrance she watched him steadfastly.
+      Tavernake, stolid, unruffled, at that time without comprehension,
+      approached the desk.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is&mdash;er&mdash;Mr. Tavernake, our manager,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling
+      announced, obsequiously. &ldquo;In the absence of my son, he is in charge of the
+      letting department. I have no doubt that he will be able to suggest
+      something suitable. Tavernake,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;this lady,&rdquo;&mdash;he
+      glanced at a card in front of him&mdash;&ldquo;Mrs. Wenham Gardner of New York,
+      is looking for a town house, and has been kind enough to favor us with an
+      inquiry.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake made no immediate reply. Mr. Dowling was shortsighted, and in
+      any case it would never have occurred to him to associate nervousness, or
+      any form of emotion, with his responsible manager. The beautiful lady
+      leaned back in her chair. Her lips were parted in a slight but very
+      curious smile, her fingers supported her cheek, her eyelids were
+      contracted as she looked into his face. Tavernake felt that their
+      recognition was mutual. Once more he was back again in the tragic
+      atmosphere of that chemist's shop, with Beatrice, half fainting, in his
+      arms, the beautiful lady turned to stone. It was an odd tableau, that, so
+      vividly imprinted upon his memory that it was there before him at this
+      very moment. There was mystery in this woman's eyes, mystery and something
+      else.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't seem to have come across anything down here which&mdash;er&mdash;particularly
+      attracts Mrs.&mdash;Mrs. Wenham Gardner,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling went on, taking up a
+      little sheaf of papers from the desk. &ldquo;I thought, perhaps, that the
+      Bryanston Square house might have suited, but it seems that it is too
+      small, far too small. Mrs. Gardner is used to entertaining, and has
+      explained to me that she has a great many friends always coming and going
+      from the other side of the water. She requires, apparently, twelve
+      bedrooms, besides servants' quarters.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your list is scarcely up to date, sir,&rdquo; Tavernake reminded him. &ldquo;If the
+      rent is of no particular object, there is Grantham House.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mr. Dowling's face was suddenly illuminated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Grantham House!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;Precisely! Now I declare that it had
+      absolutely slipped my memory for the moment&mdash;only for the moment,
+      mind&mdash;that we have just had placed upon our books one of the most
+      desirable mansions in the west end of London. A most valued client, too,
+      one whom we are most anxious to oblige. Dear, dear me! It is very
+      fortunate&mdash;very fortunate indeed that I happened to think of it,
+      especially as it seems that no one had had the sense to place it upon my
+      list. Tavernake, get the plans at once and show them to&mdash;er&mdash;to
+      Mrs. Gardner.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake crossed the room in silence, opened a drawer, and returned with
+      a stiff roll of papers, which he spread carefully out in front of this
+      unexpected client. She spoke then for the first time since he had entered
+      the room. Her voice was low and marvelously sweet. There was very little
+      of the American accent about it, but something in the intonation,
+      especially toward the end of her sentences, was just a trifle un-English.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where is this Grantham House?&rdquo; she inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Within a stone's throw of Grosvenor Square,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, briskly.
+      &ldquo;It is really one of the most central spots in the west end. If you will
+      allow me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      For the next few minutes he was very fluent indeed. With pencil in hand,
+      he explained the plans, dwelt on the advantages of the location, and from
+      the very reserve of his praise created an impression that the house he was
+      describing was the one absolutely perfect domicile in the whole of London.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can I look over the place?&rdquo; she asked, when he had finished.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By all means,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling declared, &ldquo;by all means. I was on the point of
+      suggesting it. It will be by far the most satisfactory proceeding. You
+      will not be disappointed, my dear madam, I can assure you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should like to do so, if I may, without delay,&rdquo; she said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is no opportunity like the present,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling replied. &ldquo;If you
+      will permit me,&rdquo; he added, rising, &ldquo;it will give me the greatest pleasure
+      to escort you personally. My engagements for the rest of the day happen to
+      be unimportant. Tavernake, let me have the keys of the rooms that are
+      locked up. The caretaker, of course, is there in possession.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The beautiful visitor rose to her feet, and even that slight movement was
+      accomplished with a grace unlike anything which Tavernake had ever seen
+      before.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I could not think of troubling you so far, Mr. Dowling,&rdquo; she protested.
+      &ldquo;It is not in the least necessary for you to come yourself. Your manager
+      can, perhaps, spare me a few minutes. He seems to be so thoroughly posted
+      in all the details,&rdquo; she added, apologetically, as she noticed the cloud
+      on Mr. Dowling's brow.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Just as you like, of course,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake can go, by all
+      means. Now I come to think of it, it certainly would be inconvenient for
+      me to be away from the office for more than a few minutes. Mr. Tavernake
+      has all the details at his fingers' ends, and I only hope, Mrs. Gardner,
+      that he will be able to persuade you to take the house. Our client,&rdquo; he
+      added, with a bow, &ldquo;would, I am sure, be delighted to hear that we had
+      secured for him so distinguished a tenant.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled at him, a delightful mixture of graciousness and condescension.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are very good,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;The house sounds rather large for me
+      but it depends so much upon circumstances. If you are ready, Mr.&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tavernake,&rdquo; he told her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she continued, &ldquo;my car is waiting outside and we might go
+      on at once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He bowed and held open the door for her, an office which he performed a
+      little awkwardly. Mr. Dowling himself escorted her out on to the pavement.
+      Tavernake stopped behind to get his hat, and passing out a moment
+      afterwards, would have seated himself in front beside the chauffeur but
+      that she held the door of the car open and beckoned to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you come inside, please?&rdquo; she insisted. &ldquo;There are one or two
+      questions which I might ask you as we go along. Please direct the
+      chauffeur.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He obeyed without a word; the car glided off. As they swung round the
+      first corner, she leaned forward from among the cushions of her seat and
+      looked at him. Then Tavernake was conscious of new things. As though by
+      inspiration, he knew that her visit to the office of Messrs. Dowling,
+      Spence &amp; Company had been no chance one.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She remembered him, remembered him as the companion of Beatrice during
+      that strange, brief meeting. It was an incomprehensible world, this, into
+      which he had wandered. The woman's face had lost her languid, gracious
+      expression. There was something there almost akin to tragedy. Her fingers
+      fell upon his arm and her touch was no light one. She was gripping him
+      almost fiercely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I have a memory for faces which seldom fails
+      me. I have seen you before quite lately. You remember where, of course.
+      Tell me the truth quickly, please.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The words seemed to leap from her lips. Beautiful and young though she
+      undoubtedly was, her intense seriousness had suddenly aged her face.
+      Tavernake was bewildered. He, too, was conscious of a curious emotional
+      disturbance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The truth? What truth do you mean?&rdquo; he demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was you whom I saw with Beatrice!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You saw me one night about three weeks ago,&rdquo; he admitted slowly. &ldquo;I was
+      in a chemist's shop in the Strand. You were signing his book for a
+      sleeping draught, I think.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shivered all over.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, yes!&rdquo; she cried. &ldquo;Of course, I remember all about it. The young lady
+      who was with you&mdash;what was she doing there? Where is she now?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The young lady was my sister,&rdquo; Tavernake answered stiffly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Mrs. Wenham Gardner looked, for a moment, as though she would have struck
+      him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You need not lie to me!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;It is not worth while. Tell me
+      where you met her, why you were with her at all in that intimate fashion,
+      and where she is now!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake realized at once that so far as this woman was concerned, the
+      fable of his relationship with Beatrice was hopeless. She knew!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madam,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;I made the acquaintance of the young lady with whom
+      I was that evening, at the boarding-house where we both lived.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What were you doing in the chemist's shop?&rdquo; she demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The young lady had been ill,&rdquo; he proceeded deliberately, wondering how
+      much to tell. &ldquo;She had been taken very ill indeed. She was just recovering
+      when you entered.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where is she now?&rdquo; the woman asked eagerly. &ldquo;Is she still at that
+      boarding-house of which you spoke?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Her fingers gripped his arm once more.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why do you answer me always in monosyllables? Don't you understand that
+      you must tell me everything that you know about her. You must tell me
+      where I can find her, at once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake remained silent. The woman's voice had still that note of
+      wonderful sweetness, but she had altogether lost her air of complete and
+      aristocratic indifference. She was a very altered person now from the
+      distinguished client who had first enlisted his services. For some reason
+      or other, he knew that she was suffering from a terrible anxiety.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not sure,&rdquo; he said at last, &ldquo;whether I can do as you ask.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo; she exclaimed sharply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The young lady,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;seemed, on the occasion to which you have
+      referred, to be particularly anxious to avoid recognition. She hurried out
+      of the place without speaking to you, and she has avoided the subject ever
+      since. I do not know what her motives may have been, but I think that I
+      should like to ask her first before I tell you where she is to be found.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mrs. Wenham Gardner leaned towards him. It was certainly the first time
+      that a woman in her apparent rank of life had looked upon Tavernake in
+      such a manner. Her forehead was a little wrinkled, her lips were parted,
+      her eyes were pathetically, delightfully eloquent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake, you must not&mdash;you must not refuse me,&rdquo; she pleaded.
+      &ldquo;If you only knew the importance of it, you would not hesitate for a
+      moment. This is no idle curiosity on my part. I have reasons, very serious
+      reasons indeed, for wishing to discover that poor girl's whereabouts at
+      once. There is a possible danger of which she must be warned. No one can
+      do it except myself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you her friend or her enemy?&rdquo; Tavernake asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why do you ask such a question?&rdquo; she demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am only going by her expression when she saw you come into the
+      chemist's shop,&rdquo; Tavernake persisted doggedly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a cruel suggestion, that,&rdquo; the woman cried. &ldquo;I wish to be her
+      friend, I am her friend. If I could only tell you everything, you would
+      understand at once what a terrible situation, what a hideous quandary I am
+      in.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Once more Tavernake paused for a few moments. He was never a quick thinker
+      and the situation was certainly an embarrassing one for him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madam,&rdquo; he replied at length, &ldquo;I beg that you will tell me nothing. The
+      young lady of whom you have spoken permits me to call myself her friend,
+      and what she has not told me herself I do not wish to learn from others. I
+      will tell her of this meeting with you, and if it is her desire, I will
+      bring you her address myself within a few hours. I cannot do more than
+      that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her face was suddenly cold and hard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mean that you will not!&rdquo; she exclaimed angrily. &ldquo;You are obstinate. I
+      do not know how you dare to refuse what I ask.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The car had come to a standstill. He stepped out on to the pavement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is Grantham House, madam,&rdquo; he announced. &ldquo;Will you descend?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He heard her draw a quick breath between her teeth and he caught a gleam
+      in her eyes which made him feel vaguely uneasy. She was very angry indeed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not think that it is necessary for me to do so,&rdquo; she said frigidly.
+      &ldquo;I do not like the look of the house at all. I do not believe that it will
+      suit me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At least, now that you are here,&rdquo; he protested, &ldquo;you will, if you please,
+      go over it. I should like you to see the ballroom. The decorations are
+      supposed to be quite exceptional.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She hesitated for a moment and then, with a slight shrug of the shoulders,
+      she yielded. There was a note in his tone not exactly insistent, and yet
+      dominant, a note which she obeyed although secretly she wondered at
+      herself for doing so. They passed inside the house and she followed him
+      from room to room, leaving him to do all the talking. She seemed very
+      little interested but every now and then she asked a languid question.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not think that it is in the least likely to suit me,&rdquo; she decided at
+      last. &ldquo;It is all very magnificent, of course, but I consider that the rent
+      is exorbitant.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake regarded her thoughtfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I believe,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;that our client might be disposed to consider some
+      reduction, in the event of your seriously entertaining taking the house.
+      If you like, I will see him on the subject. I feel sure that the amount I
+      have mentioned could be reduced, if the other conditions were
+      satisfactory.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There would be no harm in your doing so,&rdquo; she assented. &ldquo;How soon can you
+      come and let me know?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I might be able to ring you up this evening; certainly to-morrow
+      morning,&rdquo; he answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will not speak upon the telephone,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;I only allow it in
+      my rooms under protest. You must come and tell me what your client says.
+      When can you see him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is doubtful whether I shall be able to find him this evening,&rdquo; he
+      replied. &ldquo;It would probably be to-morrow morning.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You might go and try at once,&rdquo; she suggested.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He was a little surprised.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are really interested in the matter, then?&rdquo; he inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, yes,&rdquo; she told him, &ldquo;of course I am interested. I want you to come
+      and see me directly you have heard. It is important. Supposing you are
+      able to find your client to-night, shall you have seen the young lady
+      before then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am afraid not,&rdquo; he answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must try,&rdquo; she begged, laying her fingers upon his shoulder. &ldquo;Mr.
+      Tavernake, do please try. You can't realize what all this anxiety means to
+      me. I am not at all well and I am seriously worried about&mdash;about that
+      young lady. I tell you that I must have an interview with her. It is not
+      for my sake so much as hers. She must be warned.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Warned?&rdquo; Tavernake repeated. &ldquo;I really don't understand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course you don't!&rdquo; she exclaimed impatiently. &ldquo;Why should you
+      understand? I don't want to offend you, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she went on
+      hurriedly. &ldquo;I would like to treat you quite frankly. It really isn't your
+      place to make difficulties like this. What is this young lady to you that
+      you should presume to consider yourself her guardian?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She is a boarding-house acquaintance,&rdquo; Tavernake confessed, &ldquo;nothing
+      more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then why did you tell me, only a moment ago, that she was your sister?&rdquo;
+       Mrs. Gardner demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake threw open the door before which they had been standing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;is the famous dancing gallery. Lord Clumber is quite
+      willing to allow the pictures to remain, and I may tell you that they are
+      insured for over sixty thousand pounds. There is no finer dancing room
+      than this in all London.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her eyes swept around it carelessly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have no doubt,&rdquo; she admitted coldly, &ldquo;that it is very beautiful. I
+      prefer to continue our discussion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The dining-room,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;is almost as large. Lord Clumber tells us
+      that he has frequently entertained eighty guests for dinner. The system of
+      ventilation in this room is, as you see, entirely modern.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She took him by the arm and led him to a seat at the further end of the
+      apartment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she said, making an obvious attempt to control her
+      temper, &ldquo;you seem like a very sensible young man, if you will allow me to
+      say so, and I want to convince you that it is your duty to answer my
+      questions. In the first place&mdash;don't be offended, will you?&mdash;but
+      I cannot possibly see what interest you and that young lady can have in
+      one another. You belong, to put it baldly, to altogether different social
+      stations, and it is not easy to imagine what you could have in common.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She paused, but Tavernake had nothing to say. His gift of silence amounted
+      sometimes almost to genius. She leaned so close to him while she waited in
+      vain for his reply, that the ermine about her neck brushed his cheek. The
+      perfume of her clothes and hair, the pleading of her deep violet-blue
+      eyes, all helped to keep him tongue-tied. Nothing of this sort had ever
+      happened to him before. He did not in the least understand what it could
+      possibly mean.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am speaking to you now, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she continued earnestly, &ldquo;for
+      your own good. When you tell the young lady, as you have promised to this
+      evening, that you have seen me, and that I am very, very anxious to find
+      out where she is, she will very likely go down on her knees and beg you to
+      give me no information whatever about her. She will do her best to make
+      you promise to keep us apart. And yet that is all because she does not
+      understand. Believe me, it is better that you should tell me the truth.
+      You cannot know her very well, Mr. Tavernake, but she is not very wise,
+      that young lady. She is very obstinate, and she has some strange ideas. It
+      is not well for her that she should be left in the world alone. You must
+      see that for yourself, Mr. Tavernake.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She seems a very sensible young lady,&rdquo; he declared slowly. &ldquo;I should have
+      thought that she would have been old enough to know for herself what she
+      wanted and what was best for her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The woman at his side wrung her hands with a little gesture of despair.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, why can't I make you understand!&rdquo; she exclaimed, the emotion once
+      more quivering in her tone. &ldquo;How can I&mdash;how can I possibly make you
+      believe me? Listen. Something has happened of which she does not know&mdash;something
+      terrible. It is absolutely necessary, in her own interests as well as
+      mine, that I see her, and that very shortly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall tell her exactly what you say,&rdquo; Tavernake answered apparently
+      unmoved. &ldquo;Perhaps it would be as well now if we went on to view the
+      sleeping apartments.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never mind about the sleeping apartments!&rdquo; she cried quickly. &ldquo;You must
+      do more than tell her. You can't believe that I want to bring harm upon
+      any one. Do I look like it? Have I the appearance of a person of evil
+      disposition? You can be that young lady's best friend, Mr. Tavernake, if
+      you will. Take me to her now, this minute. Believe me, if you do that, you
+      will never regret it as long as you live.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake studied the pattern of the parquet floor for several moments. It
+      was a difficult problem, this. Putting his own extraordinary sensations
+      into the background, he was face to face with something which he did not
+      comprehend, and he disliked the position intensely. After all, delay
+      seemed safest.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madam,&rdquo; he protested, &ldquo;a few hours more or less can make but little
+      difference.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is for me to judge!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;You say that because you do not
+      understand. A few hours may make all the difference in the world.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will tell you exactly what is in my mind,&rdquo; he said, deliberately. &ldquo;The
+      young lady was terrified when she saw you that night accidentally in the
+      chemist's shop. She almost dragged me away, and although she was almost
+      fainting when we reached the taxicab, her greatest and chief anxiety was
+      that we should get away before you could follow us. I cannot forget this.
+      Until I have received her permission, therefore, to disclose her
+      whereabouts, we will, if you please, speak of something else.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He rose to his feet and glancing around was just in time to see the change
+      in the face of his companion. That eloquently pleading smile had died away
+      from her lips, her teeth were clenched. She looked like a woman struggling
+      hard to control some overwhelming passion. Without the smile her lips
+      seemed hard, even cruel. There were evil things shining out of her eyes.
+      Tavernake felt chilled, almost afraid.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We will see the rest of the house,&rdquo; she declared coldly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They went on from room to room. Tavernake, recovering himself rapidly,
+      master of his subject, was fluent and practical. The woman listened, with
+      only a terse remark here and there. Once more they stood in the hall.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is there anything else you would like to see?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing,&rdquo; she replied, &ldquo;but there is one thing more I have to say.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He waited in stolid silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Only a week ago,&rdquo; she went on, looking him in the face, &ldquo;I told a man who
+      is what you call, I think, an inquiry agent, that I would give a hundred
+      pounds if he could discover that young woman for me within twenty-four
+      hours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake started, and the smile came back to the lips of Mrs. Wenham
+      Gardner. After all, perhaps she had found the way!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A hundred pounds is a great deal of money,&rdquo; he said thoughtfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She shrugged her shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not so very much,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;About a fortnight's rent of this house,
+      Mr. Tavernake.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is the offer still open?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked into his eyes, and her face had once more the beautiful
+      ingenuousness of a child.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;the offer is still open. Get into the car with
+      me and drive back to my rooms at the Milan Court, and I will give you a
+      cheque for a hundred pounds at once. It will be very easily earned and you
+      may just as well take it, for now I know where you are employed, I could
+      have you followed day by day until I discover for myself what you are so
+      foolishly concealing. Be reasonable, Mr. Tavernake.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake stood quite still. His arms were folded, he was looking out of
+      the hall window at the smoky vista of roofs and chimneys. From the soles
+      of his ready-made boots to his ill-brushed hair, he was a commonplace
+      young man. A hundred pounds was to him a vast sum of money. It represented
+      a year's strenuous savings, perhaps more. The woman who watched him
+      imagined that he was hesitating. Tavernake, however, had no such thought
+      in his mind. He stood there instead, wondering what strange thing had come
+      to him that the mention of a hundred pounds, delightful sum though it was,
+      never tempted him for a single second. What this woman had said might be
+      true. She would probably be able to discover the address easily enough
+      without his help. Yet no such reflection seemed to make the least
+      difference. From the days of his earliest boyhood, from the time when he
+      had flung himself into the struggle, money had always meant much to him,
+      money not for its own sake but as the key to those things which he coveted
+      in life. Yet at that moment something stronger seemed to have asserted
+      itself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will come?&rdquo; she whispered, passing her arm through his. &ldquo;We will be
+      there in less than five minutes, and I will write you the cheque before
+      you tell me anything.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He moved towards the door indeed, but he drew a little away from her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madam,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I am sorry to seem so obstinate, but I thought I had
+      made you understand some time ago. I do not feel at liberty to tell you
+      anything without that young lady's permission.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You refuse?&rdquo; she cried, incredulously. &ldquo;You refuse a hundred pounds?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He opened the door of the car. He seemed scarcely to have heard her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At about eleven o'clock to-morrow morning,&rdquo; he announced, &ldquo;I shall have
+      the pleasure of calling upon you. I trust that you will have decided to
+      take the house.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER VI. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake sat a few hours later at his evening meal in the tiny
+      sitting-room of an apartment house in Chelsea. He wore a black tie, and
+      although he had not yet aspired to a dinner coat, the details of his
+      person and toilet showed signs of a new attention. Opposite to him was
+      Beatrice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me,&rdquo; she asked, as soon as the small maid-servant who brought in
+      their first dish had disappeared, &ldquo;what have you been doing all day? Have
+      you been letting houses or surveying land or book-keeping, or have you
+      been out to Marston Rise?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was her customary question, this. She really took an interest in his
+      work.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have been attending a rich American client,&rdquo; he announced, &ldquo;a
+      compatriot of your own. I went with her to Grantham House in her own
+      motor-car. I believe she thinks of taking it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;American!&rdquo; Beatrice remarked. &ldquo;What was her name?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake looked up from his plate across the little table, across the
+      bowl of simple flowers which was its sole decoration.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She called herself Mrs. Wenham Garner!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Away like a flash went the new-found peace in the girl's face. She caught
+      at her breath, her fingers gripped the table in front of her. Once more
+      she was as he had known her first&mdash;pale, with great terrified eyes
+      shining out of a haggard face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She has been to you,&rdquo; Beatrice gasped, &ldquo;for a house? You are sure?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am quite sure,&rdquo; Tavernake declared, calmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You recognized her?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He assented gravely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was the woman who stood in the chemist's shop that night, signing her
+      name in a book,&rdquo; he said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He did not apologize in any way for the shock he had given her. He had
+      done it deliberately. From that very first morning, when they had
+      breakfasted together at London Bridge, he had felt that he deserved her
+      confidence, and in a sense it was a grievance with him that she had
+      withheld it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did she recognize you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; he admitted. &ldquo;I was sent for into the office and found her there
+      with the chief. I felt sure that she recognized me from the first, and
+      when she agreed to look at Grantham House, she insisted upon it that I
+      should accompany her. While we were in the motor-car, she asked me about
+      you. She wished for your address.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did you give it to her?&rdquo; the girl cried, breathlessly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No; I said that I must consult you first.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She drew a little sigh of relief. Nevertheless, she was looking white and
+      shaken.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did she say what she wanted me for?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She was very mysterious,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;She spoke of some danger
+      of which you knew nothing. Before I came away, she offered me a hundred
+      pounds to let her know where you were.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice laughed softly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is just like Elizabeth,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;You must have made her very
+      angry. When she wants anything, she wants it very badly indeed, and she
+      will never believe that every person has not his price. Money means
+      everything to her. If she had it, she would buy, buy, buy all the time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;On the face of it,&rdquo; Tavernake remarked, soberly, &ldquo;her offer seemed rather
+      an absurd one. If she is in earnest, if she is really so anxious to
+      discover your whereabouts, she will certainly be able to do so without my
+      help.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not so sure,&rdquo; Beatrice replied. &ldquo;London is a great hiding place.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A private detective,&rdquo; he began,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not think,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;that Elizabeth will care to employ a private
+      detective. Tell me, have you to see her upon this business again?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am going to her flat at the Milan Court to-morrow morning at eleven
+      o'clock.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice leaned back in her chair. Presently she recommenced her dinner.
+      She had the air of one to whom a respite has been granted. Tavernake, in a
+      way, began to resent this continued silence of hers. He had certainly
+      hoped that she would at least have gone so far as to explain her anxiety
+      to keep her whereabouts secret.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must remember,&rdquo; he went on, after a short pause, &ldquo;that I am in a
+      somewhat peculiar position with regard to you, Beatrice. I know so little
+      that I do not even know how to answer in your interests such questions as
+      Mrs. Wenham Gardner asked me. I am not complaining, but is this state of
+      absolute ignorance necessary?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A new thought seemed to come to Beatrice. She looked at her companion
+      curiously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me,&rdquo; she asked, &ldquo;what did you think of Mrs. Wenham Gardner?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake answered deliberately, and after a moment's reflection.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I thought her,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;one of the most beautiful women I have ever
+      seen in my life. That is not saying very much, perhaps, but to me it meant
+      a good deal. She was exceedingly gracious and her interest in you seemed
+      quite real and even affectionate. I do not understand why you should wish
+      to hide from such a woman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You found her attractive?&rdquo; Beatrice persisted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I found her very attractive indeed,&rdquo; Tavernake admitted, without
+      hesitation. &ldquo;She had an air with her. She was quite different from all the
+      women I have ever met at the boarding-house or anywhere else. She has a
+      face which reminded me somehow of the Madonnas you took me to see in the
+      National Gallery the other day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice shivered slightly. For some reason, his remark seemed to have
+      distressed her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am very, very sorry,&rdquo; she declared, &ldquo;that Elizabeth ever came to your
+      office. I want you to promise me, Leonard, that you will be careful
+      whenever you are with her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Careful!&rdquo; he repeated. &ldquo;She isn't likely to be even civil to me tomorrow
+      when I tell her that I have seen you and I refuse to give her your
+      address. Careful, indeed! What has a poor clerk in a house-agent's office
+      to fear from such a personage?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The servant had reappeared with their second and last course. For a few
+      moments they spoke of casual subjects. Afterwards, however, Tavernake
+      asked a question.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By the way,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;we are hoping to let Grantham House to Mrs. Wenham
+      Gardner. I suppose she must be very wealthy?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice looked at him curiously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why do you come to me for information?&rdquo; she demanded. &ldquo;I suppose that she
+      brought you references?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We haven't quite got to that stage yet,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;Somehow or other,
+      from her manner of talking and general appearance, I do not think that
+      either Mr. Dowling or I doubted her financial position.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should never have thought you so credulous a person,&rdquo; remarked
+      Beatrice, with a smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was genuinely disturbed. His business instincts were aroused.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you really mean that this Mrs. Wenham Gardner is not a person of
+      substance?&rdquo; he inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice shrugged her shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She is the wife of a man who had the reputation of being very wealthy,&rdquo;
+       she replied. &ldquo;She has no money of her own, I am sure.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She still lives with her husband, I suppose?&rdquo; Tavernake asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice closed her eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know very little about her,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;Last time I heard, he had
+      disappeared, gone away, or something of the sort.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And she has no money,&rdquo; Tavernake persisted, &ldquo;except what she gets from
+      him? No settlement, even, or anything of that sort?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing at all,&rdquo; Beatrice answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is very bad news,&rdquo; Tavernake remarked, thinking gloomily of his
+      wasted day. &ldquo;It will be a great disappointment to Mr. Dowling. Why, her
+      motor-car was magnificent, and she talked as though money were no object
+      at all. I suppose you are quite sure of what you are saying?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice shrugged her shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I ought to know,&rdquo; she answered, grimly, &ldquo;for she is my sister.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake remained quite motionless for a minute, without speech; it was
+      his way of showing surprise. When he was sure that he had grasped the
+      import of her words, he spoke again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your sister!&rdquo; he repeated. &ldquo;There is a likeness, of course. You are dark
+      and she is fair, but there is a likeness. That would account,&rdquo; he
+      continued, &ldquo;for her anxiety to find you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It also accounts,&rdquo; Beatrice replied, with a little break of the lips,
+      &ldquo;for my anxiety that she should not find me. Leonard,&rdquo; she added, touching
+      his hand for a moment with hers, &ldquo;I wish that I could tell you everything,
+      but there are things behind, things so terrible, that even to you, my dear
+      brother, I could not speak of them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake rose to his feet and lit a cigarette&mdash;a new habit with him,
+      while Beatrice busied herself with a small coffee-making machine. He sat
+      in an easy-chair and smoked slowly. He was still wearing his ready-made
+      clothes, but his collar was of the fashionable shape, his tie well chosen
+      and neatly adjusted. He seemed somehow to have developed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice,&rdquo; he asked, &ldquo;what am I to tell your sister to-morrow?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shivered as she set his coffee-cup down by his side.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell her, if you will, that I am well and not in want,&rdquo; she answered.
+      &ldquo;Tell her, too, that I refuse to send my address. Tell her that the one
+      aim of my life is to keep the knowledge of my whereabouts a secret from
+      her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake relapsed into silence. He was thinking. Mysteries had no
+      attraction for him&mdash;he loathed them. Against this one especially he
+      felt a distinct grudge. Nevertheless, some instinct forbade his
+      questioning the girl.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Apart from more personal matters, then,&rdquo; he asked after some time, &ldquo;you
+      would not advise me to enter into any business negotiations with this
+      lady?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must not think of it,&rdquo; Beatrice replied, firmly. &ldquo;So far as money is
+      concerned, Elizabeth has no conscience whatever. The things she wants in
+      life she will have somehow, but it is all the time at other people's
+      expense. Some day she will have to pay for it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is very unfortunate,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;The commission on the letting of
+      Grantham House would have been worth having.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;After all, it is only your firm's loss,&rdquo; she reminded him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It does not appeal to me like that,&rdquo; he continued. &ldquo;So long as I am
+      manager for Dowling &amp; Spence, I feel these things personally. However,
+      that does not matter. I am afraid it is a disagreeable subject for you,
+      and we will not talk about it any longer.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She lit a cigarette with a little gesture of relief. She came once more to
+      his side.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I know that I am treating you badly in telling you
+      nothing, but it is simply because I do not want to descend to half truths.
+      I should like to tell you all or nothing. At present I cannot tell you
+      all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;I am quite content to leave it with you to do as
+      you think best.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard,&rdquo; she continued, &ldquo;of course you think me unreasonable. I can't
+      help it. There are things between my sister and myself the knowledge of
+      which is a constant nightmare to me. During the last few months of my life
+      it has grown to be a perfect terror. It sent me into hiding at Blenheim
+      House, it reconciled me even to the decision I came to that night on the
+      Embankment. I had decided that sooner than go back, sooner than ask help
+      from her or any one connected with her, I would do what I tried to do the
+      time when you saved my life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake looked at her wonderingly. She was, indeed, under the spell of
+      some deep emotion. Her memory seemed to have carried her back into another
+      world, somewhere far away from this dingy little sitting-room which they
+      two were sharing together, back into a world where life and death were
+      matters of small moment, where the great passions were unchained, and men
+      and women moved among the naked things of life. Almost he felt the thrill
+      of it. It was something new to him, the touch of a magic finger upon his
+      eyelids. Then the moment passed and he was himself again, matter-of-fact,
+      prosaic.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Let us dismiss the subject finally,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I must see your sister on
+      business to-morrow, but it shall be for the last time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think,&rdquo; she murmured, &ldquo;that you will be wise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He crossed the room and returned with a newspaper.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I saw your music in the hall as I came in,&rdquo; he remarked. &ldquo;Are you singing
+      to-night?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The question was entirely in his ordinary tone. It brought her back to the
+      world of every-day things as nothing else could have done.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes; isn't it luck?&rdquo; she told him. &ldquo;Three in one week. I only heard an
+      hour ago.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A city dinner?&rdquo; he inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Something of the sort,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;I am to be at the Whitehall Rooms
+      at ten o'clock. If you are tired, Leonard, please let me go alone. I
+      really do not mind. I can get a 'bus to the door, there and back again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not tired,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;To tell you the truth, I scarcely know
+      what it is to be tired. I shall go with you, of course.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him with a momentary admiration of his powerful frame, his
+      strong, forceful face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It seems too bad,&rdquo; she remarked, &ldquo;after a long day's work to drag you out
+      again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I really like to come,&rdquo; he assured her. &ldquo;Besides,&rdquo; he added, after a
+      moment's pause, &ldquo;I like to hear you sing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wonder if you mean that?&rdquo; she asked, looking at him curiously. &ldquo;I have
+      watched you once or twice when I have been singing to you. Do you really
+      care for it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly I do. How can you doubt it? I do not,&rdquo; he continued, slowly,
+      &ldquo;understand music, or anything of that sort, of course, any more than I do
+      the pictures you take me to see, and some of the books you talk about.
+      There are lots of things I can't get the hang of entirely, but they all
+      leave a sort of pleasure behind. One feels it even if one only half
+      appreciates.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She came over to his chair.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad,&rdquo; she said, a little wistfully, &ldquo;that there is one thing I do
+      which you like.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked at her reprovingly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear Beatrice,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I often wish I could make you understand how
+      extraordinarily helpful and useful to me you have been.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me in what way?&rdquo; she begged.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have given me,&rdquo; he assured her, &ldquo;an insight into many things in life
+      which I had found most perplexing. You see, you have traveled and I
+      haven't. You have mixed with all classes of people, and I have gone
+      steadily on in one groove. You have told me many things which I shall find
+      very useful indeed later on.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear me,&rdquo; she laughed, &ldquo;you are making me quite conceited!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Anyhow,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;I don't want you to look upon me, Beatrice, in any
+      way as a benefactor. I am much more comfortable here than at the
+      boarding-house and it is costing no more money, especially since you began
+      to get those singing engagements. By the way, hadn't you better go and get
+      ready?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She smothered a sigh as she turned away and went slowly upstairs. To all
+      appearance, no person who ever breathed was more ordinary than this
+      strong-featured, self-centered young man who had put out his arm and
+      snatched her from the Maelstrom. Yet it seemed to her that there was
+      something almost unnatural about his unapproachability. She was convinced
+      that he was entirely honest, not only with regard to his actual relations
+      toward her, but with regard to all his purposes. Her sex did not even seem
+      to exist for him. The fact that she was good-looking, and with her renewed
+      health daily becoming more so, seemed to be of no account to him whatever.
+      He showed interest in her appearance sometimes, but it was interest of an
+      entirely impersonal sort. He simply expressed himself as satisfied or
+      dissatisfied, as a matter of taste. It came to her at that moment that she
+      had never seen him really relax. Only when he sat opposite to that great
+      map which hung now in the further room, and wandered about from section to
+      section with a pencil in one hand and a piece of rubber in another, did he
+      show anything which in any way approached enthusiasm, and even then it was
+      always the unmistakable enthusiasm born of dead things. Suddenly she
+      laughed at herself in the little mirror, laughed softly but heartily. This
+      was the guardian whom Fate had sent for her! If Elizabeth had only
+      understood!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER VII. Mr. PRITCHARD OF NEW YORK
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Later in the evening, Beatrice and Tavernake traveled together in a motor
+      omnibus from their rooms at Chelsea to Northumberland Avenue. Tavernake
+      was getting quite used to the programme by now. They sat in a dimly-lit
+      waiting-room until the time came for Beatrice to sing. Every now and then
+      an excitable little person who was the secretary to some institution or
+      other would run in and offer them refreshments, and tell them in what
+      order they were to appear. To-night there was no departure from the
+      ordinary course of things, except that there was slightly more stir. The
+      dinner was a larger one than usual. It came to Beatrice's turn very soon
+      after their arrival, and Tavernake, squeezing his way a few steps into the
+      dining-room, stood with the waiters against the wall. He looked with
+      curious eyes upon a scene with which he had no manner of sympathy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A hundred or so of men had dined together in the cause of some charity.
+      The odor of their dinner, mingled with the more aromatic perfume of the
+      tobacco smoke which was already ascending in little blue clouds from the
+      various tables, hung about the over-heated room, seeming, indeed, the
+      fitting atmosphere for the long rows of guests. The majority of them were
+      in a state of expansiveness. Their faces were redder than when they had
+      sat down; a certain stiffness had departed from their shirt-fronts and
+      their manners; their faces were flushed, their eyes watery. There were a
+      few exceptions&mdash;paler-faced men who sat there with the air of
+      endeavoring to bring themselves into accord with surroundings in which
+      they had no real concern. Two of these looked up with interest at the
+      first note of Beatrice's song. The one was sitting within a few places of
+      the chairman, and he was too far away for his little start to be noticed
+      by either Tavernake or Beatrice. The nearer one, however, Tavernake
+      happened to be watching, and he saw the change in his expression. The man
+      was, in his way, ugly. His face was certainly not a good one, although he
+      did not appear to share the immediate weaknesses of his neighbors. To
+      every note of the song he listened intently. When it was over, he rose and
+      came toward Tavernake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I beg your pardon,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;but did I not see you come in with the
+      young lady who has just been singing?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You may have,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I certainly did come with her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;May I ask if you are related to her?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake had got over his hesitation in replying to such questions, by
+      now. He answered promptly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am her brother,&rdquo; he declared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The man produced a card.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Please introduce me to her,&rdquo; he begged, laconically.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why should I?&rdquo; Tavernake asked. &ldquo;I have no reason to suppose that she
+      desires to know you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man stared at him for a moment, and then laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you had better show your sister my card. She is, I
+      presume, a professional, as she is singing here. My desire to make her
+      acquaintance is purely actuated by business motives.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake moved away toward the waiting-room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The man, who according to his card was Mr. Sidney Grier, would have
+      followed him in, but Tavernake stopped him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you will wait here,&rdquo; he suggested, &ldquo;I will see whether my sister
+      desires to meet you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Once more Mr. Sidney Grier looked surprised, but after a second glance at
+      Tavernake he accepted his suggestion and remained outside. Tavernake took
+      the card to Beatrice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice,&rdquo; he announced, &ldquo;there is a man outside who has heard you sing
+      and who wants to be introduced.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She took the card and her eyes opened wide.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you know who he is?&rdquo; Tavernake asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;He is a great producer of musical comedies.
+      Let me think.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She stood with the card in her hand. Some one else was singing now&mdash;an
+      ordinary modern ballad of love and roses, rapture and despair. They heard
+      the rising and falling of the woman's voice; the clatter of the dinner had
+      ceased. Beatrice stood still thinking, her fingers clinching the card of
+      Mr. Sidney Grier.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must bring him in,&rdquo; she said to Tavernake finally.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake went outside.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My sister will see you,&rdquo; he remarked, with the air of one who brings good
+      news.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Mr. Sidney Grier grunted. He was not used to being kept waiting, even for
+      a second. Tavernake ushered him into the retiring room, and the other two
+      musicians who were there stared at him as at a god.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is the gentleman whose card you have, Beatrice,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      announced. &ldquo;Mr. Sidney Grier&mdash;Miss Tavernake!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your brother seems to be suspicious of me,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;I found it
+      quite difficult to persuade him that you might find it interesting to talk
+      to me for a few minutes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He does not quite understand,&rdquo; Beatrice answered. &ldquo;He has not much
+      experience of musical affairs or the stage, and your name would not have
+      any significance for him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake went outside and listened idly to the song which was proceeding.
+      It was a class of music which secretly he preferred to the stranger and
+      more haunting notes of Beatrice's melodies. Apparently the audience was of
+      his opinion, for they received it with a vociferous encore, to which the
+      young lady generously replied with a music-hall song about &ldquo;A French lady
+      from over the water.&rdquo; Towards the close of the applause which marked the
+      conclusion of this effort, Tavernake felt himself touched lightly upon the
+      arm. He turned round. By his side was standing the other dinner guest who
+      had shown some interest in Beatrice. He was a man apparently of about
+      forty years of age, tall and broad-shouldered, with black moustache, and
+      dark, piercing eyes. Unlike most of the guests, he wore a short
+      dinner-coat and black tie, from which, and his slight accent, Tavernake
+      concluded that he was probably an American.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say, you'll forgive my speaking to you,&rdquo; he said, touching Tavernake on
+      the arm. &ldquo;My name is Pritchard. I saw you come in with the young lady who
+      was singing a few minutes ago, and if you won't consider it a liberty,
+      I'll be very glad indeed if you'll answer me one question.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake stiffened insensibly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It depends upon the question,&rdquo; he replied, shortly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, it's about the young lady, and that's a fact,&rdquo; Mr. Pritchard
+      admitted. &ldquo;I see that her name upon the programme is given as Miss
+      Tavernake. I was seated at the other end of the room but she seemed to me
+      remarkably like a young lady from the other side of the Atlantic, whom I
+      am very anxious to meet.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps you will kindly put your question in plain words,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, that's easy,&rdquo; Mr. Pritchard declared. &ldquo;Is Miss Tavernake really her
+      name, or an assumed one? I expect it's the same over here as in my country&mdash;a
+      singer very often sings under another name than her own, you know,&rdquo; he
+      added, noting Tavernake's gathering frown.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The young lady in question is my sister, and I do not care to discuss her
+      with strangers,&rdquo; Tavernake announced.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Mr. Pritchard nodded pleasantly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, of course, that ends the matter,&rdquo; he remarked. &ldquo;Sorry to have
+      troubled you, anyway.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He strolled off back to his seat and Tavernake returned thoughtfully to
+      the dressing-room. He found Beatrice alone and waiting for him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You've got rid of that fellow, then?&rdquo; he inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice assented.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes; he didn't stay very long,&rdquo; she replied.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who was he?&rdquo; Tavernake asked, curiously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;From a musical comedy point of view,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;he was the most
+      important person in London. He is the emperor of stage-land. He can make
+      the fortune of any girl in London who is reasonably good-looking and who
+      can sing and dance ever so little.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What did he want with you?&rdquo; Tavernake demanded, suspiciously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He asked me whether I would like to go upon the stage. What do you think
+      about it, Leonard?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake, for some reason or other, was displeased.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Would you earn much more money than by singing at these dinners?&rdquo; he
+      asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very, very much more,&rdquo; she assured him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you would like the life?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed softly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why not? It isn't so bad. I was on the stage in New York for some time
+      under much worse conditions.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He remained silent for a few minutes. They had made their way into the
+      street now and were waiting for an omnibus.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What did you tell him?&rdquo; he asked, abruptly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She was looking down toward the Embankment, her eyes filled once more with
+      the things which he could not understand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have told him nothing yet,&rdquo; she murmured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You would like to accept?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not sure,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;If only&mdash;I dared!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER VIII. WOMAN'S WILES
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      At eleven o'clock the next morning, Tavernake presented himself at the
+      Milan Court and inquired for Mrs. Wenham Gardner. He was sent at once to
+      her apartments in charge of a page. She was lying upon a sofa piled up
+      with cushions, wrapped in a wonderful blue garment which seemed somehow to
+      deepen the color of her eyes. By her side was a small table on which was
+      some chocolate, a bowl of roses, and a roll of newspapers. She held out
+      her hand toward Tavernake, but did not rise. There was something almost
+      spiritual about her pallor, the delicate outline of her figure, so
+      imperfectly concealed by the thin silk dressing-gown, the faint, tired
+      smile with which she welcomed him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will forgive my receiving you like this, Mr. Tavernake?&rdquo; she begged.
+      &ldquo;To-day I have a headache. I have been anxious for your coming. You must
+      sit by my side, please, and tell me at once whether you have seen
+      Beatrice.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake did exactly as he was bidden. The chair toward which she had
+      pointed was quite close to the sofa, but there was no other unoccupied in
+      the room. She raised herself a little on the couch and turned towards him.
+      Her eyes were fixed anxiously upon his, her forehead slightly wrinkled,
+      her voice tremulous with eagerness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have seen her?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have,&rdquo; he admitted, looking steadily into the lining of his hat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She has been cruel,&rdquo; Elizabeth declared. &ldquo;I can tell it from your face.
+      You have bad news for me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not know,&rdquo; Tavernake replied, &ldquo;whether she has been cruel or not.
+      She refuses to allow me to tell you her address. She begged me, indeed, to
+      keep away from you altogether.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why? Did she tell you why?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She says that you are her sister, that you have no money of your own and
+      that your husband has left you,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, deliberately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is that all?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, it is not all,&rdquo; he continued. &ldquo;As to the rest, she told me nothing
+      definite. It is quite clear, however, that she is very anxious to keep
+      away from you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But her reason?&rdquo; Elizabeth persisted. &ldquo;Did she give you no reason?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake looked her in the face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She gave me no reason,&rdquo; he said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you believe that she is justified in treating me like this?&rdquo; Elizabeth
+      asked, playing nervously with a pendant which hung from her smooth, bare
+      neck.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course I do,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;I am quite sure that she would not feel as
+      she does unless you had been guilty of something very terrible indeed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The woman on the couch winced as though some one had struck her. A more
+      susceptible man than Tavernake must have felt a little remorseful at the
+      tears which dimmed for a moment her beautiful eyes. Tavernake, however,
+      although he felt a moment's uneasiness, although he felt himself assailed
+      all the time by a curious new emotion which he utterly failed to
+      understand, was nevertheless still immune. The things which were to happen
+      to him had not yet, arrived.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;I was very much disappointed to hear this,
+      because I had hoped that we might have been able to let Grantham House to
+      you. We cannot consider the matter at all now unless you pay for
+      everything in advance.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She uncovered her eyes and looked at him. People so direct of speech as
+      this had come very seldom into her life. She was conscious of a thrill of
+      interest. The study of men was a passion with her. Here was indeed a new
+      type!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So you think that I am an adventuress,&rdquo; she murmured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He reflected for a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose,&rdquo; he admitted, &ldquo;that it comes to that. I should not have
+      returned at all if I had not promised. If there is any message which you
+      wish me to give your sister, I will take it, but I cannot tell you her
+      address.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laid her hand suddenly upon his, and raising herself a little on the
+      couch, leaned towards him. Her eyes and her lips both pleaded with him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she said slowly, &ldquo;Beatrice is such a dear, obstinate
+      creature, but she does not quite appreciate my position. Do me a favor,
+      please. If you have promised not to give me her address let me at least
+      know some way or some place in which I could come across her. I am sure
+      she will be glad afterwards, and I&mdash;I shall be very grateful.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake felt that he was enveloped by something which he did not
+      understand, but his lack of experience was so great that he did not even
+      wonder at his insensibility.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall keep my word to your sister,&rdquo; he announced, &ldquo;in the spirit as
+      well as the letter. It is quite useless to ask me to do otherwise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth was at first amazed, then angry, how angry she scarcely knew
+      even herself. She had been a spoilt child, she had grown into a spoilt
+      woman. Men, at least, had been ready enough to do her bidding all her
+      life. Her beauty was of that peculiar kind, half seductive, half pathetic,
+      wholly irresistible. And now there had come this strange, almost
+      impossible person, against the armor of whose indifference she had spent
+      herself in vain. Her eyes filled with tears once more as she looked at
+      him, and Tavernake became uneasy. He glanced at the clock and again toward
+      the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think, if you will excuse me,&rdquo; he began,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she interrupted, &ldquo;you are very unkind to me, very unkind
+      indeed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I cannot help it,&rdquo; he answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you knew everything,&rdquo; she continued, &ldquo;you would not be so obstinate.
+      If Beatrice herself were here, if I could whisper something in her ear,
+      she would be only too thankful that I had found her out. Beatrice has
+      always misunderstood me, Mr. Tavernake. It is a little hard upon me, for
+      we are both so far away from home, from our friends.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You can send her any message you like by me,&rdquo; Tavernake declared. &ldquo;If you
+      like, I will wait while you write a letter. If you really have anything to
+      say to her which might change her opinion, you can write it, can't you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked down at her hands&mdash;very beautiful and well-kept hands&mdash;and
+      sighed. This young man, with his unusual imperturbability and hateful
+      common sense, was getting on her nerves.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is so hard to write things, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;but, of course,
+      it is something to know that if the worst happens I can send her a letter.
+      I shall think about that for a short time. Meanwhile, there is so much
+      about her I would love to have you tell me. She has no money, has she? How
+      does she support herself?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She sings occasionally at concerts,&rdquo; Tavernake replied after a moment's
+      pause. &ldquo;I suppose there is no harm in telling you that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth leaned towards him. She was very loth indeed to acknowledge
+      defeat. Once more her voice was deliciously soft, her forehead delicately
+      wrinkled, her blue eyes filled with alluring light.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she murmured, &ldquo;do you know that you are not in the least
+      kind to me? Beatrice and I are sisters, after all. Even she has admitted
+      that. She left me most unkindly at a critical time in my life; she
+      misunderstood things; if I were to see her, I could explain everything. I
+      feel it very much that she is living apart from me in this city where we
+      are both strangers. I am anxious about her, Mr. Tavernake. Does she want
+      money? If so, will you take her some from me? Can't you suggest any way in
+      which I could help her? Do be my friend, please, and advise me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Life was certainly opening out for Tavernake. The atmosphere by which he
+      was surrounded, which she was deliberately creating around him, was the
+      atmosphere of an unknown world. It was a position, this, entirely novel to
+      him. Nevertheless, he did his best to cope with it intelligently. He
+      reflected carefully before he made any reply, he refused absolutely to
+      listen to the strange voices singing in his ears, and he delivered his
+      decision with his usual air of finality.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am afraid,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;that since Beatrice refuses even to let you know
+      her whereabouts, she would not wish to accept anything from you. It seems
+      a pity,&rdquo; he went on, the instincts of the money-saver stirring within him;
+      &ldquo;she is certainly none too well off.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The lady on the couch sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice has at least a friend,&rdquo; she murmured. &ldquo;It is a great deal to
+      have a friend. It is more than I have. We are both so far from home here.
+      Often I am sorry that we ever left America. England is not a hospitable
+      country, Mr. Tavernake.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Again this painfully literal young man spoke out what was in his mind.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There was a gentleman in the motor-car with you the other night,&rdquo; he
+      reminded her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She bit her lip.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He was just an acquaintance,&rdquo; she answered, &ldquo;a man whom I used to know in
+      New York, passing through London. He called on me and asked me to go to
+      the theatre and supper. Why not? I have had a terrible time during the
+      last few months, Mr. Tavernake, and I am very lonely&mdash;lonelier than
+      ever since my sister deserted me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake began to feel, ridiculous though it seemed, that in some subtle
+      and inexplicable fashion he was in danger. At any rate, he was hopelessly
+      bewildered. He did not understand why this very beautiful lady should look
+      at him as though they were old friends, why her eyes should appeal to him
+      so often for sympathy, why her fingers, which a moment ago were resting
+      lightly upon his hand, and which she had drawn away with reluctance,
+      should have burned him like pin-pricks of fire. The woman who wishes to
+      allure may be as subtle as possible in her methods, but a sense of her
+      purpose, however vague it may be, is generally communicated to her would
+      be victim. Tavernake was becoming distinctly uneasy. He had no vanity. He
+      knew from the first that this beautiful creature belonged to a world far
+      removed from any of which he had any knowledge. The only solution of the
+      situation which presented itself to him was that she might be thinking of
+      borrowing money from him!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There was never a time in my life,&rdquo; she continued softly, &ldquo;when I felt
+      that I needed a friend more. I am afraid that my sister has prejudiced you
+      against me, Mr. Tavernake. Beatrice is very young, and the young are not
+      always sympathetic, you know. They do not make allowances, they do not
+      understand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why did you tell Mr. Dowling things which were not true?&rdquo; he asked
+      bluntly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She sighed, and looked down at the handkerchief with which she had been
+      toying.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was a very silly piece of conceit,&rdquo; she admitted, &ldquo;but, you see, I had
+      to tell him something.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why did you come to the office at all?&rdquo; he continued.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you really want to know that?&rdquo; she whispered softly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will tell you,&rdquo; she went on suddenly. &ldquo;It sounds foolish, in a way, and
+      yet it wasn't really, because, you see,&rdquo;&mdash;she smiled at him&mdash;&ldquo;I
+      was anxious about Beatrice. I saw you come out of the office that morning,
+      and I recognized you at once. I knew that it was you who had been with
+      Beatrice. I made an excuse about the house to come and see whether I could
+      find you out.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake, in whom the vanity was not yet born, missed wholly the
+      significance of her smile, her trifling hesitation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All that,&rdquo; he declared, &ldquo;is no reason why you should have told Mr.
+      Dowling that your husband was a millionaire and had given you carte
+      blanche about taking a house.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did I mention&mdash;my husband?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Distinctly,&rdquo; he assured her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For the first time she had faltered in her speech. Tavernake felt that she
+      herself was shaken by some emotion. Her eyes for a moment were
+      strangely-lit; something had come into her face which he did not
+      understand. Then it passed. The delightful smile, half deprecating, half
+      appealing, once more parted her lips; the gleam of horror no longer shone
+      in her blue eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am always so foolish about money,&rdquo; she declared, &ldquo;so ignorant that I
+      never know how I stand, but really I think that I have plenty, and a
+      hundred or two more or less for rent didn't seem to matter much.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was a point of view, this, which Tavernake utterly failed to
+      comprehend. He looked at her in surprise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose,&rdquo; he protested, &ldquo;you know how much a year you have to live on?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It seems to vary all the time,&rdquo; she sighed. &ldquo;There are so many
+      complications.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked at her in amazement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;After all,&rdquo; he admitted, &ldquo;you don't look as though you had much of a head
+      for figures.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If only I had some one to help me!&rdquo; she murmured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake moved uneasily in his chair. His sense of danger was growing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you will excuse me now,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I think that I must be getting
+      back. I am an employee at Dowling, Spence &amp; Company's, you know, and
+      my time is not quite my own. I only came because I promised to.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she begged, looking at him full out of those wonderful
+      blue eyes, &ldquo;please do me a great favor.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is it?&rdquo; he asked with clumsy ungraciousness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come and see me, every now and then, and let me know how my sister is.
+      Perhaps you may be able to suggest some way in which I can help her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake considered the question for a moment. He was angry with himself
+      for the unaccountable sense of pleasure which her suggestion had given
+      him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not quite sure,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;whether I had better come. Beatrice
+      seemed quite anxious that I should not talk about her to you at all. She
+      did not like my coming to-day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You seem to know a great deal about my sister,&rdquo; Elizabeth declared
+      reflectively. &ldquo;You call her by her Christian name and you appear to see
+      her frequently. Perhaps, even, you are fond of her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake met his questioner's inquiring gaze blankly. He was almost
+      indignant.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Fond of her!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;I have never been fond of any one in my
+      life, or anything&mdash;except my work,&rdquo; he added.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him a little bewildered at first.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, you strange person!&rdquo; she cried, her lips breaking into a delightful
+      smile. &ldquo;Don't you know that you haven't begun to live at all yet? You
+      don't even know anything about life, and at the back of it all you have
+      capacity. Yes,&rdquo; she went on, &ldquo;I think that you have the capacity for
+      living.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her hand fell upon his with a little gesture which was half a caress. He
+      looked around him as though seeking for escape. He was on his feet now and
+      he clutched at his hat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I must go,&rdquo; he insisted almost roughly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Am I keeping you?&rdquo; she asked innocently. &ldquo;Well, you shall go as soon as
+      you please, only you must promise me one thing. You must come back, say
+      within a week, and let me know how my sister is. I am not half so brutal
+      as you think. I really am anxious about her. Please!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will promise that,&rdquo; he answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wait one moment, then,&rdquo; she begged, turning to the letters by her side.
+      &ldquo;There is just something I want to ask you. Don't be impatient&mdash;it is
+      entirely a matter of business.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      All the time he was acutely conscious of that restless desire to get out
+      of the room. The woman's white arms, from which the sleeves of her blue
+      gown had fallen back, were stretched towards him as she lazily turned over
+      her pile of correspondence. They were very beautiful arms and Tavernake,
+      although he had had no experience, was dimly aware of the fact. Her eyes,
+      too, seemed always to be trying to reach some part of him which was dead,
+      or as yet unborn. He could feel her striving to get there, beating against
+      the walls of his indifference. Why should a woman wear blue stockings
+      because she had a blue gown, he wondered idly. She was not like Beatrice,
+      this alluring, beautiful woman, who lay there talking to him in a manner
+      whose meaning came to him only in strange, bewildering flashes. He could
+      be with Beatrice and feel the truth of what he had once told her&mdash;that
+      her sex was a thing which need not even be taken into account between
+      them. With this woman it was different; he felt that she wished it to be
+      different.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps you had better tell me about that matter of business next time I
+      am here,&rdquo; he suggested, with an abruptness which was almost brusque. &ldquo;I
+      must go now. I do not know why I have stayed so long.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She held out her fingers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are a very sudden person,&rdquo; she declared, smiling at his discomfiture.
+      &ldquo;If you must go!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He scarcely touched her hand, anxious only to get away. And then the door
+      opened and a man of somewhat remarkable appearance entered the room with
+      the air of a privileged person. He was oddly dressed, with little regard
+      to the fashion of the moment. His black coat was cut after the mode of a
+      past generation, his collar was of the type affected by Gladstone and his
+      fellow-statesmen, his black bow was arranged with studied negligence and
+      he showed more frilled white shirt-front than is usual in the daytime. His
+      silk hat was glossy but broad-brimmed; his masses of gray hair, brushed
+      back from a high, broad forehead, gave him almost a patriarchal aspect.
+      His features were large and fairly well-shaped, but his mouth was weak and
+      his cheeks lacked the color of a healthy life. Tavernake stared at him
+      open-mouthed. He, for his part, looked at Tavernake as he might have
+      looked at some strange wild animal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A thousand apologies, dear Elizabeth!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;I knocked, but I
+      imagine that you did not hear me. Knowing your habits, it did not occur to
+      me that you might be engaged at this hour of the morning.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a young man from the house agent's,&rdquo; she announced indifferently,
+      &ldquo;come to see me about a flat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In that case,&rdquo; he suggested amiably, &ldquo;I am, perhaps, not in the way.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth turned her head slightly and looked at him; he backed
+      precipitately toward the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In a few minutes,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I will return in a few minutes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake attempted to follow his example.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is no occasion for your friend to leave,&rdquo; he protested. &ldquo;If you
+      have any instructions for us, a note to the office will always bring some
+      one here to see you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She sat up on the couch and smiled at him. His obvious embarrassment
+      amused her. It was a new sort of game, this, altogether.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;three minutes more won't matter, will
+      it? I will not keep you longer than that, I promise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He came reluctantly a few steps back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry,&rdquo; he explained, &ldquo;but we really are busy this morning.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is business,&rdquo; she declared, still smiling at him pleasantly. &ldquo;My
+      sister has filled you with suspicions about me. Some of them may be
+      justifiable, some are not. I am not so rich as I should like some people
+      to believe. It is so much easier to live well, you know, when people
+      believe that you are rolling in money. Still, I am by no means a pauper. I
+      cannot afford to take Grantham House, but neither can I afford to go on
+      living here. I have decided to make a change, to try and economize, to try
+      and live within my means. Now will you bring me a list of small houses or
+      flats, something at not more than say two or three hundred a year? It
+      shall be strictly a business proceeding. I will pay you for your time, if
+      that is necessary, and your commission in advance. There, you can't refuse
+      my offer on those terms, can you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake remained silent. He was conscious that his lack of response
+      seemed both sullen and awkward, but he was for the moment tongue-tied. His
+      habit of inopportune self-analysis had once more asserted itself. He could
+      not understand the curious nature of his mistrust of this woman, nor could
+      he understand the pleasure which her suggestion gave him. He wanted to
+      refuse, and yet he was glad to be able to tell himself that he was, after
+      all, but an employee of his firm and not in a position to decline business
+      on their behalf.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She leaned a little towards him; her tone was almost beseeching.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are not going to be unkind? You will not refuse me?&rdquo; she pleaded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will bring you a list,&rdquo; he answered heavily, &ldquo;on the terms you
+      suggest.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To-morrow morning?&rdquo; she begged.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As soon as I am able,&rdquo; he promised.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then he escaped. Outside in the corridor, the man who had interrupted his
+      interview was walking backwards and forwards. Tavernake passed him without
+      responding to his bland greeting. He forgot all about the lift and
+      descended five flights of stairs....
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A few minutes later, he presented himself at the office and reported that
+      Mrs. Wenham Gardner had decided unfavorably about Grantham House, and that
+      she was not disposed, indeed, to take premises of anything like such a
+      rental. Mr. Dowling was disappointed, and inclined to think that his
+      employee had mismanaged the affair.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wish that I had gone myself,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;She obviously wished me to,
+      but it happened to be inconvenient. By-the-bye, Tavernake, close the door,
+      will you? There is another matter concerning which I should like to speak
+      to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake did as he was bidden at once, without any disquietude. His own
+      services to the firm were of such a nature that he had no misgiving
+      whatever as to his employer's desire for a private interview.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is about the Marston Rise estate,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling explained, arranging
+      his pince nez. &ldquo;I believe that the time is coming when some sort of
+      overtures should be made. You know what has been in my mind for a very
+      considerable time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; he admitted, &ldquo;I know quite well.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I did hear a rumor,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling continued, &ldquo;that some one had bought one
+      small plot on the outskirts of the estate. I dare say it is not true, and
+      in any case it is not worth while troubling about, but it shows that the
+      public is beginning to nibble. I am of opinion that the time is almost&mdash;yes,
+      almost ripe for a move.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you wish me to do anything in the matter, sir?&rdquo; Tavernake asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In the first place,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling declared, &ldquo;I should like you to try to
+      find out whether any of the plots have really been sold, and, if so, to
+      whom, and what would be their price. Can you do this during the week?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think so,&rdquo; Tavernake answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say Monday morning,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling suggested, taking down his hat. &ldquo;I shall
+      be playing golf to-morrow and Friday, and of course Saturday. Monday
+      morning you might let me have a report.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake went back to his office. After all, then, things were to come to
+      a crisis a little earlier than he had thought. He knew quite well that
+      that report, if he made it honestly, and no other idea was likely to occur
+      to him, would effectually sever his connection with Messrs. Dowling,
+      Spence &amp; Company.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER IX. THE PLOT THICKENS
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The man whom Tavernake had left walking up and down the corridor lost no
+      time in presenting himself once more at the apartments of Mrs. Wenham
+      Gardner. He entered the suite without ceremony, carefully closing both
+      doors behind him. It became obvious then that his deportment on the
+      occasion of his previous appearance had been in the nature of a bluff. The
+      air with which he looked across the room at the woman who watched him was
+      furtive; the hand which laid his hat upon the table was shaking; there was
+      a gleam almost of terror in his eyes. The woman remained impassive,
+      inscrutable, simply watching him. After a moment or two, however, she
+      spoke&mdash;a single monosyllable.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man broke down.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Elizabeth,&rdquo; he exclaimed, &ldquo;you are too&mdash;too ghastly! I can't stand
+      it. You are unnatural.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She stretched herself upon the couch and turned towards him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Unnatural, am I?&rdquo; she remarked. &ldquo;And what are you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He sank into a chair. He had become very flabby indeed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What you are always calling me, I suppose,&rdquo; he muttered,&mdash;&ldquo;a coward.
+      You have so little consideration, Elizabeth. My health isn't what it was.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His eyes had wandered longingly toward the cupboard at the further end of
+      the apartment. The woman upon the couch smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You may help yourself,&rdquo; she directed carelessly. &ldquo;Perhaps then you will
+      be able to tell me why you have come in such a state.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He crossed the room in a few hasty steps, his head and shoulders
+      disappeared inside the cupboard. There was the sound of the withdrawal of
+      a cork, the fizz of a sodawater syphon. He returned to his place a
+      different man.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must remember my age, Elizabeth dear,&rdquo; he said, apologetically. &ldquo;I
+      haven't your nerve&mdash;it isn't likely that I should have. When I was
+      twenty-five, there was nothing in the world of which I was afraid.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked him over critically.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps I am not so absolutely courageous as you think,&rdquo; she remarked.
+      &ldquo;To tell you the truth, there are a good many things of which I am afraid
+      when you come to me in such a state. I am afraid of you, of what you will
+      do or say.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You need not be,&rdquo; he assured her hastily. &ldquo;When I am away from you, I am
+      dumb. What I suffer no one knows. I keep it to myself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded, a little contemptuously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose you do your best,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;Tell me, now, what is this
+      fresh thing which has disturbed you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her visitor stared at her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Does there need to be any fresh thing?&rdquo; he muttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose it is something about Wenham?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The man shivered. He opened his lips and closed them again. The woman's
+      tone, if possible, grew colder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I hope you are not going to tell me that you have disobeyed my orders,&rdquo;
+       she said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he protested, &ldquo;no! I was there yesterday. I came back by the mail
+      from Penzance. I had to motor thirty miles to catch it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Something has happened, of course,&rdquo; she went on, &ldquo;something which you are
+      afraid to tell 'me. Sit up like a man, my dear father, and let me have the
+      truth.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing fresh has happened at all,&rdquo; he assured her. &ldquo;It is simply that
+      the memory of the day I spent at that place and that the sight of him has
+      got on my nerves till I can't sleep or think of anything else.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What rubbish!&rdquo; she exclaimed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have only seen the place in fine weather,&rdquo; he continued, dropping his
+      voice a little. &ldquo;Elizabeth, you have no idea what it is really like.
+      Yesterday morning I got out of the train at Bodmin and I motored through
+      to the village of Clawes. After that there were five miles to walk.
+      There's no road, only a sort of broken track, and for the whole of that
+      five miles there isn't even a farm building to be seen and I didn't meet a
+      human soul. There was a sort of pall of white-gray mists everywhere over
+      the moor, sometimes so dense that I couldn't see my way, and you could
+      stop and listen and there wasn't a thing to be heard, not even a sheep
+      bell.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed softly..
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear, foolish father,&rdquo; she murmured, &ldquo;you don't understand what a rest
+      cure is. This is quite all right, quite as it should be. Poor Wenham has
+      been seeing too many people all his life&mdash;that is why we have to keep
+      him quiet for a time. You can skip the scenery. I suppose you got to the
+      house at last?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I got there,&rdquo; continued her father. &ldquo;You know what a bleak-looking
+      place it is, right on the side of a bare hill&mdash;a square, gray stone
+      place just the color of the hillside. Well, I got there and walked in.
+      There was Ted Mathers, half dressed, no collar, with a bottle of whiskey
+      on the table, playing some wretched game of cards by himself. Elizabeth,
+      what a brute that man is!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go on,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;What about Wenham?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He was there in a corner, gazing out of the window. When I came he sprang
+      up, but when he saw who it was, he&mdash;he tried to hide. He was afraid
+      of me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He said that I&mdash;I reminded him of you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Absurd!&rdquo; she murmured. &ldquo;Tell me, how did he look?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ill, wretched, paler and thinner than ever, and wilder looking.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What did Mathers say about him?&rdquo; she demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What could he? He told me that he cried all day and begged to be taken
+      back to America.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No one goes near the place, I suppose?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not a soul. A man comes from the village to sell things once a week.
+      Mathers knows when to expect him and takes care that Wenham is not around.
+      They are out of the world there&mdash;no road, no paths, nothing to bring
+      even a tourist. I could have imagined such a spot in Arizona, Elizabeth,
+      but in England&mdash;no!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Has he any amusements at all?&rdquo; she inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The man's hands were shaking; once more his eyes went longingly toward the
+      cupboard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He has made&mdash;a doll,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;carved it out of a piece of wood and
+      dressed it in oddments from his ties. Mathers showed it to me as a joke.
+      Elizabeth, it was wonderful&mdash;horrible!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why?&rdquo; she asked him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is you,&rdquo; he continued, moistening his lips with his tongue, &ldquo;you, in a
+      blue gown&mdash;your favorite shade. He has even made blue stockings and
+      strange little shoes. He has got some hair from somewhere and parted it
+      just like yours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It sounds very touching,&rdquo; she remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The man was shivering again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Elizabeth,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I do not think that he means it kindly. Mathers
+      took me up into his room. He has made something there which looks like a
+      scaffold. The doll was hanging by a piece of string from the gallows.
+      Elizabeth!&mdash;my God, but it was like you!&rdquo; he cried, suddenly dropping
+      his head upon his arms.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For a moment, a reflection of the terror which had seized him flashed in
+      her own face. It passed quickly away. She laughed mockingly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear father,&rdquo; she protested, &ldquo;you are certainly not yourself this
+      morning.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I saw you swinging,&rdquo; he muttered, &ldquo;swinging by that piece of cord! There
+      was a great black pin through your heart. Elizabeth, if he should get away
+      sometime! If some one should come over from America and discover where he
+      was! If he should find us out! Oh, my God, if he should find us out!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth had risen to her feet. She was standing now before the fire, her
+      left elbow resting upon the mantelpiece, a trifle of silver gleaming in
+      her right hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Father,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;there is no danger in life for those who know no
+      fear. Look at me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His eyes sought hers, fascinated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If he should find me out,&rdquo; she continued, &ldquo;it would be no such terrible
+      thing, after all. It would be the end.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her fingers disclosed the little ornament she was carrying&mdash;a tiny
+      pistol. She slipped it back into her pocket. The man was wondering how
+      such a thing as this came to be his daughter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have courage, Elizabeth,&rdquo; he whispered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have courage,&rdquo; she assented, &ldquo;because I have brains. I never allow
+      myself to be in a position where I should be likely to get the worst of
+      it. Ever since the day when he turned so suddenly against me, I have been
+      careful.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her father leaned towards her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Elizabeth,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I never really understood. What was it that came
+      over him so suddenly? One day he was your slave, the next I think he would
+      have murdered you if he could.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shrugged her shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Honestly,&rdquo; she replied, &ldquo;I felt it impossible to keep up the sham any
+      longer. I married Wenham Gardner in New York because he was supposed to be
+      a millionaire and because it seemed to be the best thing to do, but as to
+      living with him, I never meant that. You know how ridiculous his behavior
+      was on the boat. He never let me out of his sight, but swore that he was
+      going to give up smoking and drinking and lead a new life for my sake. I
+      really believe he meant it, too.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wouldn't it have been better, dear,&rdquo; her father suggested, timidly, &ldquo;to
+      have encouraged him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He was absolutely hopeless,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;You say that I have no
+      nerves; that is because I do not allow myself to suffer. If I had gone on
+      living with Wenham, it would have driven me mad. His habits, his manner of
+      life, everything disgusted me. Until I came to see so much of him, I never
+      understood what the term 'decadent' really can mean. The very touch of him
+      grew to be hateful. No woman could live with such a man. By the way, he
+      signed the draft, I suppose?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her father handed her a slip of paper, which she looked at and locked in
+      her drawer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did he make any trouble about it?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor shivered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He refused to sign it,&rdquo; he said, in a low tone, &ldquo;swore he would never
+      sign it. Mathers sent me out for a few minutes, made me go into another
+      room. When I came back, he gave me the draft. I heard him calling out.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mathers certainly earns his money,&rdquo; she remarked, drily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He gazed at her with grudging admiration. This was his daughter, his own
+      flesh and blood. Back through the years, for a moment, he seemed to see
+      her, a child with hair down her back, sitting on his knee, listening to
+      his stories, wondering at the little arts and tricks by which he had
+      wrested their pennies and sixpennies from a credulous public.
+      Phrenologist, hypnotist, conjurer&mdash;all these things the great
+      Professor Franklin had called himself. Often, from the rude stage where he
+      had given his performance, he had terrified to death the women and
+      children of his audience. It flashed upon him at that moment that never,
+      even in the days of her childhood, had he seen fear in Elizabeth's face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You should have been a man, Elizabeth,&rdquo; he muttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head, smiling as though not ill-pleased at the compliment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The power of a man is so limited,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;A woman has more
+      weapons.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;More weapons indeed,&rdquo; the professor agreed, as his eyes traveled over the
+      slim yet wonderful perfection of her form, lingered for a moment at the
+      little knot of lace at her throat, wrestled with the delicate sweetness of
+      her features, struggling hard to think from whom among his ancestors could
+      have come a creature so physically attractive.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;More weapons, indeed,&rdquo; he repeated. &ldquo;Elizabeth, what a gift&mdash;what a
+      gift!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You speak,&rdquo; she replied, &ldquo;as though it were an evil one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was only thinking,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;that it seems a pity. You are so
+      wonderful, we might have found an easier and a less dangerous way to
+      fortune.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The Bohemian blood in me, I suppose,&rdquo; she remarked. &ldquo;The crooked ways
+      attract, you know, when one has been brought up as I was.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your poor mother had no love for them,&rdquo; he reminded her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice has inherited everything that belonged to my mother. I am your
+      own daughter, father. You ought to be proud of me. But there, I gave you
+      another commission. Is it true that Jerry is really here?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He arrived in England on Wednesday on the Lusitania. He has been in town
+      all the time since.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      A distinct frown darkened her face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He must have had my letter, then,&rdquo; she murmured, half to herself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Without a doubt,&rdquo; her father admitted. &ldquo;Elizabeth, why do you take
+      chances about seeing this man? He was fond of you in New York, I know, but
+      then he was fond of his brother, too. He may not believe your story. It
+      may be dangerous.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think I can convince Jerry Gardner of anything I choose to tell him,&rdquo;
+       she said. &ldquo;Besides, it is absolutely necessary that I have some
+      information about Wenham's affairs. He must have a great deal more money
+      somewhere and I must find out how we are to get at it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't like it,&rdquo; he muttered. &ldquo;Supposing he finds Beatrice!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth shrugged her shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice is made of silent stuff,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;I should never be
+      afraid of her. All the same, I wish I could find out just where she is. It
+      would look better if we were living together.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor shook his head sadly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She left us of her own free will,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;and I don't believe,
+      Elizabeth, that she would ever come back again. She knew very well what
+      she was doing. She knew that our views of life were not hers. She didn't
+      know half but she knew enough. You were quite right in what you said just
+      now; Beatrice was more like her mother, and her mother was a good woman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Really!&rdquo; Elizabeth remarked, insolently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't answer like that,&rdquo; he blustered, striking the table. &ldquo;She was your
+      mother, too.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The woman's face was inscrutable, hard, and flawless behind the little
+      cloud of tobacco smoke. The man began to tremble once more. Every time he
+      ventured to assert himself, a single look from her was sufficient to quell
+      him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Elizabeth,&rdquo; he muttered, &ldquo;you haven't a heart, you haven't a soul, you
+      haven't a conscience. I wonder&mdash;what sort of a woman you are!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am your daughter,&rdquo; she reminded him, pleasantly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was never quite so bad as that,&rdquo; he went on, taking a large silk
+      handkerchief from his pocket and dabbing his forehead. &ldquo;I had to live and
+      times were hard. I have cheated the public, perhaps. I haven't been above
+      playing at cards a little cleverly, or making something where I could out
+      of the weaker men. But, Elizabeth, I am afraid of you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Men are generally afraid of the big stakes,&rdquo; she remarked, flicking the
+      ash from her cigarette. &ldquo;They will cheat and lie for halfpennies, but they
+      are bad gamblers when life or death&mdash;the big things are in the
+      balance. Bah!&rdquo; she went on. &ldquo;Father, I want Jerry Gardner to come and see
+      me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you can't make him come, my dear,&rdquo; the professor said, &ldquo;I am sure it
+      will be of no use my trying.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He has had my letter,&rdquo; she continued, half to herself; &ldquo;he has had my
+      letter and he does not come.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is nothing to be done but wait,&rdquo; her father decided.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And meanwhile,&rdquo; she went on, &ldquo;supposing he were to discover Beatrice,
+      supposing they two were to come together; supposing he were to tell her
+      what he knows and she were to tell him what she guessed!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor buried his face in his hands. Elizabeth threw her cigarette
+      away with an impatient gesture.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What an idiot I am!&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;What is the use of wasting time like
+      this?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a knock at the door. A trim-looking French maid presented
+      herself. She addressed her mistress in voluble French. A coiffeur and a
+      manicurist were waiting in the next apartment; it was time that Madame
+      habited herself. The professor listened to these announcements with an air
+      of half-admiring wonder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose I must be going,&rdquo; he said, rising to his feet. &ldquo;There is just
+      one thing I should like to ask you, Elizabeth, if I may, before I go.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who was the young man whom I met here just now?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why do you ask that?&rdquo; she demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I really do not know,&rdquo; her father replied, thoughtfully, &ldquo;except that his
+      appearance seemed a little singular. In some respects he appeared so
+      commonplace. His clothes and bearing, in fact, were so ordinary that I was
+      surprised to find him here with you. And, on the other hand, his face&mdash;you
+      must remember, my dear, that this is entirely a professional instinct; I
+      am still interested in faces&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Quite so,&rdquo; she admitted. &ldquo;Go on. The young man rather puzzles me myself.
+      I should like to hear what you make of him. What did you think of his
+      face?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There was something powerful about it,&rdquo; he declared, &ldquo;something dogged,
+      splendid, narrow, impossible,&mdash;the sort of face which belongs to a
+      man who achieves great things because he is too stupid to recognize
+      failure, even when it has him in its arms and its fingers are upon his
+      throat. That young man has qualities, my dear, I am sure. Mind you, at
+      present they are dormant, but he has qualities.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She led him to the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear father,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;sometimes I really respect you. If you should
+      come across that young man again, keep your eye upon him. He knows one
+      thing at least which I wish he would tell us&mdash;he knows where Beatrice
+      is.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her father looked at her in amazement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He knows where Beatrice is and he has not told you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You tried to have him tell you and he refused?&rdquo; the professor persisted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Exactly,&rdquo; she admitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Her father put on his hat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I knew that young man was something out of the common.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER X. THE JOY OF BATTLE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      They sat on the trunk of a fallen tree, in the topmost corner of the
+      field. In the hedge, close at hand, was a commotion of birds. In the elm
+      tree, a little further away, a thrush was singing. A soft west wind blew
+      in their faces; the air immediately around them was filled with sunlight.
+      Yet almost to their feet stretched one of those great arms of the city&mdash;a
+      suburb, with its miles of villas, its clanging of electric cars, its waste
+      plots, its rows of struggling shops. And only a little further away still,
+      the body itself&mdash;the huge city, throbbing beneath its pall of smoke
+      and cloud. The girl, who had been gazing steadily downwards for several
+      moments, turned at last to her companion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you know,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;that this makes me think of the first night you
+      spoke to me? You remember it&mdash;up on the roof at Blenheim House?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake did not answer for a moment. He was looking through a
+      queerly-shaped instrument that he had brought with him at half-a-dozen
+      stakes that he had laboriously driven into the ground some distance away.
+      He was absolutely absorbed in his task.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The main avenue,&rdquo; he muttered softly to himself. &ldquo;Yes, it must be a
+      trifle more to the left. Then we get all the offshoots parallel and the
+      better houses have their southern aspect. I beg your pardon, Beatrice, did
+      you say anything?&rdquo; he broke off suddenly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing worth mentioning. I was just thinking that it reminded me a
+      little up here of the first time you and I ever talked together.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He glanced down at the panorama below, with its odd jumble of hideous
+      buildings, softened here and there with wreaths of sunstained smoke, its
+      great blots of ugliness irredeemable, insistent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It's different, of course,&rdquo; she went on. &ldquo;I remember, even now, the view
+      from the house-top that night. In a sense, it was finer than this;
+      everything was more lurid and yet more chaotic; one simply felt that
+      underneath all those mysterious places was some great being, toiling and
+      struggling&mdash;Life itself, groaning through space with human cogwheels.
+      Up here one sees too much. Oh, my dear Leonard,&rdquo; she continued, &ldquo;to think
+      that you, too, should be one of the devastators!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He fitted his instrument into its case and replaced it in his pocket.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you mustn't call me hard names. I shall remind you of
+      the man whose works you are making me read. You know what he says&mdash;'The
+      aesthete is, after all, only a dallier. The world lives and progresses by
+      reason of its utilitarians.' This hill represents to me most of the things
+      that are worth having in life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed shortly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will cut down those hedges and drive away the birds to find a fresh
+      home; you will plough up the green grass, cut out a street and lay down
+      granite stones. Then I see your ugly little houses coming up like
+      mushrooms all over the place. You are a vandal, my dear Leonard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am simply obeying the law,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;After all, even from your own
+      point of view, I do not think that it is so bad. Look closer, and you will
+      find that the hedges are blackened here and there with smuts. The birds
+      will find a better dwelling place further away. See how the smoke from
+      those factory chimneys is sending its smuts across these fields. They are
+      no longer country; they are better gathered in.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shivered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is something about life,&rdquo; she said, sadly, &ldquo;which terrifies me.
+      Every force that counts seems to be destructive.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Up the steep hill behind them came the puffing and groaning of a small
+      motor-car. They both turned their heads to watch it come into view. It was
+      an insignificant affair of an almost extinct pattern, a single cylinder
+      machine with a round tonneau back. The engine was knocking badly as the
+      driver brought it to a standstill a few yards away from them.
+      Involuntarily Tavernake stiffened as he saw the two men who descended from
+      it, and who were already passing through the gate close to where they
+      were. One was Mr. Dowling, the other the manager of the bank where they
+      kept their account. Mr. Dowling recognized his manager with surprise but
+      much cordiality.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear me!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;Dear me, this is most fortunate! You know Mr.
+      Tavernake, of course, Belton? My manager, Mr. Tavernake&mdash;Mr. Belton,
+      of the London &amp; Westminster Bank. I have brought Mr. Belton up here,
+      Tavernake, to have a look round, so that he may know what we mean to do
+      with all the money we shall have to come and borrow, eh?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The bank manager smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a very fine situation,&rdquo; he remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The eyes of the two men fell upon Beatrice, who had drawn a little to one
+      side.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;May we have the pleasure, Tavernake?&rdquo; Mr. Dowling said, graciously. &ldquo;You
+      are not married, I believe?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, this is my sister,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, slowly,&mdash;&ldquo;Mr. Belton and
+      Mr. Dowling.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The two men acknowledged the salute with some slight surprise. Beatrice,
+      although her clothes were simple, had always the air of belonging to a
+      different world.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your brother, my dear Miss Tavernake,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling declared, &ldquo;is a
+      perfect genius at discovering these desirable sites. This one I honestly
+      consider to be the find of our lifetime. We have now,&rdquo; he proceeded,
+      turning to Mr. Belton, &ldquo;certain information that the cars will run to
+      whatever point we desire in this vicinity, and the Metropolitan Railway
+      has also arranged for an extension of its system. To-morrow I propose,&rdquo;
+       Mr. Dowling continued, holding the sides of his coat and assuming a
+      somewhat pompous manner, &ldquo;to make an offer for the whole of this site. It
+      will involve a very large sum of money indeed, but I am convinced that it
+      will be a remunerative speculation.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake remained grimly silent. This was scarcely the time or the place
+      which he would have selected for an explanation with his employer. There
+      were signs, however, that the thing was to be forced upon him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am very pleased indeed to meet you here, Tavernake,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling went
+      on, &ldquo;pleased both for personal reasons and because it shows, if I may be
+      allowed to say so, the interest which you take in the firm's business,
+      that you should devote your holiday to coming and&mdash;er&mdash;surveying
+      the scene of our exploits, so to speak. Perhaps now that you are here you
+      would be able to explain to Mr. Belton better than I should, just what it
+      is that we propose.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake hesitated for a moment. Finally, however, he proceeded to make
+      clear a very elaborate and carefully thought out building scheme, to which
+      both men listened with much attention. When he had finished, however, he
+      turned round to Mr. Dowling, facing him squarely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will understand, sir,&rdquo; he concluded, &ldquo;that a scheme such as I have
+      pointed out could only be carried through if the whole of the property
+      were in one person's hands. I may say that the information to which you
+      referred a few days ago was perfectly correct. A considerable portion of
+      the south side of the hill has already been purchased, besides certain
+      other plots which would interfere considerably with any comprehensive
+      scheme of building.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mr. Dowling's face fell at once; his tone was one of annoyance mingled
+      with irritation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come, come,&rdquo; he declared, &ldquo;this sounds very bad, Mr. Tavernake, very
+      neglectful, very careless as to the interests of the firm. Why did we not
+      keep our eye upon it? Why did we not forestall this other purchaser, eh?
+      It appears to me that we have been slack, very slack indeed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake took a small book from his pocket.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will remember, sir,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;that it was on the eleventh of May
+      last year when I first spoke to you of this site.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, well,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling exclaimed, sharply, &ldquo;what of it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You were starting out for a fortnight's golf somewhere,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      continued, &ldquo;and you promised to look into the affair when you returned. I
+      spoke to you again but you declared that you were far too busy to go into
+      the matter at all for the present, you didn't care about this side of
+      London, you considered that we had enough on hand&mdash;in fact, you threw
+      cold water upon the idea.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I may not have been very enthusiastic at first,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling admitted,
+      grudgingly. &ldquo;Latterly, however, I have come round to your views.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There have been several articles in various newspapers, and a good deal
+      of talk,&rdquo; Tavernake remarked, &ldquo;which have been more effectual, I think, in
+      bringing you round, than my advice. However, what I wish to say to you is
+      this, sir, that when I found myself unable to interest you in this scheme,
+      I went into it myself to some extent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Went into it yourself?&rdquo; Mr. Dowling repeated, incredulously. &ldquo;What do you
+      mean, Tavernake? What do you mean, sir?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I mean that I have invested my savings in the purchase of several plots
+      of land upon this hillside,&rdquo; Tavernake explained.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;On your own account?&rdquo; Mr. Dowling demanded. &ldquo;Your savings, indeed!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;Why not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But it's the firm's business, sir&mdash;the firm's, not yours!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The firm had the opportunity,&rdquo; Tavernake pointed out, &ldquo;and were not
+      inclined to avail themselves of it. If I had not bought the land when I
+      did, some one else would have bought the whole of it long ago.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mr. Dowling was obviously in a furious temper.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you mean to tell me, sir,&rdquo; he exclaimed, &ldquo;that you dared to enter into
+      private speculations while still an employee of the firm? It is a most
+      unheard-of thing, unwarranted, ridiculous. I shall require you, sir, to at
+      once make over the plots of land to us&mdash;to the firm, you understand.
+      We shall give you your price, of course, although I expect you paid much
+      more for it than we should have done. Still, we must give you what you
+      paid, and four per cent interest for your money.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry,&rdquo; Tavernake replied, &ldquo;but I am afraid that I should require
+      better terms than that. In fact,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;I do not wish to sell. I
+      have given a great deal of thought and time to this matter, and I intend
+      to carry it out as a personal speculation.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then you will carry it out, sir, from some other place than from within
+      the walls of my office,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling declared, furiously. &ldquo;You understand
+      that, Tavernake?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perfectly,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;You wish me to leave you. It is very
+      unwise of you to suggest it, but I am quite prepared to go.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will either resell me those plots at cost price, or you shall not set
+      foot within the office again,&rdquo; Mr. Dowling insisted. &ldquo;It is a gross breach
+      of faith, this. I never heard of such a thing in all my life. Most
+      unprofessional, impossible behavior!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake showed no signs of anger&mdash;he simply turned a little away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall not sell you my land, Mr. Dowling,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;and it will suit me
+      very well to leave your employ. You appear,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;to expect some
+      one else to do the whole of the work for you while you reap the entire
+      profits. Those days have gone by. My business in the world is to make a
+      fortune for myself, and not for you!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How dare you, sir!&rdquo; Mr. Dowling cried. &ldquo;I never heard such impertinence
+      in my life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You haven't done a stroke of work for five years,&rdquo; Tavernake went on,
+      unmoved, &ldquo;and my efforts have supplied you with a fairly good income. In
+      future, those efforts will be directed towards my own advancement.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mr. Dowling turned back toward the car.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Young man,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you can brazen it out as much as you like, but you
+      have been guilty of a gross breach of faith. I shall take care that the
+      exact situation is made known in all responsible quarters. You'll get no
+      situation with any firm with whom I am acquainted&mdash;I can promise you
+      that. If you have anything more to say to Dowling, Spence &amp; Company,
+      let it be in writing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They parted company there and then. Tavernake and Beatrice went down the
+      hill in silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Does this bother you at all?&rdquo; she inquired presently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing to speak of,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;It had to come. I wasn't quite
+      ready but that doesn't matter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What shall you do now?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Borrow enough to buy the whole of the hill,&rdquo; he replied.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Won't that mean a great deal of money?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It will be a big thing, of course,&rdquo; he admitted. &ldquo;Never mind, I dare say
+      I shall be able to interest some one in it. In any case, I never meant Mr.
+      Dowling to make a fortune out of this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They walked on in silence a little further. Then she spoke again, with
+      some hesitation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose that what you have done is quite fair, Leonard?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He answered her promptly, without any sign of offence at her question.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As a matter of fact,&rdquo; he confessed, &ldquo;it is an unusual thing for any one
+      in the employ of a firm of estate agents to make speculations on their own
+      account in land. In this case, however, I consider that I was justified. I
+      have opened up three building speculations for the firm, on each one of
+      which they have made a great deal of money, and I have not even had my
+      salary increased, or any recognition whatever offered me. There is a debt,
+      of course, which an employee owes to his employer. There is also a debt,
+      however, which the employer owes to his employee. In my case I have never
+      been treated with the slightest consideration of any sort. What I have
+      done I shall stick to. After all, I am more interested in making money for
+      myself than for other people.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They had reached the corner of the field now, and turning into the lane
+      commenced the steep descent. It was Sunday evening, and from all the
+      little conventicles and tin churches below, the bells began their
+      unmusical summons. From further away in the distance came the more
+      melodious chiming from the Cathedral and the city churches. The shriller
+      and nearer note, however, prevailed. The whole medley of sound was a
+      discord. As they descended, they could see the black-coated throngs slowly
+      moving towards the different places of worship. There was something
+      uninspiring about it all. She shuddered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I wonder why you are so anxious to get on in the
+      world. Why do you want to be rich?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He was glancing back toward the hill, the light of calculations in his
+      eyes. Once more he was measuring out those plots of land, calculating
+      rent, deducting interest.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We all seek different things,&rdquo; he replied tolerantly,&mdash;&ldquo;some fame,
+      some pleasure. Mr. Dowling, for instance, has no other ambition than to
+      muddle round the golf links a few strokes better than his partner.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is success I seek,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;Women, as a rule, do not understand.
+      You, for instance, Beatrice, are too sentimental. I am very practical. It
+      is money that I want. I want money because money means success.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And afterwards?&rdquo; she whispered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He was attending to her no longer. They were turning now into the broad
+      thoroughfare at the bottom of the lane, at the end of which a tram-car was
+      waiting. He scribbled a few, final notes into his pocket-book.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To-morrow,&rdquo; he exclaimed, with the joy of battle in his tone, &ldquo;to-morrow
+      the fight begins in earnest!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice passed her hand through his arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not only for you, dear friend, but for me,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;For you? What do
+      you mean?&rdquo; he asked quickly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have been trying to tell you all day,&rdquo; she continued, &ldquo;but you have
+      been too engrossed. Yesterday afternoon I went to see Mr. Grier at the
+      Atlas Theatre. I had my voice tried, and to-morrow night I am going to
+      take a small part in the new musical comedy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake stared at her in something like consternation. His ideas as to
+      the stage and all that belonged to it were of a primitive order. Mrs.
+      Fitzgerald was perhaps as near as possible to his idea of the type. He
+      glanced incredulously at Beatrice&mdash;slim, quietly dressed, yet with
+      the unmistakable, to him mysterious, distinction of breeding.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You an actress!&rdquo; he exclaimed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed softly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear Leonard,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;this is going to be a part of your education.
+      To-morrow night you shall come to the theatre and wait for me at the
+      stage-door.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XI. A BEWILDERING OFFER
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth stood with her hands behind her back, leaning slightly against
+      the writing-table. The professor, with his broad-brimmed hat clinched in
+      his fingers, walked restlessly up and down the little room. The discussion
+      had not been altogether a pleasant one. Elizabeth was composed but
+      serious, her father nervous and excited.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are mad, Elizabeth!&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;Is it that you do not understand,
+      or will not? I tell you that we must go.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shrugged her shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where would you drag me to?&rdquo; she asked. &ldquo;We certainly can't go back to
+      New York.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He turned fiercely upon her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Whose fault is it that we can't?&rdquo; he demanded. &ldquo;If it weren't for you and
+      your confounded schemes, I could be walking down Broadway next week. God's
+      own city it is, too!&rdquo; he muttered. &ldquo;I wish we'd never seen those two young
+      men.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was a pity, perhaps,&rdquo; she admitted, &ldquo;yet we had to do something. We
+      were absolutely stonybroke, as they say over here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Anyway, we've got to get out of this,&rdquo; the professor declared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear father,&rdquo; she replied, &ldquo;I will agree that if a new city or a new
+      world could arise from the bottom of the sea, where Professor Franklin was
+      unknown, and his beautiful daughter Elizabeth had neyer been heard of, it
+      might perhaps be advisable for us to go there. As it is--&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is Rome,&rdquo; he exclaimed, &ldquo;or some of the smaller places! We have
+      money for a time. We could get another draft, perhaps, from Wenham.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head. &ldquo;We are just as safe here as anywhere on the
+      Continent,&rdquo; she remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Once more he struck the table. Then he threw out his hands above his head
+      with the melodramatic instinct which had always been strong in his blood.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you think that I am a fool?&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;Do you think I do not know
+      that if there were not something moving in your brain you would think no
+      more of that clerk, that bourgeois estate agent, than of the door-mat
+      beneath your feet? It is what I always complain about. You make use of me
+      as a tool. There are always things which I do not understand. He comes
+      here, this young man, under a pretext, whether he knows it or not. You
+      talk to him for an hour at a time. There should be nothing in your life
+      which I do not know of, Elizabeth,&rdquo; he continued, his voice suddenly
+      hoarse as he leaned towards her. &ldquo;Can't you see that there is danger in
+      friendships for you and for me, there is danger in intimacies of any sort?
+      I share the danger; I have a right to share the knowledge. This young man
+      has no money of his own, I take it. Of what use is he to us?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are too hasty, my dear father,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;Let me assure you that
+      there is nothing at all mysterious about Mr. Tavernake. The simple truth
+      is that the young man rather attracts me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor gazed at her incredulously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Attracts you! He!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have never perfectly understood me, my dear parent,&rdquo; she murmured.
+      &ldquo;You have never appreciated that trait in my character, that strange
+      preference, if you like, for the absolutely original. Now in all my life I
+      never met such a young man as this. He wears the clothes and he has the
+      features and speech of just such a person as you have described, but there
+      is a difference.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A difference, indeed!&rdquo; the professor interrupted roughly. &ldquo;What
+      difference, I should like to know?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shrugged her shoulders lightly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is stolid without being stupid,&rdquo; she explained. &ldquo;He is entirely
+      self-centered. I smile at him, and he waits patiently until I have
+      finished to get on with our business. I have said quite nice things to him
+      and he has stared at me without change of expression, absolutely without
+      pleasure or emotion of any sort.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are too vain, Elizabeth,&rdquo; her father declared. &ldquo;You have been spoilt.
+      There are a few people in the world whom even you might fail to charm. No
+      doubt this young man is one of them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She sighed gently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It really does seem,&rdquo; she admitted, &ldquo;as though you were right, but we
+      shall see. By-the-bye, hadn't you better go? The five minutes are nearly
+      up.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He came over to her side, his hat and gloves in his hand, prepared for
+      departure.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you tell me, upon your honor, Elizabeth,&rdquo; he begged, &ldquo;that there is
+      no other reason for your interest? That you are not engaged in any fresh
+      schemes of which I know nothing? Things are bad enough as they are. I
+      cannot sleep, I cannot rest, for thinking of our position. If I thought
+      that you had any fresh plans on hand&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She flicked the ash from her cigarette and checked him with a little
+      gesture.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He knows where Beatrice is,&rdquo; she remarked thoughtfully, &ldquo;and I can't get
+      him to tell me. There is nothing beyond&mdash;absolutely nothing.&rdquo;...
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When Tavernake was announced, Elizabeth was still smoking, sitting in an
+      easy-chair and looking into the fire. Something in her attitude, the droop
+      of her head as it rested upon her fingers, reminded him suddenly of
+      Beatrice. He showed no other emotion than a sudden pause in his walk
+      across the room. Even that, however, in a person whose machinelike
+      attitude towards her provoked her resentment, was noticeable.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good morning, my friend!&rdquo; she said pleasantly. &ldquo;You have brought me the
+      fresh list?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Unfortunately, no, madam,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I have called simply to
+      announce that I am not able to be of any further assistance to you in the
+      matter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him for a moment without remark.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you serious, Mr. Tavernake?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;The fact is I am not in a position to help you. I have
+      left the employ of Messrs. Dowling, Spence &amp; Company.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of your own accord?&rdquo; she inquired quietly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, I was dismissed,&rdquo; he confessed. &ldquo;I should have been compelled to
+      leave in a very short time, but Mr. Dowling forestalled me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Won't you sit down and tell me about it?&rdquo; she invited.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked her in the eyes, square and unflinching. He was still able to do
+      that!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It could not possibly interest you,&rdquo; he said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And&mdash;my sister? You have seen her?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have seen your sister,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, without hesitation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have a message for me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;None,&rdquo; he declared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She refuses&mdash;to be reconciled, then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am afraid she has no friendly feelings towards you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She gave you no reason?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No direct reason,&rdquo; he admitted, &ldquo;but her attitude is&mdash;quite
+      uncompromising.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She rose and swept across the floor towards him. With firm but gentle
+      fingers she took his worn bowler hat and mended gloves from his hand. Her
+      gesture guided him towards a sofa.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice has prejudiced you against me,&rdquo; she murmured. &ldquo;It is not fair.
+      Please come and sit down&mdash;for five minutes,&rdquo; she pleaded. &ldquo;I want you
+      to tell me why you have quarrelled with that funny little man, Mr.
+      Dowling.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, madam,&mdash;&rdquo; he protested.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you refuse, I shall think that my sister has been telling you stories
+      about me,&rdquo; she declared, watching him closely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake drew a little away from her but seated himself on the sofa which
+      she had indicated. He took up as much room as possible, and to his relief
+      she did not persist in her first intention, which was obviously to seat
+      herself beside him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your sister has told me nothing about you whatsoever,&rdquo; he said
+      deliberately. &ldquo;At the same time, she asked me not to give you her
+      address.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We will talk about that presently,&rdquo; she interrupted. &ldquo;In the first place,
+      tell me why you have left your place.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Dowling discovered,&rdquo; he told her, in a matter-of-fact tone, &ldquo;that I
+      had been doing some business on my own account. He was quite right to
+      disapprove. I have not been back to the office since he found it out.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What sort of business?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The business of the firm is to buy property in undeveloped districts and
+      sell it for building estate,&rdquo; he explained. &ldquo;I have been very successful
+      hitherto in finding sites for their operations. A short time ago, I
+      discovered one so good that I invested all my own savings in buying
+      certain lots, and have an option upon the whole. Mr. Dowling found it out
+      and dismissed me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But it seems most unfair,&rdquo; she declared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not at all,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;In Mr. Dowling's place I should have done the
+      same thing. Every one with his way in life to make must look out for
+      himself. Strictly speaking, what I did was wrong. I wish, however, that I
+      had done it before. One must think of one's self first.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now?&rdquo; she inquired. &ldquo;What are you going to do now?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am going to find a capitalist or float a company to buy the rest of the
+      site,&rdquo; he announced. &ldquo;After that, we must see about building. There is no
+      hurry about that, though. The first thing is to secure the site.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How much money does it require?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;About twelve thousand pounds,&rdquo; he told her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It seems very little,&rdquo; she murmured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The need for money comes afterwards,&rdquo; he explained. &ldquo;We want to drain and
+      plan and build without mortgages. As soon as we are sure of the site, one
+      can think of that. My option only extends for a week or so.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you really think that it is a good speculation?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not think about such matters,&rdquo; he answered, drily. &ldquo;I know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She leaned back in her chair, watching him for several seconds&mdash;admiring
+      him, as a matter of fact. The profound conviction of his words was almost
+      inspiring. In her presence, and she knew that she was a very beautiful
+      woman, he appeared, notwithstanding his absence of any knowledge of her
+      sex and his lack of social status, unmoved, wholly undisturbed. He sat
+      there in perfect naturalness. It did not seem to him even unaccountable
+      that she should be interested in his concerns. He was not conceited or
+      aggressive in any way. His complete self-confidence lacked any militant
+      impulse. He was&mdash;himself, impervious to surroundings, however
+      unusual.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why should I not be your capitalist?&rdquo; she inquired slowly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you as much as twelve thousand pounds that you want to invest?&rdquo; he
+      asked, incredulously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She rose to her feet and moved across to her desk. He sat quite still,
+      watching her without any apparent curiosity. She unlocked a drawer and
+      returned to him with a bankbook in her hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Add that up,&rdquo; she directed, &ldquo;and tell me how much I have.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He drew a lead pencil from his pocket and quickly added up the total.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you have not given any cheques since this was made up,&rdquo; he said
+      calmly, &ldquo;you have a credit balance of thirteen thousand, one hundred and
+      eighteen pounds, nine shillings and fourpence. It is very foolish of you
+      to keep so much money on current account. You are absolutely losing about
+      eight pounds a week.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is foolish of me, I suppose,&rdquo; she admitted, &ldquo;but I have no one to
+      advise me just now. My father knows no more about money than a child, and
+      I have just had quite a large amount paid to me in cash. I only wish we
+      could get Beatrice to share some of this, Mr. Tavernake.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He made no remark. To all appearance, he had never heard of her sister.
+      She came and sat down by his side again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you have me for a partner, Mr. Tavernake?&rdquo; she whispered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then, indeed, for a moment, the impassivity of his features relaxed. He
+      was frankly amazed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You cannot mean this,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;You know nothing about the value of
+      the property, nothing about the affair at all. It is quite impossible.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know what you have told me,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;Is not that enough? You are
+      sure that it will make money and you have just told me how foolish I am to
+      keep so much money in my bank. Very well, then, I give it to you to
+      invest. You must pay me quite a good deal of interest.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But you know nothing about me,&rdquo; he protested, &ldquo;nothing about the
+      property.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;One must trust somebody,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;Why shouldn't I trust you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He was nonplussed. This woman seemed to have an answer for everything.
+      Besides, when once he had got over the unexpectedness of the thing, it
+      was, of course, a wonderful stroke of fortune for him. Then came a whole
+      rush of thoughts, a glow which he thrust back sternly. It would mean
+      seeing her often; it would mean coming here to her rooms; it would mean,
+      perhaps, that she might come to look upon him as a friend. He set his
+      teeth hard. This was folly!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you any idea about terms?&rdquo; he inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed softly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear friend,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;why do you ask me such a question? You know
+      quite well that I am not competent to discuss terms with you. Listen. You
+      are engaged in a speculation to carry out which you want the loan of
+      twelve thousand pounds. Draw up a paper in which you state what my share
+      will be of the profits, what interest I shall get for my money, and give
+      particulars of the property. Then I will take it to my solicitor, if you
+      insist upon it, although I am willing to accept what you think is fair.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must take it to a solicitor, of course,&rdquo; he answered, thoughtfully.
+      &ldquo;I may as well tell you at once, however, that he will probably advise you
+      against investing it in such a way.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That will make no difference at all,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;Solicitors hate all
+      investments, I know, except their horrid mortgages. There are only two
+      conditions that I shall make.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What are they?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The first is that you must not say a word of this to my sister.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake frowned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is a little difficult,&rdquo; he remarked. &ldquo;It happens that your sister
+      knows something about the estate and my plans.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is no need to tell her the name of your partner,&rdquo; Elizabeth said.
+      &ldquo;I want this to be our secret entirely, yours and mine.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her hand fell upon his; he gripped the sides of his chair. Again he was
+      conscious of this bewildering, incomprehensible sensation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And the other condition?&rdquo; he demanded, hoarsely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That you come sometimes and tell me how things are going on.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come here?&rdquo; he repeated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Please! I am very lonely. I shall look forward to your visits.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake rose slowly to his feet. He held out his hand&mdash;she knew
+      better than to attempt to keep him. He made a speech which was for him
+      gallant, but while he made it he looked into her eyes with a directness to
+      which she was indeed unaccustomed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall come,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I should have wanted to come, anyhow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then he turned abruptly away and left the room. It was the first speech of
+      its sort which he had ever made in his life.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XII. TAVERNAKE BLUNDERS
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake felt that he had indeed wandered into an alien world as he took
+      his place the following evening among the little crowd of people who were
+      waiting outside the stage-door of the Atlas Theatre. These were
+      surroundings to which he was totally unaccustomed. Two very handsome
+      motor-cars were drawn up against the curb, and behind them a string of
+      electric broughams and taxicabs, proving conclusively that the young
+      ladies of the Atlas Theatre were popular in other than purely theatrical
+      circles.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The handful of young men by whom Tavernake was surrounded were of a genus
+      unknown to him. They were all dressed exactly alike, they all seemed to
+      breathe the same atmosphere, to exhibit the same indifference towards the
+      other loungers. One or two more privileged passed in through the
+      stage-door and disappeared. Tavernake contented himself with standing on
+      the edge of the curbstone, his hands thrust into the pockets of his dark
+      overcoat, his bowler hat, which was not quite the correct shape, slightly
+      on the back of his head; his serious, stolid face illuminated by the gleam
+      from a neighboring gas lamp.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently, people began to emerge from the door. First of all, the
+      musicians and a little stream of stage hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then a girl's hat appeared in the doorway, and the first of the Atlas
+      young ladies came out, to be claimed at once by her escort. Very soon
+      afterwards, Beatrice arrived. She recognized Tavernake at once and crossed
+      over to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You looked very nice,&rdquo; he said, slowly, as he led the way down the
+      street. &ldquo;Of course, I knew about your singing, but everything else&mdash;seemed
+      such a surprise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For instance?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, I mean your dancing,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;and somehow or other you looked
+      different on the stage.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;'Different' won't do for me,&rdquo; she persisted. &ldquo;I must have something more
+      specific.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, then, you looked much prettier than I thought you were,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      declared, solemnly. &ldquo;You looked exceedingly nice.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You really thought so?&rdquo; she asked, a little doubtfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I really thought so. I thought you looked much nicer than any of the
+      others.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She squeezed his arm affectionately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear Leonard,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;it's so nice to have you think so. Do you know,
+      Mr. Grier actually asked me out to supper.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What impertinence!&rdquo; Tavernake muttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice threw her head back and laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear brother,&rdquo; she protested, &ldquo;it was a tremendous compliment. You
+      must remember that it was entirely through him, too, that I got the
+      engagement. Four pounds a week I am going to have. Just think of it!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Four pounds a week is all very well,&rdquo; Tavernake admitted. &ldquo;It seems a
+      great deal of money to earn like that. But I don't think you ought to go
+      out to supper with any one whom you know so slightly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear prig! You know, you are a shocking prig, Leonard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Am I?&rdquo; he answered, without offence, and with the air of one seriously
+      considering the subject.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course you are. How could you help it, living the sort of life you've
+      led all your days? Never mind, I like you for it. I don't know whether I
+      want to go out to supper with anybody&mdash;I really haven't decided yet&mdash;but
+      if I did, it would certainly be better for me to go with Mr. Grier,
+      because he can do me no end of good at the theatre, if he likes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was silent for several moments. He was conscious of feeling
+      something which he did not altogether understand. He only knew that it
+      involved a strong and unreasonable dislike to Mr. Grier. Then he
+      remembered that he was her brother, that he had the right to speak with
+      authority.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I hope that you will not go out to supper with any one,&rdquo; he said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She began to laugh but checked herself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; she remarked, &ldquo;that sounds very terrible. Shall we take a 'bus? To
+      tell you the truth, I am dying of hunger. We rehearsed for two hours
+      before the performance, and I ate nothing but a sandwich&mdash;I was so
+      excited.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake hesitated a moment&mdash;he certainly was not himself this
+      evening!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Would you like to have some supper at a restaurant,&rdquo; he asked, &ldquo;before we
+      go home?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should love it,&rdquo; she declared, taking his arm as they passed through a
+      stream of people. &ldquo;To tell you the truth, I was so hoping that you would
+      propose it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think,&rdquo; Tavernake said, deliberately, &ldquo;that there is a place a little
+      way along here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They pushed their way down the Strand and entered a restaurant which
+      Tavernake knew only by name. A small table was found for them and Beatrice
+      looked about with delight.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Isn't this jolly!&rdquo; she exclaimed, taking off her gloves. &ldquo;Why, there are
+      five or six of the girls from the theatre here already. There are two,
+      see, at the corner table, and the fair-haired girl&mdash;she is just
+      behind me in the chorus.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake glanced around. The young women whom she pointed out were all
+      escorted by men who were scrupulously attired in evening dress. She seemed
+      to read his thoughts as she laughed at him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You stupid boy,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;You don't suppose that I want to be like
+      them, do you? There are lots of things it's delightful to look on at, and
+      that's all. Isn't this fish good? I love this place.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake looked around him with an interest which he took no pains to
+      conceal. Certainly the little groups of people by whom they were
+      surrounded on every side had the air of finding some zest in life which up
+      to the present, at any rate, had escaped him. They came streaming in,
+      finding friends everywhere, laughing and talking, insisting upon tables in
+      impossible places, calling out greetings to acquaintances across the room,
+      chaffing the maitre d'hotel who was hastening from table to table. The
+      gathering babel of voices was mingled every now and then with the popping
+      of corks, and behind it all were the soft strains of a very seductive
+      little band, perched up in the balcony. Tavernake felt the color mounting
+      into his cheeks. It was true: there was something here which was new to
+      him!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice,&rdquo; he asked her suddenly, &ldquo;have you ever drunk champagne?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed at him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Often, my dear brother,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;Why?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I never have,&rdquo; he confessed. &ldquo;We are going to have some now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She would have checked him but he had summoned a waiter imperiously and
+      given his order.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear Leonard,&rdquo; she protested, &ldquo;this is shocking extravagance.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it?&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;I don't care. Tell me about the theatre. Were they
+      kind to you there? Will you be able to keep your place?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The girls were all much nicer than I expected,&rdquo; she told him, &ldquo;and the
+      musical director said that my voice was much too good for the chorus. Oh,
+      I do hope that they will keep me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They would be idiots if they didn't,&rdquo; he declared, vigorously. &ldquo;You sing
+      better and you dance more gracefully and to me you seemed much prettier
+      than any one else there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed into his eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear brother,&rdquo; she exclaimed, &ldquo;your education is progressing indeed!
+      It is positively the first evening I have ever heard you attempt to make
+      pretty speeches, and you are quite an adept already.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't know about that,&rdquo; he protested. &ldquo;I suppose it never occurred to
+      me before that you were good-looking,&rdquo; he added, examining her critically,
+      &ldquo;or I dare say I should have told you so. You see, one doesn't notice
+      these things in an ordinary way. Lots of other people must have told you
+      so, though.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was never spoilt with compliments,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;You see, I had a
+      beautiful sister.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The words seemed to have escaped her unconsciously. Almost as they passed
+      her lips, her expression changed. She shivered, as though reminded of
+      something unpleasant. Tavernake, however, noticed nothing. For the greater
+      part of the day he had been sedulously fighting against a new and
+      unaccustomed state of mind. He had found his thoughts slipping away, time
+      after time, until he had had to set his teeth and use all his will power
+      to keep his attention concentrated upon his work. And now once more they
+      had escaped, again he felt the strange stir in his blood. The slight flush
+      on his cheek grew suddenly deeper. He looked past the girl opposite to
+      him, out of the restaurant, across the street, into that little
+      sitting-room in the Milan Court. It was Elizabeth who was there in front
+      of him. Again he heard her voice, saw the turn of her head, the slow,
+      delightful curve of the lips, the eyes that looked into his and spoke to
+      him the first strange whispers of a new language. His heart gave a quick
+      throb. He was for the moment transformed, a prisoner no longer, a
+      different person, indeed, from the stolid, well-behaved young man who
+      found himself for the first time in his life in these unaccustomed
+      surroundings. Then Beatrice leaned towards him, her voice brought him back
+      to the present&mdash;not, alas, the voice which at that moment he would
+      have given so much to have heard.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To-night,&rdquo; she murmured, &ldquo;I feel as though we were at the beginning of
+      new things. We must drink a toast.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake filled her glass and his own.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Luck to you in your new profession!&rdquo; he said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And here is one after your own heart, you most curious of men!&rdquo; she
+      exclaimed, a few seconds later. &ldquo;To the undiscovered in life!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He drained his glass and set it down empty.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The undiscovered,&rdquo; he muttered, looking around. &ldquo;It is a very good toast,
+      Beatrice. There are many things of which one might remain ignorant all
+      one's life if one relied wholly upon one's own perceptions.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I believe,&rdquo; she agreed, &ldquo;that if I had not appeared you were in great
+      danger of becoming narrow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sure of it,&rdquo; he answered, &ldquo;but you see you came.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She was thoughtful for a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This reminds me just a little of that first dreary feast of ours,&rdquo; she
+      said. &ldquo;You knew what it was like then to feed a genuinely starving girl.
+      And I was miserable, Leonard. It didn't seem to me that there was any
+      other end save one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You've got over all that nonsense?&rdquo; he asked anxiously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I suppose so,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;You see, I've started life again and
+      one gets stronger. But there are times even now,&rdquo; she added, &ldquo;when I am
+      afraid.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The mirth had suddenly died from her face. She looked older, tired, and
+      careworn. The shadows were back under her eyes; she glanced around almost
+      timorously. He filled her glass.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is foolishness,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Nothing nor anybody can harm you now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Some note in his voice attracted her attention. Strong and square, with
+      hard, forceful face, he sat wholly at his ease among these unfamiliar
+      surroundings, a very tower of refuge, she felt, to the weak. His face was
+      not strikingly intellectual&mdash;she was not sure now about his mouth&mdash;but
+      one seemed to feel that dogged nature, the tireless pains by which he
+      would pursue any aim dear to him. The shadows passed away from her mind.
+      What was dead was gone! It was not reasonable that she should be haunted
+      all her days by the ghosts of other people's sins. The atmosphere of the
+      place, the atmosphere of the last few hours, found its way again into her
+      blood. After all, she was young, the music was sweet, her pulses were
+      throbbing to the tune of this new life. She drank her wine and laughed,
+      her head beating time to the music.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have been sad long enough,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;You and I, my dear serious
+      brother, will embark in earnest now upon the paths of frivolity. Tell me,
+      how did things go to-day?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It flashed into his mind that he had great news, but that it was not for
+      her. About that matter there was still doubt in his mind, but he could not
+      speak of it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have had an offer,&rdquo; he said guardedly. &ldquo;I cannot say much about it at
+      present, for nothing is certain, but I am sure that I shall be able to
+      raise the money somehow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His tone was calm and confident. There was no self-assurance or bluster
+      about it, and yet it was convincing. She looked at him curiously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are a very positive person, Leonard,&rdquo; she remarked. &ldquo;You must have
+      great faith in yourself, I think.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He considered the question for a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps I have,&rdquo; he admitted. &ldquo;I do not think that there is any other way
+      to succeed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The atmosphere of the place was becoming now almost languorous. The band
+      had ceased to play; little parties of men and women were standing about,
+      bidding one another goodnight. The lamps had been lowered, and in the
+      gloom the voices and laughter seemed to have become lower and more
+      insinuating; the lights in the eyes of the women, as they passed down the
+      room on their way out, softer and more irresistible.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose we must go,&rdquo; she said reluctantly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake paid his bill and they turned into the street. She took his arm
+      and they turned westward. Even out here, the atmosphere of the restaurant
+      appeared to have found its way. The soberness of life, its harder and more
+      practical side, was for the moment obscured. It was not the daytime crowd,
+      this, whose footsteps pressed the pavements. The careworn faces of the
+      money-seekers had vanished. The men and women to whom life was something
+      of a struggle had sought their homes&mdash;resting, perhaps, before they
+      took up their labors again. Every moment taxicabs and motor-cars whirled
+      by, flashing upon the night a momentary impression of men in evening
+      dress, of women in soft garments with jewels in their hair. The spirit of
+      pleasure seemed to have crept into the atmosphere. Even the poorer people
+      whom they passed in the street, were laughing or singing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake stopped short.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To-night,&rdquo; he declared, &ldquo;is not the night for omnibuses. We are going to
+      have a taxicab. I know that you are tired.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should love it,&rdquo; she admitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They hailed one and drove off. Beatrice leaned back among the cushions and
+      closed her eyes, her ungloved hand rested almost caressingly upon his. He
+      leaned forward. There were new things in the world&mdash;he was sure of it
+      now, sure though they were coming to him through the mists, coming to him
+      so vaguely that even while he obeyed he did not understand. Her full, soft
+      lips were slightly parted; her heavily-fringed eyelids closed; her deep
+      brown hair, which had escaped bounds a little, drooping over her ear. His
+      fingers suddenly clasped hers tightly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice!&rdquo; he whispered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She sat up with a start, her eyes questioning his, the breath coming
+      quickly through her parted lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Once you asked me to kiss you, Beatrice,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;To-night&mdash;I am
+      going to.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She made no attempt to repulse him. He took her in his arms and kissed
+      her. Even in that moment he knew that he had made a mistake. Nevertheless,
+      he kissed her again and again, crushing her lips against his.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Please let me go, Leonard,&rdquo; she begged at last.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He obeyed at once. He understood quite well that some strange thing had
+      happened. It seemed to him during those next few minutes that everything
+      which had passed that night was a dream, that this vivid picture of a life
+      more intense, making larger demands upon the senses than anything he had
+      yet experienced, was a mirage, a thing which would live only in his
+      memory, a life in which he could never take any part. He had blundered; he
+      had come into a new world and he had blundered. A sense of guilt was upon
+      him. He had a sudden wild desire to cry out that it was Elizabeth whom he
+      had kissed. Beatrice was sitting upright in her place, her head turned a
+      little away from him. He felt that she was expecting him to speak&mdash;that
+      there were inevitable words which he should say. His silence was a
+      confession. He would have lied but the seal was upon his lips. So the
+      moment passed, and Tavernake had taken another step forward towards his
+      destiny! ...
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      As he helped her out of the cab, her fingers tightened for a moment upon
+      his hand. She patted it gently as she passed out before him into the
+      house, leaving the door open. When he had paid the cabman and followed,
+      she had disappeared. He looked into the sitting-room; it was empty.
+      Overhead, he could hear her footsteps as she ascended to her room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XIII. AN EVENING CALL
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      In the morning, when he left for the city, she was not down. When he came
+      home in the evening, she was gone. Without removing his hat or overcoat,
+      he took the letter which he found propped up on the mantelpiece and
+      addressed to him to the window and read it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      DEAR BROTHER LEONARD,&mdash;It wasn't your fault and I don't think it was
+      mine. If either of us is to blame, it is certainly I, for though you are
+      such a clever and ambitious young person, you really know very little
+      indeed of the world,&mdash;not so much, I think, as I do. I am going to
+      stay for a few nights, at any rate, with one of the girls at the theatre,
+      who I know wants some one to share her tiny flat with her. Afterwards, I
+      shall see.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Don't throw this letter in the fire and don't think me ungrateful. I shall
+      never forget what you did for me. How could I?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      I will send you my address as soon as I am sure of it, or you can always
+      write me to the theatre.
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+                Good-bye, dear Leonard,
+                                        YOUR SISTER BEATRICE.
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake looked from the sheet of notepaper out across the gray square.
+      He knew that he was very angry, angry though he deliberately folded the
+      letter up and placed it in his pocket, angry though he took off his
+      overcoat and hung it up with his usual care; but his anger was with
+      himself. He had blundered badly. This episode of his life was one which he
+      had better forget. It was absolutely out of harmony with all his ideas. He
+      told himself that he was glad Beatrice was gone. Housekeeping with an
+      imaginary sister in this practical world was an absurdity. Sooner or later
+      it must have come to an end. Better now, before it had gone too far&mdash;better
+      now, much better! All the same, he knew that he was going to be very
+      lonely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He rang the bell for the woman who waited upon them, and whom he seldom
+      saw, for Beatrice herself had supplied their immediate wants. He found
+      some dinner ready, which he ate with absolute unconsciousness. Then he
+      threw himself fiercely into his work. It was all very well for the first
+      hour or so, but as ten o'clock grew near he began to find a curious
+      difficulty in keeping his attention fixed upon those calculations. The
+      matter of average rentals, percentage upon capital&mdash;things which but
+      yesterday he had found fascinating&mdash;seemed suddenly irksome. He could
+      fix his attention upon nothing. At last he pushed his papers away, put on
+      his hat and coat, and walked into the street.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At the Milan Court, the hall-porter received his inquiry for Elizabeth
+      with an air of faint but well-bred surprise. Tavernake, in those days, was
+      a person exceedingly difficult to place. His clothes so obviously denoted
+      the station in life which he really occupied, while the slight
+      imperiousness of his manner, his absolute freedom from any sort of
+      nervousness or awkwardness, seemed to bespeak a consideration which those
+      who had to deal with him as a stranger found sometimes a little puzzling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mrs. Wenham Gardner is in her rooms, I believe, sir,&rdquo; the man said. &ldquo;If
+      you will wait for a moment, I will inquire.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He disappeared into his office, thrusting his head out, a moment or two
+      later, with the telephone receiver still in his hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mrs. Gardner would like the name again, sir, please,&rdquo; he remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake repeated it firmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You might say,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;that I shall not detain her for more than a
+      few minutes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man disappeared once more. When he returned, he indicated the lift to
+      Tavernake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you will go up to the fifth floor, sir,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;Mrs. Gardner will
+      see you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake found his courage almost leaving him as he knocked at the door
+      of her rooms. Her French maid ushered him into the little sitting-room,
+      where, to his dismay, he found three men, one sitting on the table, the
+      other two in easy-chairs. Elizabeth, in a dress of pale blue satin, was
+      standing before the mirror. She turned round as Tavernake entered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake shall decide!&rdquo; she exclaimed, waving her hand to him. &ldquo;Mr.
+      Tavernake, there is a difference of opinion about my earrings. Major Post
+      here,&rdquo;&mdash;she indicated a distinguished-looking elderly gentleman, with
+      carefully trimmed beard and moustache, and an eyeglass attached to a thin
+      band of black ribbon&mdash;&ldquo;Major Post wants me to wear turquoises. I
+      prefer my pearls. Mr. Crease half agrees with me, but as he never agrees
+      with any one, on principle, he hates to say so. Mr. Faulkes is wavering.
+      You shall decide; you, I know, are one of those people who never waver.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should wear the pearls,&rdquo; Tavernake said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth made them a little courtesy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You see, my dear friends,&rdquo; she declared, &ldquo;you have to come to England,
+      after all, to find a man who knows his own mind and speaks it without
+      fear. The pearls it shall be.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It may be decision,&rdquo; Crease drawled, speaking with a slight American
+      accent, &ldquo;or it may be gallantry. Mr. Tavernake knew your own choice.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The last word, as usual,&rdquo; she sighed. &ldquo;Now, if you good people will
+      kindly go on downstairs, I will join you in a few minutes. Mr. Tavernake
+      is my man of business and I am sure he has something to say to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She dismissed them all pleasantly. As soon as the door was closed she
+      turned to Tavernake. Her manner seemed to become a shade less gracious.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't know why I came,&rdquo; Tavernake confessed bluntly. &ldquo;I was restless
+      and I wanted to see you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him for a moment and then she laughed. Tavernake felt a
+      sense of relief; at least she was not angry.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, you strangest of mortals!&rdquo; she exclaimed, holding out her hands.
+      &ldquo;Well, you see me&mdash;in one of my most becoming gowns, too. What do you
+      think of the fit?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She swept round and faced him again with an expectant look. Tavernake, who
+      knew nothing of women's fashions, still realized the superbness of that
+      one unbroken line.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I can't think how you can move a step in it,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;but you look&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He paused. It was as though he had lost his breath. Then he set his teeth
+      and finished.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You look beautiful,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;I suppose you know that. I suppose
+      they've all been telling you so.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They haven't all your courage, dear Briton,&rdquo; she remarked, &ldquo;and if they
+      did tell me so, I am not sure that I should be convinced. You see, most of
+      my friends have lived so long and lived so quickly that they have learned
+      to play with words until one never knows whether the things they speak
+      come from their hearts. With you it is different.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; Tavernake admitted, &ldquo;with me it is different!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She glanced at the clock.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;you have seen me and I am glad to have seen you, and
+      you may kiss my fingers if you like, and then you must run away. I am
+      engaged to have supper with my friends downstairs.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He raised her fingers clumsily enough to his lips and kept them there for
+      a moment. When he let them go, she wrung them as though in pain, and
+      looked at him. She turned abruptly away. In a sense she was disappointed.
+      After all, he was an easy victim!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Elise,&rdquo; she called out, &ldquo;my cloak.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her maid came hurrying from the next room. Elizabeth turned towards her,
+      holding out her shoulders. She nodded to Tavernake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know the way down, Mr. Tavernake? I shall see you again soon, sha'n't
+      I? Good-night!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She scarcely glanced at him as she sent him away, yet Tavernake walked on
+      air.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XIV. A WARNING FROM Mr. PRITCHARD
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake hesitated for a moment under the portico of the Milan Court,
+      looking out at the rain which had suddenly commenced to descend. He
+      scarcely noticed that he had a companion until the man who was standing by
+      his side addressed him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say, your name is Tavernake, isn't it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake, who had been on the point of striding away, turned sharply
+      around. The man who had spoken to him was wearing morning clothes of dark
+      gray tweed and a soft Homburg hat. His complexion was a little sallow and
+      he was clean-shaven except for a slight black moustache. He was smoking a
+      black cigar and his accent was transatlantic. Something about his
+      appearance struck Tavernake as being vaguely familiar, but he could not at
+      first recall where he had seen him before.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is my name, certainly,&rdquo; Tavernake admitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am going to ask you a somewhat impertinent question,&rdquo; his neighbor
+      remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose you can ask it,&rdquo; Tavernake rejoined. &ldquo;I am not obliged to
+      answer, am I?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;that's honest, at any rate. Are you in a hurry for a few
+      minutes?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am in no particular hurry,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;What do you want?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A few nights ago,&rdquo; the stranger continued, lowering his voice a little,
+      &ldquo;I met you with a young lady whose appearance, for some reason which we
+      needn't go into, interested me. To-night I happened to overhear you
+      inquiring, only a few minutes ago, for the sister of the same young lady.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What you heard doesn't concern me in the least,&rdquo; Tavernake retorted. &ldquo;I
+      should say that you had no business to listen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His companion smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; he declared, &ldquo;I have always heard a good deal about British
+      frankness, and it seems to me that I'm getting some. Anyway, I'll tell you
+      where I come in. I am interested in Mrs. Wenham Gardner. I am interested,
+      also, in her sister, whom I think you know&mdash;Miss Beatrice Franklin,
+      not Miss Tavernake!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake made no immediate reply. The man was an American, without a
+      doubt. Perhaps he knew something of Beatrice. Perhaps this was one of the
+      friends of that former life concerning which she had told him nothing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are not, by any chance, proposing,&rdquo; Tavernake said at last, &ldquo;to
+      discuss either of these ladies with me? I do not know you or what your
+      business may be. In any case, I am going now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The other laid his hand on Tavernake's shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You'll be soaked to the skin,&rdquo; he protested. &ldquo;I want you to come into the
+      smoking-room here with me for a few minutes. We will have a drink together
+      and a little conversation, if you don't mind.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I do mind,&rdquo; Tavernake declared. &ldquo;I don't know who you are and I don't
+      want to know you, and I am not going to talk about Mrs. Gardner, or any
+      other lady of my acquaintance, with strangers. Good-night!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;One moment, please, Mr. Tavernake.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake hesitated. There was something curiously compelling in the
+      other's smooth, distinct voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I'd like you to take this card,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I told you my name before but
+      I expect you've forgotten it,&mdash;Pritchard&mdash;Sam Pritchard. Ever
+      heard of me before?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not to have heard of me in the United States,&rdquo; the other continued, with
+      a grim smile, &ldquo;would be a tribute to your respectability. Most of the
+      crooks who find their way over here know of Sam Pritchard. I am a
+      detective and I come from New York.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake turned and looked the man over. There was something convincing
+      about his tone and appearance. It did not occur to him to doubt for a
+      moment a word of this stranger's story.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You haven't anything against her&mdash;against either of them?&rdquo; he asked,
+      quickly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing directly,&rdquo; the detective answered. &ldquo;All the same, you have been
+      calling upon Mrs. Wenham Gardner this evening, and if you are a friend of
+      hers I think that you had better come along with me and have that talk.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will come,&rdquo; Tavernake agreed, &ldquo;but I come as a listener. Remember that
+      I have nothing to tell you. So far as you are concerned, I do not know
+      either of those ladies.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I guess we'll let it go at that. All the same, if you
+      don't mind, we'll talk. Come this way and we'll get to the smoking-room
+      through the hotel. It's under cover.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake moved restlessly in his chair.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What the devil is all this talk about crooks!&rdquo; he exclaimed impatiently.
+      &ldquo;I didn't come here to listen to this sort of thing. I am not sure that I
+      believe a word of what you say.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why should you,&rdquo; Pritchard remarked, &ldquo;without proof? Look here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He drew a leather case from his pocket and spread it out. There were a
+      dozen photographs there of men in prison attire. The detective pointed to
+      one, and with a little shiver Tavernake recognized the face of the man who
+      had been sitting at the right hand of Elizabeth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You don't mean to say,&rdquo; he faltered, &ldquo;that Mrs. Gardner&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The detective folded up his case and replaced it in his pocket.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;we haven't any photographs of your lady friend there, nor
+      of her sister. And yet, it may not be so far off.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you are trying to fasten anything upon those ladies,&mdash;&rdquo; Tavernake
+      began, threateningly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The detective laughed and patted him on the shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It isn't my business to try and fasten things upon any one,&rdquo; he
+      interrupted. &ldquo;At the same time, you seem to be a friend of Mrs. Wenham
+      Gardner, and it is just as well that some one should warn her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Warn her of what?&rdquo; Tavernake asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The detective looked at his cigar meditatively.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Make her understand that there is trouble ahead,&rdquo; he replied.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake sipped his whiskey and soda and lit a cigarette. Then he turned
+      in his chair and looked thoughtfully at his companion. Pritchard was a
+      striking-looking man, with hard, clean-cut features&mdash;a man of
+      determination.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Pritchard, I am a clerk in an estate office. My people were
+      work-people and I am trying to better myself in the world. I haven't
+      learned how to beat about a subject, but I have learned a little of the
+      world, and I know that people such as you are not in the habit of doing
+      things without a reason. Why the devil have you brought me in here to talk
+      about Mrs. Gardner and her sister? If you've anything to say, why don't
+      you go to Mrs. Gardner herself and say it? Why do you come and talk to
+      strangers about their affairs? I am here listening to you, but I tell you
+      straight I don't like it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say, I am not sure that I don't like that sort of talk,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;I
+      know all about you, young man. You're in Dowling &amp; Spence's office and
+      you've got to quit. You've got an estate you want financing. Miss Beatrice
+      Franklin was living under your roof&mdash;as your sister, I understand&mdash;until
+      yesterday, and Mrs. Gardner, for some reason of her own, seems to be doing
+      her best to add you to the list of her admirers. I am not sure what it all
+      means but I could make a pretty good guess. Here's my point, though.
+      You're right. I didn't bring you here for your health. I brought you here
+      because you can do me a service and yourself one at the same time, and
+      you'll be doing no one any harm, nobody you care about, anyway. I have no
+      grudge against Miss Beatrice. I'd just as soon she kept out of the trouble
+      that's coming.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is this service?&rdquo; Tavernake asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard for the moment evaded the point.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I dare say you can understand, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;that in my
+      profession one has to sometimes go a long way round to get a man or a
+      woman just where you want them. Now we merely glanced at that table as we
+      came in, and I can tell you this for gospel truth&mdash;there isn't one of
+      that crowd that I couldn't, if I liked, haul back to New York on some
+      charge or another. You wonder why I don't do it. I'll tell you. It's
+      because I am waiting&mdash;waiting until I can bring home something more
+      serious, something that will keep them out of the way for just as long as
+      possible. Do you follow me, Mr. Tavernake?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose I do,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, doubtfully. &ldquo;You are only talking of
+      the men, of course?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My young friend,&rdquo; he agreed, &ldquo;I am only talking of the men. At the same
+      time, I guess I'm not betraying any confidence, or telling you anything
+      that Mrs. Wenham Gardner doesn't know herself, when I say that she's doing
+      her best to qualify for a similar position.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mean that she is doing something against the law!&rdquo; Tavernake
+      exclaimed, indignantly. &ldquo;I don't believe it for a moment. If she is
+      associating with these people, it's because she doesn't know who they
+      are.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard flicked the ash from his cigar.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;every man has a right to his own opinions, and for my
+      part I like to hear any one stick up for his friends. It makes no odds to
+      me. However, here are a few facts I am going to bring before you. Four
+      months ago, one of the turns at a vaudeville show down Broadway consisted
+      of a performance by a Professor Franklin and his two daughters, Elizabeth
+      and Beatrice. The professor hypnotized, told fortunes, felt heads, and the
+      usual rigmarole. Beatrice sang, Elizabeth danced. People came to see the
+      show, not because it was any good but because the girls, even in New York,
+      were beautiful.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A music-hall in New York!&rdquo; Tavernake muttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The detective nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Among the young bloods of the city,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;were two brothers, as
+      much alike as twins, although they aren't twins, whose names were Wenham
+      and Jerry Gardner. There's nothing in fast life which those young men
+      haven't tried. Between them, I should say they represented everything that
+      was known of debauchery and dissipation. The eldest can't be more than
+      twenty-seven to-day, but if you were to see them in the morning, either of
+      them, before they had been massaged and galvanized into life, you'd think
+      they were little old men, with just strength enough left to crawl about.
+      Well, to cut a long story short, both of them fell in love with
+      Elizabeth.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Brutes!&rdquo; Tavernake interjected.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I guess they found Miss Elizabeth a pretty tough nut to crack,&rdquo; the
+      detective went on. &ldquo;Anyhow, you know what her price was from her name,
+      which is hers right enough. Wenham, who was a year younger than his
+      brother, was the first to bid it. Three months ago, Mr. and Mrs. Wenham
+      Gardner, Miss Beatrice, and the devoted father left New York in the
+      Lusitania and came to London.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where is this Wenham Gardner, then?&rdquo; Tavernake demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard took his cigar case from his pocket and selected another cigar.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say, that's where you strike the nail right on the head,&rdquo; he remarked.
+      &ldquo;Where is this Wenham Gardner?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't mind telling you, Mr. Tavernake, that to discover his whereabouts
+      is exactly what I am over on this side for. I have a commission from the
+      family to find out, and a blank cheque to do it with.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you mean that he has disappeared, then?&rdquo; asked Tavernake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Off the face of the earth, sir,&rdquo; Pritchard replied. &ldquo;Something like two
+      months ago, the young married couple, with Miss Beatrice, started for a
+      holiday tour somewhere down in the west of England. A few days after they
+      started, Miss Beatrice comes back to London alone. She goes to a
+      boarding-house, is practically penniless, but she has shaken her sister&mdash;has,
+      I believe, never spoken with her since. A little later, Elizabeth alone
+      turns up in London. She has plenty of money, more money than she has ever
+      had the control of before in her life, but no husband.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So far, I don't see anything remarkable about that,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      interposed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That may or may not be,&rdquo; Pritchard answered, drily. &ldquo;This creature,
+      Wenham Gardner&mdash;I hate to call him a man&mdash;was her abject slave&mdash;up
+      till the time they reached London, at any rate. He would never have quit
+      of his own accord. He stopped quite suddenly communicating with all his
+      friends. None of their cables, even, were answered.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why don't you go and ask Mrs. Gardner where he is?&rdquo; Tavernake demanded
+      bluntly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have already,&rdquo; Pritchard declared, &ldquo;taken that liberty. With tears in
+      her eyes, she assured me that after some slight quarrel, in which she
+      admits that she was the one to blame, her husband walked out of the house
+      where they were staying, and she has not seen him since. She was quite
+      ready with all the particulars, and even implored me to help find him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I cannot imagine,&rdquo; Tavernake said, &ldquo;why any one should disbelieve her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The detective smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There are a few little outside circumstances,&rdquo; he remarked, looking at
+      the ash of his cigar. &ldquo;In the first place, how do you suppose that this
+      young Wenham Gardner spent the last week of his stay in New York?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How should I know?&rdquo; Tavernake replied, impatiently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By realizing every cent of his property on which he could lay his hands,&rdquo;
+       the detective continued. &ldquo;It isn't at any time an easy business, and the
+      Gardner interest is spread out in many directions, but he must have sailed
+      with something like forty thousand pounds in hard cash. A suspicious
+      person might presume that that forty thousand pounds has found its way to
+      the stronger of the combination.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Anything else?&rdquo; Tavernake asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I won't worry you much more,&rdquo; the detective answered. &ldquo;There are a few
+      other circumstances which seem to need explanation, but they can wait.
+      There is one serious one, however, and that is where you come in.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Indeed!&rdquo; Tavernake remarked. &ldquo;I was hoping you would come to that soon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The two sisters, Beatrice and Elizabeth, have been together ever since we
+      can learn anything of their history. Those people who don't understand the
+      disappearance of Wenham Gardner would like to know why they quarreled and
+      parted, why Beatrice is keeping away from her sister in this strange
+      manner. I personally, too, should like to know from Miss Beatrice when she
+      last saw Wenham Gardner alive.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You want me to ask Miss Beatrice these things?&rdquo; Tavernake demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It might come better from you,&rdquo; Pritchard admitted. &ldquo;I have written her
+      to the theatre but naturally she has not replied.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake looked curiously at his companion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you really suppose,&rdquo; he asked, &ldquo;that, even granted there were any
+      unusual circumstances in connection with that quarrel&mdash;do you
+      seriously suppose that Beatrice would give her sister away?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The detective sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No doubt, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;these young ladies are friends of
+      yours, and perhaps for that reason you are a little prejudiced in their
+      favor. Their whole bringing-up and associations, however, have certainly
+      not been of a strict order. I cannot help thinking that persuasion might
+      be brought to bear upon Miss Beatrice, that it might be pointed out to her
+      that a true story is the safest.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, if you've finished,&rdquo; Tavernake declared, &ldquo;I'd like to tell you what
+      I think of your story. I think it's all d&mdash;d silly nonsense! This
+      Wenham Gardner, by your own saying, was half mad. There was a quarrel and
+      he's gone off to Paris or somewhere. As to your suggestions about Mrs.
+      Gardner, I think they're infamous.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard was unmoved by his companion's warmth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, that's all right, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; he affirmed. &ldquo;I can quite
+      understand your feeling like that just at first. You see, I've been among
+      crime and criminals all my days, and I learn to look for a certain set of
+      motives when a thing of this sort happens. You've been brought up among
+      honest folk, who go the straightforward way about life, and naturally you
+      look at the same matter from a different point of view. But you and I have
+      got to talk this out. I want you to understand that those very charming
+      young ladies are not quite the class of young women whom you know anything
+      about. Mind you, I haven't a word to say against Miss Beatrice. I dare say
+      she's as straight as they make 'em. But&mdash;you must take another
+      whiskey and soda, Mr. Tavernake. Now, I insist upon it. Tim, come right
+      over here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mr. Pritchard seemed to have forgotten what he was talking about. The room
+      had been suddenly invaded. The whole of the little supper party, whose
+      individual members he had pointed out to his companion, came trooping into
+      the room. They were all apparently on the best of terms with themselves,
+      and they all seemed to make a point of absolutely ignoring Pritchard's
+      presence. Elizabeth was the one exception. She was carrying a tiny Chinese
+      spaniel under one arm; with the fingers of her other hand she held a
+      tortoise-shell mounted monocle to her eye, and stared directly at the two
+      men. Presently she came languidly across the room to them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear me,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I had no idea that even your wide circle of
+      acquaintances, Mr. Pritchard, included my friend, Mr. Tavernake.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The two men rose to their feet. Tavernake felt confused and angry. It was
+      as though he had been playing the traitor in listening, even for a moment,
+      to these stories.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Pritchard introduced himself to me only a few minutes ago,&rdquo; he
+      declared. &ldquo;He brought me in here and I have been listening to a lot of
+      rubbish from him of which I don't believe a single word.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She flashed a wonderful smile upon him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Pritchard is so very censorious,&rdquo; she murmured. &ldquo;He takes such a very
+      low view of human nature. After all, though, I suppose we must not blame
+      him. I think that as men and women we do not exist to him. We are simply
+      the pegs by means of which he can climb a little higher in the esteem of
+      his employers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard took up his soft hat and stick.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mrs. Gardner,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I will confess that I have been wasting my time
+      with this young man. You are a trifle severe upon me. You may find, and
+      before long, that I am your best friend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed delightfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear Mr. Pritchard,&rdquo; she exclaimed, &ldquo;it is a strange thought, that! If
+      only I dared hope that some day it might come true!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;More unlikely things, madam, are happening every hour,&rdquo; the detective
+      remarked. &ldquo;The world&mdash;our little corner of it, at any rate&mdash;is
+      full of anomalies. There might even come a time to any one of us three
+      when liberty was more dangerous than the prison cell itself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He nodded carelessly to Tavernake, and with a bow to Elizabeth turned and
+      left the room. Elizabeth remained as though turned to stone, looking after
+      him as he descended the stairs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The man is a fool!&rdquo; Tavernake cried, roughly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth shook her head and sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is something far more ineffective,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;He is just a little too
+      clever.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER, XV. GENERAL DISCONTENT
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth did not at once rejoin her friends. Instead, she sank on to the
+      low settee close to where she had been standing, and drew Tavernake down
+      to her side. She waved her hand across at the others, who were calling for
+      her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In a moment, dear people,&rdquo; she said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then she leaned back among the cushions and laughed at her companion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she asked, &ldquo;don't you feel that you have stepped
+      into a sort of modern Arabian Nights?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I know Mr. Pritchard's weakness,&rdquo; she continued. &ldquo;He loves to throw a
+      glamour around everything he says or does. Because he honors me by
+      interesting himself in my concerns, he has probably told you all sorts of
+      wonderful things about me and my friends. A very ingenious romancer, Mr.
+      Pritchard, you know. Confess, now, didn't he tell you some stories about
+      us?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She might have spared herself the trouble of beating about the bush. There
+      was no hesitation about Tavernake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He said that your friends were every one of them criminals,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      declared, &ldquo;and he admitted that he was working hard at the present moment
+      to discover that you were one, too.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed softly but heartily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wonder what was his object,&rdquo; she remarked, &ldquo;in taking you into his
+      confidence.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He happened to know,&rdquo; Tavernake explained, &ldquo;that I was intimate with your
+      sister. He wanted me to ask Beatrice a certain question.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth laughed no more. She looked steadfastly into his eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And that question?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He wanted me to ask Beatrice why she left you and hid herself in London.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She tried to smile but not very successfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;According to his story,&rdquo; Tavernake continued, &ldquo;you and Beatrice and your
+      husband were away together somewhere in the country. Something happened
+      there, something which resulted in the disappearance of your husband.
+      Beatrice came back alone and has not been near you since. Soon afterwards,
+      you, too, came back alone. Mr. Gardner has not been seen or heard of.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth was bending over her dog, but even Tavernake, unobservant though
+      he was, could see that she was shaken.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pritchard is a clever man, generally,&rdquo; she remarked, &ldquo;diabolically
+      clever. Why has he told you all this, I wonder? He must have known that
+      you would probably repeat it to me. Why does he want to show me his hand?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have no idea,&rdquo; Tavernake replied. &ldquo;These matters are all beyond me.
+      They do not concern me in any way. I am not keeping you from your friends?
+      Please send me away when you like.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't go just yet,&rdquo; she begged. &ldquo;Sit with me for a moment. Can't you
+      see,&rdquo; she added, whispering, &ldquo;that I have had a shock? Sit with me. I
+      can't go back to those others just yet.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake did as he was bidden. The woman at his side was still caressing
+      the little animal she carried. Watching her, however, Tavernake could see
+      that her bosom was rising and falling quickly. There was an unnatural
+      pallor in her cheeks, a terrified gleam in her eyes. Nevertheless, these
+      things passed. In a very few seconds she was herself again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;it is not often that I give way. The only time I am
+      ever afraid is when there is something which I do not understand. I do not
+      understand Mr. Pritchard to-night. I know that he is my enemy. I cannot
+      imagine why he should talk to you. He must have known that you would
+      repeat all he said. It is not like him. Tell me, Mr. Tavernake, you have
+      heard all sorts of things about me. Do you believe them? Do you believe&mdash;it's
+      rather a horrible thing to ask, isn't it?&rdquo; she went on hurriedly,&mdash;&ldquo;do
+      you believe that I made away with my husband?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You surely do not need to ask me that question,&rdquo; Tavernake answered,
+      fervently. &ldquo;I should believe your word, whatever you told me. I should not
+      believe that you could do anything wrong.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her hand touched his for a moment and he was repaid.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't think too well of me,&rdquo; she begged. &ldquo;I don't want to disappoint
+      you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Some one pushed open the swing doors and she started nervously. It was
+      only a waiter who passed through into the bar.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What I think of you,&rdquo; Tavernake said slowly, &ldquo;nothing could alter, but
+      because I am stupid, I suppose, there is quite a good deal that I cannot
+      understand. I cannot understand, for instance, why they should suspect you
+      of having anything to do with your husband's disappearance. You can prove
+      where you were when he left you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Quite easily,&rdquo; she answered, &ldquo;only, unfortunately, no one seems to have
+      seen him go. He timed his departure so cunningly that he apparently
+      vanished into thin air. Even then,&rdquo; she continued, &ldquo;but for one thing I
+      don't suppose that any one would have had suspicions. I dare say Mr.
+      Pritchard told you that before we left New York my husband sold out some
+      of his property and brought it over to Europe with him in cash. We had
+      both determined that we would live abroad and have nothing more to do with
+      America. It was not I who persuaded him to do this. It made no difference
+      to me. If he had run away and left me, the courts would have given me
+      money. If he had died and I had been a widow, he would have left me his
+      property. But simply because there was all this money in our hands, and
+      because he disappeared, his people and this man Pritchard suspect me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is wicked,&rdquo; he muttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned slowly towards him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;do you know that you can help me very much
+      indeed?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I only wish I could,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;Try me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can't you see,&rdquo; she went on, &ldquo;that the great thing against me is that
+      Beatrice left me suddenly when we were on that wretched expedition, and
+      came back alone? She is in London, I know, quite close to me, and still
+      she hides. Pritchard asks himself why. Mr. Tavernake, go and tell her what
+      people are saying, go and tell her everything that has happened, let her
+      understand that her keeping away is doing me a terrible injury, beg her to
+      come and let people see that we are reconciled, and warn her, too, against
+      Pritchard. Will you do this for me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course I will,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I will see her to-morrow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth drew a little sigh of relief.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you'll let me know what she says?&rdquo; she asked, rising.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall be only too glad to,&rdquo; Tavernake assured her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good-night!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked up into his face with a smile which had turned the heads of
+      hardened stagers in New York. No wonder that Tavernake felt his heart beat
+      against his ribs! He took her hands and held them for a moment. Then he
+      turned abruptly away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good-night!&rdquo; he said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He disappeared through the swing doors. She strolled across the room to
+      where her friends were sitting in a circle, laughing and talking. Her
+      father, who had just come in and joined them, gripped her by the arm as
+      she sat down.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What does it mean?&rdquo; he demanded, with shaking voice. &ldquo;Did you see that he
+      was there with Pritchard&mdash;your young man&mdash;that wretched estate
+      agent's clerk? I tell you that Pritchard was pumping him for all he was
+      worth.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear father,&rdquo; she whispered, coldly, &ldquo;don't be melodramatic. You give
+      yourself away the whole time. Go to bed if you can't behave like a man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The lights had been turned low, there was no one else in the room. The
+      little old gentleman with the eyeglass leaned forward.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you any notion, my dear Elizabeth,&rdquo; he asked, &ldquo;why our friend
+      Pritchard is so much in evidence just at present?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not on account of you, Jimmy,&rdquo; she answered, &ldquo;nor of any one else here,
+      in fact. The truth is he has conceived a violent admiration for me&mdash;an
+      admiration so pronounced, indeed, that he hates to let me out of his
+      sight.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They all laughed uproariously. Then Walter Crease, the journalist, leaned
+      forward,&mdash;a man with a long, narrow face, yellow-stained fingers, and
+      hollow cheekbones. He glanced around the room before he spoke, and his
+      voice sounded like a hoarse whisper.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;See here,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;seems to me Pritchard is getting mighty awkward. He
+      hasn't got his posse around him in this country, anyway.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a dead silence for several seconds. Then the little old
+      gentleman nodded solemnly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am a trifle tired of Pritchard myself,&rdquo; he admitted, &ldquo;and he certainly
+      knows too much. He carries too much in his head to go around safely.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The eyes of Elizabeth were bright.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He treats us like children,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;To-night he has told the
+      whole of my affairs to a perfect stranger. It is intolerable!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The little party broke up soon after. Only Walter Crease and the man
+      called Jimmy Post were left talking, and they retired into the
+      window-seat, whispering together.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake, with his hands thrust deep in his overcoat pockets, left the
+      hotel and strode along the Strand. Some fancy seized him before he had
+      gone many paces, and turning abruptly to the left he descended to the
+      Embankment. He made his way to the very seat upon which he had sat once
+      before with Beatrice. With folded arms he leaned back in the corner,
+      looking out across the river, at the curving line of lights, at the black,
+      turgid waters, the slowly-moving hulk of a barge on its way down the
+      stream. It was a new thing, this, for him to have to accuse himself of
+      folly, of weakness. For the last few days he had moved in a mist of
+      uncertainty, setting his heel upon all reflection, avoiding every issue.
+      To-night he could escape those accusing thoughts no longer; to-night he
+      was more than ever bitter with himself. What folly was this which had
+      sprung up in his life&mdash;folly colossal, unimaginable, as unexpected as
+      though it had fallen a thunderbolt from the skies! What had happened to
+      change him so completely!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His thought traveled back to the boarding-house. It was there that the
+      thing had begun. Before that night upon the roof, the finger-posts which
+      he had set up with such care and deliberation along the road which led
+      towards his coveted goal, had seemed to him to point with unfaltering
+      directness towards everything in life worthy of consideration. To-night
+      they were only dreary phantasms, marking time across a miserable plain.
+      Perhaps, after all, there had been something in his nature, some rebel
+      thing, intolerable yet to be reckoned with, which had been first born of
+      that fateful curiosity of his. It had leapt up so suddenly, sprung with
+      such scanty notice into strenuous and insistent life. Yet what place had
+      it there? He must fight against it, root it out with both hands. What was
+      this world of intrigue, this criminal, undesirable world, to him? His
+      common sense forbade him altogether to dissociate Elizabeth from her
+      friends, from her surroundings. She was the secret of the pain which was
+      tearing at his heartstrings, of all the excitement, the joy, the passion
+      which had swept like a full flood across the level way of his life, which
+      had set him drifting among the unknown seas. Yet it was Beatrice who had
+      brought this upon him. If she had never left, if he had not tasted the
+      horrors of this new loneliness, he might have been able to struggle on. He
+      missed her, missed her diabolically. The other things, marvelous though
+      they were, had been more or less like a mirage. This world of new emotions
+      had spread like a silken mesh over all his thoughts, over all his desires.
+      Beatrice had been a tangible person, restful, delightful, a real
+      companion, his one resource against this madness. And now she was gone,
+      and he was powerless to get her back. He turned his head, he looked up the
+      road along which he had torn that night with his arms around her. She owed
+      him her life and she had gone! With all a man's inconsequence, it seemed
+      to him as he rose heavily to his feet and started homeward, that she had
+      repaid him with a certain amount of ingratitude, that she had left him at
+      the one moment in his life when he needed her most.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XVI. AN OFFER OF MARRIAGE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The next afternoon, at half-past four, Tavernake was having tea with
+      Beatrice in the tiny flat which she was sharing with another girl, off
+      Kingsway. She opened the door to him herself, and though she chattered
+      ceaselessly, it seemed to him that she was by no means at her ease. She
+      installed him in the only available chair, an absurd little wicker thing
+      many sizes too small for him, and seated herself upon the hearth-rug a few
+      feet away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have soon managed to find me out, Leonard,&rdquo; she remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;I had to go to the stage doorkeeper for your
+      address.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He hadn't the slightest right to give it you,&rdquo; she declared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake shrugged his shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I had to have it,&rdquo; he said simply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The power of the purse again!&rdquo; she laughed. &ldquo;Now that you are here, I
+      don't believe that you are a bit glad to see me. Are you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He did not answer for a moment. He was thinking of that vigil upon the
+      Embankment, of the long walk home, of the battle with himself, the
+      continual striving to tear from his heart this new thing, for which, with
+      a curious and most masculine inconsistency, he persisted in holding her
+      responsible.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know, Leonard,&rdquo; she continued, getting up abruptly and beginning to
+      make the tea, &ldquo;I believe that you are angry with me. If you are, all I can
+      say is that you are a very foolish person. I had to come away. Can't you
+      see that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I cannot,&rdquo; he answered stolidly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are not a reasonable person,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;I suppose it is because
+      you have led such a queer life, and had no womenfolk to look after you.
+      You don't understand. It was absurd, in a way, that I should ever have
+      called myself your sister, that we should even have attempted such a
+      ridiculous experiment. But after&mdash;after the other night&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can't we forget that?&rdquo; he interrupted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She raised her eyes and looked at him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can you?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a curious, almost a pleading earnestness in her tone. Her eyes
+      had something new to say, something which, though it failed to stir his
+      blood, made him vaguely uncomfortable. Nevertheless, he answered her
+      without hesitation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;I could forget it. I will promise to forget it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was unaccountable, but he almost fancied that he saw this new thing
+      pass from her face, leaving her pale and tremulous. She looked away again
+      and busied herself with the tea-caddy, but the fingers which held the
+      spoon were shaking a little.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I suppose I could forget,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;but it would be very difficult
+      for either of us to behave as though it had never happened. Besides, it
+      really was an impossible situation, you know,&rdquo; she went on, looking down
+      into the tea-caddy. &ldquo;It is much better for me to be here with Annie. You
+      can come and see me now and then and we can still be very good friends.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was annoyed. He said nothing, and Beatrice, glancing up, laughed
+      at his gloomy expression.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You certainly are,&rdquo; she declared, &ldquo;the most impossible, the most
+      primitive person I ever met. London isn't Arcadia, you know, and you are
+      not my brother. Besides, you were such an autocrat. You didn't even like
+      my going out to supper with Mr. Grier.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I hate the fellow!&rdquo; Tavernake admitted. &ldquo;Are you seeing much of him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He took us all out to supper last night,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;I thought it was
+      very kind of him to ask me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Kind, indeed! Does he want to marry you?&rdquo; Tavernake demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She set down the teapot and again she laughed softly. In her plain black
+      gown, very simple, adorned only by the little white bow at her neck,
+      quakerlike and spotless, with the added color in her cheeks, too, which
+      seemed to have come there during the last few moments, she was a very
+      alluring person.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He can't,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;He is married already.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then there came to Tavernake an inspiration, an inspiration so wonderful
+      that he gripped the sides of his chair and sat up. Here, after all, was
+      the way out for him, the way out from his garden of madness, the way to
+      escape from that mysterious, paralyzing yoke whose burden was already
+      heavy upon his shoulders. In that swift, vivid moment he saw something of
+      the truth. He saw himself losing all his virility, the tool and plaything
+      of this woman who had bewitched him, a poor, fond creature living only for
+      the kind words and glances she might throw him at her pleasure. In those
+      few seconds he knew the true from the false. Without hesitation, he
+      gripped with all the colossal selfishness of his unthinking sex at the
+      rope which was thrown to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, then, I do,&rdquo; he said firmly. &ldquo;Will you marry me, Beatrice?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She threw her head back and laughed, laughed long and softly, and
+      Tavernake, simple and unversed in the ways of women, believed that she was
+      indeed amused.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Neither you nor any one else, dear Leonard!&rdquo; she exclaimed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I want you to,&rdquo; he persisted. &ldquo;I think that you will.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was coquetry now in the tantalizing look she flashed him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Am I, too, then, one of these things to be attained in your life?&rdquo; she
+      asked. &ldquo;Dear Leonard, you mustn't say it like that. I don't like the look
+      of your jaw. It frightens me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is nothing to be afraid of in marrying me,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;I should
+      make you a very good husband. Some day you would be rich, very rich
+      indeed. I am quite sure that I shall succeed, if not at once, very soon.
+      There is plenty of money to be made in the world if one perseveres.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She had the air of trying to take him seriously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You sound quite convincing,&rdquo; she admitted, &ldquo;but I do wish that you would
+      put all these thoughts out of your mind, Leonard. It doesn't sound like
+      you in the least. Remember what you told me that first night; you assured
+      me that women had not the slightest part in your life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have changed,&rdquo; he confessed. &ldquo;I did not expect anything of the sort to
+      happen, but it has. It would be foolish of me to deny it. I have been all
+      my life learning, Beatrice,&rdquo; he continued, with a sudden curious softness
+      in his tone, &ldquo;and yet, somehow or other, it seems to me that I never knew
+      anything at all until lately. There was no one to direct me, no one to
+      show me just what is worth while in life. You have taught me a great deal,
+      you have taught me how little I know. And there are things,&rdquo; he went on,
+      solemnly, &ldquo;of which I am afraid, things which I do not begin even to
+      understand. Can't you see how it is with me? I am really very ignorant. I
+      want some one who understands; I want you, Beatrice, very badly.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She patted the back of his hand caressingly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mustn't talk like that, Leonard,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;I shouldn't make you a
+      good wife. I am not going to marry any one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And why?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is my secret,&rdquo; she told him, looking into the fire.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mean to say that, you will never marry?&rdquo; he persisted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I suppose I shall change, like other women,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;Just at
+      present, I feel like that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it because your sister's marriage&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She caught hold of both his hands; her eyes were suddenly full of terror.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mustn't talk about Elizabeth,&rdquo; she begged, &ldquo;you please mustn't talk
+      about her. Promise that you won't.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I came here to talk about her,&rdquo; he replied.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice, for a moment, said nothing. Then she threw down his hands and
+      laughed once more. As she flung herself back in her place, it seemed to
+      Tavernake that he saw once more the girl who had stood upon the roof of
+      the boarding-house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You came to talk about Elizabeth!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;I forgot. Well, go on,
+      what is it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your sister is in trouble!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you her confidant?&rdquo; Beatrice asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not exactly that,&rdquo; he admitted, &ldquo;but she has asked me to come and
+      see you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice had suddenly grown hard, her lips were set together, even her
+      attitude was uncompromising.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say exactly what you have to say,&rdquo; she told him. &ldquo;I will not interrupt.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It sounds foolish,&rdquo; Tavernake declared, &ldquo;because I know so little, but it
+      seems that your sister is being annoyed by a man named Pritchard, an
+      American detective. She tells me that he suspects her of being concerned
+      in some way with the disappearance of her husband. One of his reasons is
+      that you left her abruptly and went into hiding, that you will not see or
+      speak to her. She wishes you to be reconciled.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is that all?&rdquo; Beatrice asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is all,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;so long as you understand its significance. If
+      you go to see your sister, or let her come to see you, this man Pritchard
+      will have one of his causes for suspicion removed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So you came as Elizabeth's ambassador,&rdquo; Beatrice said, half as though to
+      herself. &ldquo;Well, here is my answer. I will not go to Elizabeth. If she
+      finds out my whereabouts and comes here, then I shall go away again and
+      hide. I shall never willingly exchange another word with her as long as I
+      live.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake looked at her doubtfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But she is your sister!&rdquo; he explained.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She is my sister,&rdquo; Beatrice repeated, &ldquo;and yet what I have said to you I
+      mean.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a short silence. Tavernake felt unaccountably ill at ease.
+      Something had sprung up between them which he did not understand. He was
+      swift to recognize, however, the note of absolute finality in her tone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have given my message,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;I shall tell her what you say.
+      Perhaps I had better go now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He half rose to his feet. Suddenly she lost control of herself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard, Leonard,&rdquo; she cried, &ldquo;don't you see that you are being very
+      foolish indeed? You have been good to me. Let me try and repay it a
+      little. Elizabeth is my sister, but listen! What I say to you now I say in
+      deadly earnest. Elizabeth has no heart, she has no thought for other
+      people, she makes use of them and they count for no more to her than the
+      figures that pass through one's dreams. She has some sort of hateful
+      gift,&rdquo; Beatrice continued, and her voice shook and her eyes flashed, &ldquo;some
+      hateful gift of attracting people to her and making them do her bidding,
+      of spoiling their lives and throwing them away when they have ceased to be
+      useful. Leonard, you must not let her do this with you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He rose to his feet awkwardly. Very likely it was all true, and yet, what
+      difference did it make?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; he said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They stood, for a moment, hand in hand. Then they heard the sound of a key
+      in the lock.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Here's Annie coming back!&rdquo; Beatrice exclaimed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was introduced to Miss Annie Legarde, who thought he was a very
+      strange person indeed because he did not fit in with any of the types of
+      men, young or old, of whom she knew anything. And as for Tavernake, he
+      considered that Miss Annie Legarde would have looked at least as well in a
+      hat half the size, and much better without the powder upon her face. Her
+      clothes were obviously more expensive than Beatrice's, but they were put
+      on with less care and taste.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice came out on to the landing with him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So you won't marry me, Beatrice?&rdquo; he said, as she held out her hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him for a moment and then turned away with a faint sob,
+      without even a word of farewell. He watched her disappear and heard the
+      door shut. Slowly he began to descend the stone steps. There was something
+      to him a little fateful about the closed door above, the long yet easy
+      descent into the street.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0017" id="link2HCH0017">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XVII. THE BALCONY AT IMANO'S
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      At six o'clock that evening, Tavernake rang up the Milan Court and
+      inquired for Elizabeth. There was a moment or two's delay and then he
+      heard her reply. Even over the telephone wires, even though he stood,
+      cramped and uncomfortable, in that stuffy little telephone booth, he felt
+      the quick start of pleasure, the thrill of something different in life,
+      which came to him always at the sound of her voice, at the slightest
+      suggestion of her presence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, my friend, what fortune?&rdquo; she asked him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;None,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;I have done my best. Beatrice will not listen to
+      me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She will not come and see me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She will not.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth was silent for a moment. When she spoke again, there was a
+      change in her tone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have failed, then.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I did everything that could be done,&rdquo; Tavernake insisted eagerly. &ldquo;I am
+      quite sure that nothing anybody could say would move Beatrice. She is very
+      decided indeed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have another idea,&rdquo; Elizabeth remarked, after a brief pause. &ldquo;She will
+      not come to me; very well, I must go to her. You must take me there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I cannot do that,&rdquo; Tavernake answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice has refused absolutely to permit me to tell you or any one else
+      of her whereabouts,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;Without her permission I cannot do it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you mean that?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course,&rdquo; he answered uncomfortably.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was another silence. When she spoke again, her voice had changed for
+      the second time. Tavernake felt his heart sink as he listened.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;I thought that you were my friend, that you wished
+      to help me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;but you would not have me break my word?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are breaking your word with me,&rdquo; she told him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a different thing,&rdquo; he insisted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will not take me there?&rdquo; she said once more.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I cannot,&rdquo; Tavernake answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well, good-bye!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't go,&rdquo; he begged. &ldquo;Can't I see you somewhere for a few minutes this
+      evening?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am afraid not,&rdquo; Elizabeth replied coolly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you going out?&rdquo; he persisted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am going to the Duke of York's Theatre with some friends,&rdquo; she
+      answered. &ldquo;I am sorry. You have disappointed me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She rang off and he turned away from the telephone booth into the street.
+      It seemed to him, as he walked down the crowded thoroughfare, that some
+      reflection of his own self-contempt was visible in the countenances of the
+      men and women who were hurrying past him. Wherever he looked, he was
+      acutely conscious of it. In his heart he felt the bitter sense of shame of
+      a man who wilfully succumbs to weakness. Yet that night he made his
+      efforts.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For four hours he sat in his lonely rooms and worked. Then the unequal
+      struggle was ended. With a groan he caught up his hat and coat and left
+      the house. Half an hour later, he was among the little crowd of loiterers
+      and footmen standing outside the doors of the Duke of York's Theatre.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was still some time before the termination of the performance. As the
+      slow minutes dragged by, he grew to hate himself, to hate this new thing
+      in his life which had torn down his everyday standards, which had carried
+      him off his feet in this strange and detestable fashion. It was a dormant
+      sense, without a doubt, which Elizabeth had stirred into life&mdash;the
+      sense of sex, quiescent in him so long, chiefly through his perfect
+      physical sanity; perhaps, too, in some measure, from his half-starved
+      imagination. It was significant, though, that once aroused it burned with
+      surprising and unwavering fidelity. The whole world of women now were
+      different creatures to him, but they left him as utterly unmoved as in his
+      unawakened days. It was Elizabeth only he wanted, craved for fiercely,
+      with all this late-born passion of mingled sentiment and desire. He felt
+      himself, as he hung round there upon the pavement, rubbing shoulders with
+      the liveried servants, the loafers, and the passers-by, a thing to be
+      despised. He was like a whipped dog fawning back to his master. Yet if
+      only he could persuade her to come with him, if it were but for an hour!
+      If only she would sit opposite him in that wonderful little restaurant,
+      where the lights and the music, the laughter and the wine, were all
+      outward symbols of this new life from before which her fingers seemed to
+      have torn aside the curtains! His heart beat with a fierce impatience. He
+      watched the thin stream of people who left before the play was over,
+      suburbanites mostly, in a hurry for their trains. Very soon the whole
+      audience followed, commissionaires were busy with their whistles, the
+      servants eagerly looking right and left for their masters. And then
+      Elizabeth! She came out in the midst of half-a-dozen others, brilliant in
+      a wonderful cloak and dress of turquoise blue, laughing with her friends,
+      to all appearance the gayest of the party. Tavernake stepped quickly
+      forward, but at that moment there was a crush and he could not advance.
+      She passed within a yard of him, escorted by a couple of men, and for a
+      moment their eyes met. She raised her eyebrows, as though in surprise, and
+      her recognition was of the slightest. She passed on and entered a waiting
+      motorcar, accompanied by the two men. Tavernake stood and looked after it.
+      She did not even glance round. Except for that little gesture of cold
+      surprise, she had ignored him. Tavernake, scarcely knowing what he did,
+      turned slowly towards the Strand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He was face to face now with a crisis before which he seemed powerless.
+      Men were there in the world to be bullied, cajoled, or swept out of the
+      way. What did one do with a woman who was kind one moment and insolent the
+      next, who raised her eyebrows and passed on when he wanted her, when he
+      was there longing for her? Those old solid dreams of his&mdash;wealth,
+      power, his name on great prospectuses, a position in the world&mdash;these
+      things now appeared like the day fancies of a child. He had seen his way
+      towards them. Already he had felt his feet upon the rungs of the ladder
+      which leads to material success. This was something different, something
+      greater. Then a sense of despair chilled his heart. He felt how ignorant,
+      how helpless he was. He had not even studied the first text-book of life.
+      Those very qualities which had served him so well before were hopeless
+      here. Persistence, Beatrice had told him once, only annoys a woman.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He came to a standstill outside the entrance to the Milan Court, and
+      retraced his steps. The thought of Beatrice had brought something soothing
+      with it. He felt that he must see her, see her at once. He walked back
+      along the Strand and entered the restaurant where Beatrice and he had had
+      their memorable supper. From the vestibule he could just see Grier's back
+      as he stood talking to a waiter by the side of a round table in the middle
+      of the room. Tavernake slowly withdrew and made his way upstairs. There
+      were one or two little tables there in the balcony, hidden from the lower
+      part of the room. He seated himself at one, handing his coat and hat
+      mechanically to the waiter who came hurrying up.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, Monsieur,&rdquo; the man explained, with a deprecating gesture, &ldquo;these
+      tables are all taken.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake, who kept an account book in which he registered even his car
+      fares, put five shillings in the man's hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This one I will have,&rdquo; he said, firmly, and sat down.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The man looked at him and turned aside to speak to the head waiter. They
+      conversed together in whispers. Tavernake took no notice. His jaw was set.
+      Himself unseen, he was gazing steadfastly at that table below. The head
+      waiter shrugged his shoulders and departed; his other clients must be
+      mollified. There was a finality which was unanswerable about Tavernake's
+      methods.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake ate and drank what they brought to him, ate and drank and
+      suffered. Everything was as it had been that other night&mdash;the popping
+      of corks, the soft music, the laughter of women, the pleasant, luxurious
+      sense of warmth and gayety pervading the whole place.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was all just the same, but this time he sat outside and looked on.
+      Beatrice was seated next Grier, and on her other side was a young man of
+      the type which Tavernake detested, partly because it inspired him with a
+      reluctant but insistent sense of inferiority. The young man was handsome,
+      tall, and thin. His evening clothes fitted him perfectly, his studs and
+      links were of the latest mode, his white tie arranged as though by the
+      fingers of an artist. And yet he was no tailor's model. A gentleman,
+      beyond a doubt, Tavernake decided, watching grudgingly the courteous
+      movement of his head, listening sometimes to his well-bred but rather
+      languid voice. Beatrice laughed often into his face. She admired him, of
+      course. How could she help it! Grier sat at her other side. He, too,
+      talked to her whenever he had the chance. It was a new fever which
+      Tavernake was tasting, a new fever burning in his blood. He was jealous;
+      he hated the whole party below. In imagination he saw Elizabeth with her
+      friends, supping most likely in that other, more resplendent restaurant,
+      only a few yards away. He imagined her the centre of every attention.
+      Without a doubt, she was looking at her neighbor as she had looked at him.
+      Tavernake bit his lip, frowning. If he had had it in his power, in those
+      black moments, to have thrown a thunderbolt from his place, he would have
+      wrecked every table in the room, he would have watched with joy the white,
+      startled faces of the revelers as they fled away into the night. It was a
+      new torture, indescribable, bitter. Indeed, this curiosity of his, of
+      which he had spoken to Beatrice as they had walked together down Oxford
+      Street on that first evening, was being satisfied with a vengeance! He was
+      learning of those other things of life. He had sipped at the sweetness; he
+      was drinking the bitters!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      An altercation by his side distracted him. Again there was the head waiter
+      and a protesting guest. Tavernake looked up and recognized Professor
+      Franklin. With his broad-brimmed hat in his hand, the professor, in fluent
+      phraseology and a strong American accent, was making himself decidedly
+      disagreeable.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You had better send for your manager right away, young man,&rdquo; he declared.
+      &ldquo;On Tuesday night he brought me here himself and I engaged this table for
+      the week. No, I tell you I won't have any other! I guess my order was good
+      enough. You send for Luigi right here. You know who I am? Professor
+      Franklin's my name, from New York, and if I say I mean to have a thing, I
+      expect to get it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      For the first time he recognized Tavernake, and paused for a moment in his
+      speech.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have I got your table, Professor?&rdquo; Tavernake asked, slowly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have, sir,&rdquo; the professor answered. &ldquo;I did not recognize you when I
+      came in or I would have addressed you personally. I have particular
+      reasons for occupying a front table here every night this week.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The thoughts began to crowd in upon Tavernake's brain. He hesitated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why not sit down with me?&rdquo; he suggested.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor acquiesced without a word. The head waiter, with a sigh of
+      relief, took his hat and overcoat and accepted his order. Tavernake leaned
+      across the table.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Professor,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;why do you insist upon sitting up here?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor moved his head slowly downwards.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My young friend, I speak to you in confidence?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In confidence,&rdquo; Tavernake repeated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I come here secretly,&rdquo; the professor continued, &ldquo;because it is the only
+      chance I have of seeing a very dear relative of mine. I am obliged to keep
+      away from her just now, but from here I can watch, I can see that she is
+      well.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mean your daughter Beatrice,&rdquo; Tavernake said, calmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor trembled all over.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know!&rdquo; he muttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I know,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I have been able to be of some slight
+      assistance to your daughter Beatrice.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor grasped his hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, yes,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;Elizabeth is very angry with you because you will
+      not tell her where to find the little girl. You are right, Mr. Tavernake.
+      You must never tell her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't intend it,&rdquo; Tavernake declared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say, this is a great evening for me!&rdquo; the professor went on, eagerly. &ldquo;I
+      found out by accident myself. I was at the bar and I saw her come in with
+      a lot of others.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why don't you go and speak to her?&rdquo; Tavernake asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor shivered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There has been a disagreement,&rdquo; he explained. &ldquo;Beatrice and Elizabeth
+      have quarreled. Mind you, Beatrice was right.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then why don't you go to her instead of staying with Elizabeth?&rdquo;
+       Tavernake demanded, bluntly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor temporarily collapsed. He drank heavily of the whiskey and
+      soda by his side, and answered gloomily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My young friend,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;Beatrice, when she left us, was penniless.
+      Mind you, Elizabeth is the one with brains. It is Elizabeth who has the
+      money. She has a strong will, too. She keeps me there whether I will or
+      not, she makes me do many things&mdash;many things, surely&mdash;which I
+      hate. But Elizabeth has her way. If I had gone with Beatrice, if I were to
+      go to her now, I should be only a burden upon her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have no money, then?&rdquo; Tavernake remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor shook his head sadly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Speculations, my young friend,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;speculations undertaken
+      solely with the object of making a fortune for my children. I have had
+      money and lost it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can't you earn any?&rdquo; Tavernake asked. &ldquo;Beatrice doesn't seem
+      extravagant.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor regarded this outspoken young man with an air of hurt
+      dignity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you will forgive me,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I think that we will choose another
+      subject of conversation.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At any rate,&rdquo; Tavernake declared, &ldquo;you must be fond of your daughter or
+      you would not come here night after night just to look at her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor shook out a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed his
+      eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice was always my favorite,&rdquo; he announced solemnly, &ldquo;but Elizabeth&mdash;well,
+      you can't get away from Elizabeth,&rdquo; he added, leaning across the table.
+      &ldquo;To tell you the truth, Mr. Tavernake, Elizabeth terrifies me sometimes,
+      she is so bold. I am afraid where her scheming may land us. I would be
+      happier with Beatrice if only she had the means to satisfy my trifling
+      wants.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He turned to the waiter and ordered a pint of champagne.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Veuve Clicquot '99,&rdquo; he instructed the man. &ldquo;At my age,&rdquo; he remarked,
+      with a sigh, &ldquo;one has to be careful about these little matters. The wrong
+      brand of champagne means a sleepless night.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake looked at him in a puzzled way. The professor was a riddle to
+      him. He represented no type which had come within the orbit of his
+      experience. With the arrival of the champagne, the professor became almost
+      eloquent. He leaned forward, gazing stealthily down at the round table.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I could tell you of that girl's mother, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;if I
+      could tell you what her history, our history, has been, it would seem to
+      you so strange that you would probably regard me as a romancer. No, we
+      have to carry our secrets with us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By-the-bye,&rdquo; Tavernake asked, &ldquo;what are you a professor of?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of the hidden sciences, sir,&rdquo; was the immediate reply. &ldquo;Phrenology was my
+      earliest love. Since then I have studied in the East; I have spent many
+      years in a monastery in China. I have gratified in every way my natural
+      love of the occult. I represent today those people of advanced thought who
+      have traveled, even in spirit, for ever such a little distance across the
+      line which divides the Seen from the Unseen, the Known from the Infinite.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He took a long draught of champagne. Tavernake gazed at him in blank
+      amazement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't know much about science,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;It is only lately that I have
+      begun to realize how ignorant I really am. Your daughter has helped to
+      teach me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor sighed heavily.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A young woman of attainments, sir,&rdquo; he remarked, &ldquo;of character, too. Look
+      at the way she carries her head. That was a trick of her mother's.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't you mean to speak to her at all, then?&rdquo; Tavernake asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I dare not,&rdquo; the professor replied. &ldquo;I am naturally of a truthful
+      disposition, and if Elizabeth were to ask me if I had spoken to her
+      sister, I should give myself away at once. No, I look on and that is all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake drummed with his fingers upon the tablecloth. Something in the
+      merriment of that little party downstairs had filled him with a very
+      bitter feeling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You ought to go and claim her, professor,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;Look down at
+      them now. Is that the best life for a girl? The men are almost strangers
+      to her, and the girls are not fit for her to associate with. She has no
+      friends, no relatives. Your daughter Elizabeth can do without you very
+      well. She is strong enough to take care of herself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But my dear sir,&rdquo; the professor objected, &ldquo;Beatrice could not support
+      me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake paid his bill without another word. Downstairs the lights had
+      been lowered, the party at the round table were already upon their feet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good-night, professor!&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I am going to see the last of Beatrice
+      from the top of the stairs.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor followed him&mdash;they stood there and watched her depart
+      with Annie Legarde. The two girls got into a taxicab together, and
+      Tavernake breathed a sigh of relief, a relief for which he was wholly
+      unable to account, when he saw that Grier made no effort to follow them.
+      As soon as the taxi had rolled away, they descended and passed into the
+      street. Then the professor suddenly changed his tone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I know what you are thinking about me: I am a
+      weak old man who drinks too much and who wasn't born altogether honest. I
+      can't give up anything. I'd be happier, really happier, on a crust with
+      Beatrice, but I daren't, I simply daren't try it. I prefer the flesh pots
+      with Elizabeth, and you despise me for it. I don't blame you, Mr.
+      Tavernake, but listen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well?&rdquo; Tavernake interjected.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor's fingers gripped his arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You've known Beatrice longer&mdash;you don't know Elizabeth very well,
+      but let me tell you this. Elizabeth is a very wonderful person. I know
+      something about character, I know something about those hidden powers
+      which men and women possess&mdash;strange powers which no one can
+      understand, powers which drag a man to a woman's feet, or which make him
+      shiver when he passes another even in a crowd. You see, these things are a
+      science with me, Mr. Tavernake, but I don't pretend to understand
+      everything. All I know is that Elizabeth is one of those people who can
+      just do what she likes with men. I am her father and I am her slave. I
+      tell myself that I would rather be with Beatrice, and I am as powerless to
+      go as though I were bound with chains. You are a young ignorant man, Mr.
+      Tavernake, you know nothing of life, and I will give you a word of
+      warning. It is better for you that you keep away from over there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He raised one hand and pointed across the street towards the Milan Court;
+      with the other he once more gripped Tavernake's arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why she should take the trouble even to speak with you for a moment, I do
+      not know,&rdquo; the professor continued, &ldquo;but she does. It has pleased her to
+      talk with you&mdash;why I can't imagine&mdash;only if I were you I would
+      get away while there is yet time. She is my daughter but she has no heart,
+      no pity. I saw her smile at you. I am sorry always for the man she smiles
+      upon like that. Goodnight, Mr. Tavernake!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor crossed the street. Tavernake watched him until he was out
+      of sight. Then he felt an arm thrust through his.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, this is what I call luck!&rdquo; a familiar voice exclaimed. &ldquo;Mr.
+      Tavernake, you're the very man I was looking for!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0018" id="link2HCH0018">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XVIII. A MIDNIGHT ADVENTURE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was not sociably inclined and took no pains to conceal the fact.
+      Mr. Pritchard, however, was not easily to be shaken off.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So you've been palling up to the old man, eh?&rdquo; he remarked, in friendly
+      fashion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I came across the professor unexpectedly,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, coldly.
+      &ldquo;What do you want with me, please? I am on my way home.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard laughed softly to himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say, there's something about you Britishers I can't help admiring!&rdquo; he
+      declared. &ldquo;You are downright, aren't you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose you think we are too clumsy to be anything else,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      replied. &ldquo;This is my 'bus coming. Good-night!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard's hand, however, tightened upon his companion's arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look here, young man,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;don't you be foolish. I'm a valuable
+      acquaintance for you, if you only realized it. Come along across the
+      street with me. My club is on the Terrace, just below. Stroll along there
+      with me and I'll tell you something about the professor, if you like.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank you,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, &ldquo;I don't think I care about hearing
+      gossip. Besides, I think I know all there is to be known about him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did you give Miss Beatrice my message?&rdquo; Pritchard asked suddenly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I did,&rdquo; Tavernake replied, &ldquo;I have no answer for you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you tell her this,&rdquo; Pritchard began,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, I will tell her nothing!&rdquo; Tavernake interrupted. &ldquo;You can look after
+      your own affairs. I have no interest in them and I don't want to have.
+      Good-night!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard laughed again but he did not relax his grasp upon the other's
+      arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;it won't do for you to quarrel with me. I
+      shouldn't be surprised if you discovered that I am one of the most useful
+      acquaintances you ever met in your life. You needn't come into the club
+      unless you like, but walk as far as there with me. When we get on to the
+      Terrace, with closed houses on one side and a palisade upon the other, I
+      am going to say something to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well,&rdquo; Tavernake decided, reluctantly. &ldquo;I don't know what there is
+      you can have to tell me, but I'll come as far as there, at any rate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They crossed the Strand and turned into Adam Street. As they neared the
+      further corner, Pritchard stepped from the pavement into the middle of the
+      street, and looked searchingly around.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say, you'll excuse my being a little careful,&rdquo; he remarked. &ldquo;This is
+      rather a lonely part for the middle of London, and I have been followed
+      for the last two days by people whose company I am not over keen about.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Followed? What for?&rdquo; Tavernake demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, the usual thing!&rdquo; answered the detective, with a shrug of the
+      shoulders. &ldquo;That company of crooks I showed you last night don't fancy
+      having me around. They've a good many grudges up against Sam Pritchard. I
+      am not quite so safe over here as I should be in New York. Most of them
+      are off to Paris tomorrow, thank Heavens!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you?&rdquo; Tavernake asked. &ldquo;Are you going, too?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If only those fools would believe it, I'm not over here on their business
+      at all. I came over on a special commission this time, as you know. I have
+      a word of warning for you, Mr. Tavernake. I guess you won't like to hear
+      it, but you've got to.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake stopped short.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't want your warnings!&rdquo; he said angrily. &ldquo;I don't want you
+      interfering in my affairs!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The detective smiled quietly. Then a new expression suddenly tightened his
+      lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Never mind about that just now!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;See here, take this
+      police whistle from my left hand, quick, and blow it for all that you are
+      worth!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was characteristic of Tavernake that he was prepared to obey without a
+      second's hesitation. The opportunity, however, was denied him. The events
+      which followed came and passed like a thought. A blow on his left wrist
+      and the whistle fell into the road. A dark figure had sprung up,
+      apparently from space; a long arm was twined around Pritchard's neck,
+      bending him backwards; there was a gleam of steel within a few inches of
+      his throat. And then Tavernake saw a wonderful thing. With a turn of his
+      wrist, Pritchard suddenly seemed to lift the form of his assailant into
+      the air. Tavernake caught a swift impression of a man's white face, the
+      head pointing to the street, the legs twitching convulsively. Head over
+      heels Pritchard seemed to throw him, while the knife clattered harmlessly
+      into the roadway. The man lay crumpled up and moaning before the door of
+      one of the houses. Pritchard sprang after him. The door had been
+      cautiously opened and the man crawled through; Pritchard followed; then
+      the door closed and Tavernake beat upon it in vain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For several seconds&mdash;it seemed to Tavernake much longer&mdash;he
+      stood gazing at the door, breathing heavily, absolutely unable to collect
+      his thoughts. The whole affair had happened with such amazing celerity! He
+      could not bring himself to realize it, to believe that it was Pritchard
+      who had been with him only a few seconds ago, who in danger of his life
+      had performed that marvelous trick of jiu-jutsu, had followed his unknown
+      assailant into that dark, mysterious house, from no single window of which
+      was a single gleam of light visible. Tavernake had led an uneventful life.
+      Of the passions which breed murder and the desire to kill he knew nothing.
+      He was dazed with the suddenness of it all. How could such a thing happen
+      in the midst of London, in a thoroughfare only momentarily deserted, at
+      the further end of which, indeed, were many signs of life! Then the
+      thought of that knife made him shiver&mdash;blue glittering steel cutting
+      the air like whipcord. He remembered the look in the assassin's face&mdash;horrible,
+      an epitome of the passions, which seemed to reveal to him in that moment
+      the existence of some other, some unknown world, about which he had
+      neither read nor dreamed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The sound of footsteps came as an immense relief. A man came round the
+      corner, smoking a cigarette and humming softly to himself. The presence of
+      another human being seemed suddenly to bring Tavernake's feet back upon
+      the earth. He moved toward the pavement and addressed the newcomer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can you tell me how to get inside that house?&rdquo; he asked quickly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The man removed the cigarette from his mouth and stared at his questioner.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should ring the bell,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;but surely it's unoccupied? What do
+      you want to get in there for?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Less than a minute ago,&rdquo; Tavernake told him, &ldquo;I was walking here with a
+      friend. A man came up behind us and tried deliberately to stab him. He
+      bolted afterwards through that door, my friend followed him, the door was
+      closed in my face.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The newcomer was a youngish man, a musician, who had just come from a
+      concert and was on his way to the club at the end of the street. Probably,
+      had he been a journalist, his curiosity would have been greater than his
+      incredulity. As it was, however, he gazed at Tavernake, for a moment,
+      blankly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look here,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;this doesn't sound a very likely story of yours,
+      you know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't care whether it's likely or not,&rdquo; Tavernake answered hotly; &ldquo;it's
+      true! The knife's somewhere in the road there&mdash;it fell up against the
+      railings.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They crossed the road together and searched. There were no signs of the
+      weapon. Tavernake peered over the railings.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;When my friend struck the other man and twisted him over,&rdquo; he explained,
+      &ldquo;the knife seemed to fly up into the air; it might even have reached the
+      gardens.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His companion turned slowly away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, it's no use looking down there for it,&rdquo; he remarked. &ldquo;We might try
+      the door, if you like.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They leaned their weight against it, hammered at the panels, and waited.
+      The door was fast closed and no reply came. The musician shrugged his
+      shoulders and prepared to depart, after one more glance at Tavernake, half
+      suspicious, half questioning.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you think it worth while,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you had better fetch the police,
+      perhaps. If you take my advice, though, I think I should go home and
+      forget all about it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He passed on, leaving Tavernake speechless. The idea that people might not
+      believe his story had never seriously occurred to him. Yet all of a sudden
+      he began to doubt it himself. He stepped back into the road and looked up
+      at the windows of the house&mdash;dark, uncurtained, revealing no sign of
+      life or habitation. Had he really taken that walk with Pritchard, stood on
+      this spot with him only a minute or two ago? Then he picked up the police
+      whistle and he had no longer any doubts. The whole scene was before him
+      again, more vividly than ever. Even at this moment, Pritchard might be in
+      need of help!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He turned and walked sharply to the corner of the Terrace, finding himself
+      almost immediately face to face with a policeman.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must come into this house with me at once!&rdquo; Tavernake exclaimed,
+      pointing backwards. &ldquo;A friend of mine was attacked here just now; a man
+      tried to stab him. They are both in that house. The man ran away and my
+      friend followed him. The door is closed and no one answers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The constable looked at Tavernake very much as the musician had done.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do either of them live there, sir?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How should I know!&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;The man sprang upon my friend
+      from behind. He had a knife in his hand&mdash;I saw it. My friend threw
+      him over and he escaped into that house. They are both there now.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Which house is it, sir?&rdquo; the policeman inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They were standing almost in front of it. The gate was open and Tavernake
+      beat against the panels with the flat of his hand. Then, with a cry of
+      triumph, he stooped down and picked something up from a crack in the
+      flagged stones.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The key!&rdquo; he cried. &ldquo;Come on, quick!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He thrust it into the lock and turned it; the door swung smoothly open.
+      The policeman laid his hand upon Tavernake's shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look here,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;let's have that story of yours again, a little more
+      clearly. Who is it that's in this house?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Five minutes ago,&rdquo; Tavernake began, speaking rapidly, &ldquo;I met a man in the
+      Strand whom I know slightly&mdash;Pritchard, an American detective. He
+      said that he had something to say to me and he asked me to walk round with
+      him to a club in this Terrace. We were in the middle of the road there,
+      talking, when a man sprang at him; he must have come up behind quite
+      noiselessly. The man had a knife in his hand. My friend threw him head
+      over heels&mdash;it was some trick of jiu-jutsu; I have seen it done at
+      the Polytechnic. He fell in front of this door which must either have been
+      ajar or else some one who was waiting must have let him in. He crawled
+      through and my friend followed him. The door was slammed in my face.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How long ago was this?&rdquo; the policeman asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not much more than five minutes,&rdquo; Tavernake answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The policeman coughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It's a very queer story, sir.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It's true!&rdquo; Tavernake declared, fiercely. &ldquo;You and I have got to search
+      this house.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The policeman nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There's no harm in that, sir, anyway.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He flashed his lantern around the hall&mdash;unfurnished, with paper
+      hanging from the walls. Then they began to enter the rooms, one by one.
+      Nowhere was there any sign of occupation. From floor to floor they passed,
+      in grim silence. In the front chamber of the attic was a camp bedstead,
+      two or three humble articles of furniture, and a small stove.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Caretaker's kit,&rdquo; the policeman muttered. &ldquo;Nothing seems to have been
+      used for some time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They descended the stairs again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You say you saw the two men enter this house, sir?&rdquo; the policeman
+      remarked doubtfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I did,&rdquo; Tavernake declared. &ldquo;There is no doubt about it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The back entrances are all properly locked,&rdquo; the policeman pointed out.
+      &ldquo;None of the windows by which any one could escape have been opened. We've
+      been into every room. There's no one in the house now, sir, is there?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There doesn't seem to be,&rdquo; Tavernake admitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The policeman looked him over once more; Tavernake certainly had not the
+      appearance of one attempting a hoax.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am afraid there is nothing more we can do, sir,&rdquo; the man said civilly.
+      &ldquo;You had better give me your name and address.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can't we go over the place once more?&rdquo; Tavernake suggested. &ldquo;I tell you I
+      saw them come in.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have my beat outside to look after, sir,&rdquo; the constable answered. &ldquo;If
+      it wasn't that you seem respectable, I should begin to think that you
+      wanted me out of the way for a bit. Name and address, please.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake gave them readily. They passed out together into the street.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall report this matter,&rdquo; the man said, closing his book. &ldquo;Perhaps the
+      sergeant will have the house searched again. If you take my advice, sir,&rdquo;
+       he added, &ldquo;you'll go home.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I saw them both pass through that door,&rdquo; Tavernake repeated, half to
+      himself, still standing upon the pavement and staring at the unlit
+      windows.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The constable made no reply but moved off. Soon he reached the corner of
+      the Terrace and disappeared. Tavernake slowly crossed the road and with
+      his back to the railings looked steadfastly at the dark front of gray
+      stone houses. Big Ben struck one o'clock, several people passed backwards
+      and forwards. Men were coming out from the club, and separating for the
+      night; the roar of the city was growing fainter. Yet Tavernake felt
+      indisposed to move. The look in that man's drawn white face and black eyes
+      haunted him, There was tragedy there, the shadow of terrible things, fear,
+      and the murderous desire to kill! Through that door they had passed, the
+      two men, one in flight, the other in pursuit. Where were they now? Perhaps
+      it had been a trap. Pritchard had spoken seriously enough of his enemies.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then, as he stood there, he saw for the first time a thin line of light
+      through the closely-drawn curtains of a room on the ground floor of the
+      adjoining house. Without a moment's hesitation, he crossed the road and
+      rang the bell. The door was opened, after a trifling delay, by a man in
+      plain clothes, who might, however, have been a servant in mufti. He looked
+      at Tavernake suspiciously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry to have disturbed you,&rdquo; Tavernake explained, &ldquo;but I saw some
+      one go in the house next to you, a little time ago. Can you tell me if you
+      have heard any noises or voices during the last half-hour?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We have heard nothing, sir,&rdquo; he said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who lives here?&rdquo; Tavernake asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did you call me up at one o'clock in the morning to ask silly questions?&rdquo;
+       the man replied insolently. &ldquo;Every one's in bed here and I was just
+      going.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There's a light in your ground floor room,&rdquo; Tavernake remarked. &ldquo;There's
+      some one talking there now&mdash;I can hear voices.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man closed the door in his face. For some time Tavernake wandered
+      restlessly about, starting at last reluctantly homewards. He had reached
+      the Strand and was crossing Trafalgar Square when a sudden thought held
+      him. He stood still for a moment in the middle of the street. Then he
+      turned abruptly round. In less than five minutes he was once more on the
+      Terrace.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0019" id="link2HCH0019">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XIX. TAVERNAKE INTERVENES
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake had the feelings of a man suddenly sobered as he turned once
+      more into the Adelphi Terrace. Waiting until no one was in sight, he
+      opened the door of the empty house with the Yale key which he had kept,
+      and carefully closed it. He struck a match and listened for several
+      minutes intently; not a sound from anywhere. He moved a few yards further
+      to the bottom of the stairs, and listened again; still silence. He turned
+      the handle of the ground floor apartment and commenced a fresh search.
+      Room by room he examined by the light of his rapidly dwindling matches.
+      This time he meant to leave behind him no possibility of any mistake. He
+      even measured the depths of the walls for any secret hiding place. From
+      room to room he passed, leisurely, always on the alert, always listening.
+      Once, as he opened a door on the third floor there was a soft scurrying as
+      though of a skirt across the floor. He struck a match quickly, to find a
+      great rat sitting up and looking at him with black, beady eyes. It was the
+      only sign of life he found in the whole building.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      When he had finished his search, he came down to the ground floor and
+      entered the room corresponding with the one from which he had heard voices
+      in the adjoining house. He crouched here upon the dusty boards for some
+      time, listening. Now and then he fancied that he could still hear voices
+      on the other side of the wall, but he was never absolutely certain.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last he rose to stretch himself, and almost as he did so a fresh sound
+      from outside attracted his notice. A motor-car had turned into the
+      Terrace. He walked to the uncurtained window and stood there, sure of
+      being himself unseen. Then his heart gave a great leap. Unemotional though
+      he was, this was a happening which might well have excited a more
+      phlegmatic individual. A motor-car which he remembered very well, although
+      it was driven now by a man in dark livery, had stopped at the next house.
+      A woman and two men had descended. Tavernake never glanced at the latter;
+      his eyes were fastened upon their companion. She was wrapped in a long
+      cloak, but she lifted her skirts as she crossed the pavement, and he saw
+      the flash of her silver buckles. Her carriage, her figure, were
+      unmistakable. It was Elizabeth who was paying this early morning visit
+      next door! Already the little party had disappeared. They did not even
+      ring the bell. The door must have been opened silently at their coming.
+      The motor-car glided off. Once more the Terrace was deserted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake felt sure that he knew now the solution,&mdash;there was a way
+      from this house into the next one. He struck another match and, standing
+      back a few yards, looked critically at the dividing wall. In ancient days
+      this had evidently been a dwelling-house of importance, elaborately
+      decorated, as the fresco work upon the ceiling still indicated. The wall
+      had been divided into three panels, with a high wainscoting. Inch by inch
+      he examined it from one end to the other; he started from the back and
+      came toward the front. About three-quarters of the way there, he paused.
+      It was very simple, after all. The solid wall for a couple of feet
+      suddenly ceased, and the design was continued with an expanse of stretched
+      canvas, which yielded easily to his finger. He leaned his ear against it;
+      he could hear now distinctly the sound of voices&mdash;he heard even the
+      woman's laughter. For the height of about four feet the wall had been
+      bodily removed. He made a small hole in the canvas&mdash;there was still
+      darkness. He enlarged the hole until he could thrust his hand through&mdash;there
+      was nothing but canvas the other side. He knew now where he was. There was
+      only that single thickness of canvas between him and the room. He had but
+      to make the smallest hole in it and he would be able to see through. Even
+      now, with the removal of the barrier on his side, the voices were more
+      distinct. A complete section of the wall had evidently been taken out and
+      replaced by a detachable framework of wood covered with stretched canvas.
+      He stood back for a moment and felt with his finger; he could almost trace
+      the spot where the woodwork fitted upon hinges. Then he went on his hands
+      and knees again, and with his penknife in his hand he paused to listen. He
+      could hear the man Crease talking&mdash;a slow, nasal drawl. Then he heard
+      Pritchard's voice, followed by what seemed to be a groan. There was a
+      silence, then Elizabeth seemed to ask a question. He heard her low laugh
+      and some note in it sent a shiver through his body. Pritchard was speaking
+      fiercely now. Then, in the middle of his sentence, there was silence once
+      more, followed by another groan. He could almost feel the people in that
+      room holding their breaths.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was rapidly forgetting all caution. The point of his knife was
+      through the canvas. Slowly he worked it round until a small piece, the
+      size of a half-crown, was partially cut through. With infinite pains he
+      got his head and shoulders into the small recess and for the first time
+      looked into the room. Pritchard was sitting almost in the middle of the
+      apartment; his arms seemed to be bound to the chair and his legs were tied
+      together. A few yards away, Elizabeth, her fur coat laid aside, was
+      lounging back in an easy-chair, her dress all glittering with sequins, a
+      curious light in her eyes, a cruel smile parting her lips. By her side&mdash;sitting,
+      in fact, on the arm of her chair&mdash;was Crease, his long, worn face
+      paler, even, than usual; his lips curled in a smile of cynical amusement.
+      Major Post was there, carefully dressed as though he had been attending
+      some social gathering, standing upon the hearth-rug with his coat-tails
+      under his arms. The professor, in whose face seemed written the most
+      abject terror, was talking. Tavernake now could hear every word
+      distinctly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear Elizabeth! My dear Crease! You are both too precipitate! I tell
+      you that I protest&mdash;I protest most strongly. Mr. Pritchard, I am
+      sure, with a little persuasion, will listen to reason. I will not be a
+      party to any such proceeding as&mdash;as this. You understand, Crease? We
+      have gone quite far enough as it is. I will not have it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth laughed softly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear father,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;you will really have to take something for
+      your nerves. Nothing need happen to Mr. Pritchard at all unless he asks
+      for it. He has his chance&mdash;. no one should expect more.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are right, my dear Elizabeth,&rdquo; declared Crease, speaking very slowly
+      and with his usual drawl. &ldquo;This question of his health for the future&mdash;at
+      any rate, for the immediate future&mdash;is entirely in Pritchard's own
+      hands. There is no one who has received so many warnings as he. Bramley
+      was cautioned twice; Mallison was warned three times and burned to death;
+      Forsith had word from us only once, and he was shot in a drunken brawl.
+      This man Pritchard has been warned a dozen times, he has escaped death
+      twice. The time has come to show him that we are in earnest. Threats are
+      useless; the time has come for deeds. I say that if Pritchard refuses this
+      trifling request of ours, let us see that he leaves this house in such a
+      state that he will not be able to do us any harm for some time at least.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But he will give his word!&rdquo; the professor cried excitedly. &ldquo;I am quite
+      sure that if you allow me to talk to him reasonably, he will pledge his
+      word to go back to the States and interfere no longer with your affairs.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard turned his head slightly. He was a little pale, and the blood
+      was dropping slowly on to the floor from a wound in his temple, but his
+      tone was contemptuous.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I will give you my word, Professor, and you, Elizabeth Gardner, and you,
+      Jim Post, and you, Walter Crease, that crippled, or straight, in evil or
+      good health, from the very jaws of death I will hang on to life until you
+      have paid your just debts. You understand that, all of you? I don't know
+      what sort of a show this is. You may be in earnest, or you may be trying a
+      rag. In any case, let me assure you of this. You won't get me to beg for
+      mercy. If you force me to drink that stuff you are talking about, I'll
+      find the antidote, and as sure as there's a prison in America, so surely
+      I'll make you suffer for it! If you take my advice,&rdquo; he went on slowly,
+      &ldquo;and I know what I'm talking about, you'll cut these ropes and set open
+      your front door. You 'll live longer, all of you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An idiot,&rdquo; Elizabeth remarked pleasantly, &ldquo;can do but little harm in the
+      world. The word of a person of weak intellect is not to be relied upon.
+      For my part, I am very tired of our friend, Mr. Pritchard. If you others
+      had been disposed to go to much greater lengths, if you had said 'Hang him
+      from the ceiling,' I should have been well pleased.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard made a slight movement in his chair&mdash;it was certainly not a
+      movement of fear.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Madam,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I admire your candor. Let me return it. I don't believe
+      there's one of you here has the pluck to attempt to do me any serious
+      injury. If there is, get on with it. You hear, Mr. Walter Crease? Bring
+      out that bottle of yours.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Crease removed his cigar from his lips and rose slowly to his feet. From
+      his waistcoat pocket he produced a small phial, from which he drew the
+      cork.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Seems to me it's up to us to do the trick,&rdquo; he remarked languidly. &ldquo;Catch
+      hold of his forehead, Jimmy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man known as Major Post threw away his cigarette, and coming round
+      behind Pritchard's chair, suddenly bent the man's head backward. Crease
+      advanced, phial in hand. Then all Hell seemed to be let loose in
+      Tavernake. He stepped back in his place and marked the extent of that
+      wooden partition. Then, setting his teeth, he sprang at it, throwing the
+      great weight of his massive shoulder against the framework door. Scratched
+      and bleeding, but still upon his feet, he burst into the room, with the
+      noise of bricks falling behind,&mdash;an apparition so unexpected that the
+      little company gathered there seemed turned into some waxwork group from
+      the Chamber of Horrors&mdash;motionless, without even the power of
+      movement.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake, in those few moments, was like a giant among a company of
+      degenerates. He was strong, his muscles were like whipcord, and his
+      condition was perfect. Walter Crease went over like a log before his fist;
+      Major Post felt the revolver at which he had snatched struck from his
+      hand, and he himself remembered nothing more till he came to his senses
+      some time afterwards. A slash and a cut and Pritchard was free. The
+      professor stood wringing his hands. Elizabeth had risen to her feet. She
+      was pale, but she was still more nearly composed than any other person in
+      the room. Tavernake and Pritchard were masters of the situation. Pritchard
+      leaned toward the mirror and straightened his tie.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am afraid,&rdquo; he said looking down at Walter Crease's groaning figure,
+      &ldquo;that our hosts are scarcely in fit condition to take leave of us. Never
+      mind, Mrs. Gardner, we excuse ourselves to you. I cannot pretend to be
+      sorry that my friend's somewhat impetuous entrance has disturbed your
+      plans for the evening, but I do hope that you will realize now the
+      fatuousness of such methods in these days. Good-night! It is time we
+      finished our stroll together, Tavernake.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They moved towards the door&mdash;there was no one to stop them. Only the
+      professor tried to say a few words.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear Mr. Pritchard&mdash;my dear Pritchard, if you will allow me to
+      call you so,&rdquo; he exclaimed, &ldquo;let me beg of you, before you leave us, not
+      to take this trifling adventure too seriously! I can assure you that it
+      was simply an attempt to coerce you, not in the least an affair to be
+      taken seriously!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Professor,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;and you, Walter Crease, and you, Jimmy Post, if
+      you're able to listen, listen to me. You have played the part of children
+      to-night. So surely as men and women exist who live as you do, so surely
+      must the law wait upon their heels. You cannot cheat justice. It is as
+      inexorable as Time itself. When you try these little tricks, you simply
+      give another turn to the wheel, add another danger to life. You had better
+      learn to look upon me as necessary, all of you, for I am certainly
+      inevitable.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They passed backwards through the door, then they went down the silent
+      hall and out into the street. Even as they did so, the clock struck a
+      quarter to two.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My friend Tavernake,&rdquo; Pritchard declared, lighting a cigarette with
+      steady fingers, &ldquo;you are a man. Come into the club with me while I bathe
+      my forehead. After all, we'll have that drink together before we say
+      goodnight.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0020" id="link2HCH0020">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XX. A PLEASANT REUNION
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake awoke some hours later with a puzzled sense of having lost his
+      own identity, of having taken up another man's life, stepped into another
+      man's shoes. From the day of his first arrival in London, a raw country
+      youth, till the night when he had spoken to Beatrice on the roof of
+      Blenheim House, nothing that could properly be called an adventure had
+      ever happened to him. He had never for a moment felt the want of it; he
+      had not even indulged in the reading of books of romance. The thing which
+      had happened last night, as in the cold morning sunlight he sat up in his
+      bed, seemed to him a thing grotesque, inconceivable. It was not really
+      possible that those people&mdash;those well-bred, well-looking people&mdash;had
+      seriously contemplated an enormity which seemed to belong to the back
+      pages of history, or that he, Tavernake, had burst through a wall with no
+      weapons in his hand, and had dominated the situation! He sat there
+      steadily thinking. It was incredible, but it was true! There existed still
+      in his mind some faint doubt as to whether they would really have
+      proceeded to extremities. Pritchard himself had made light of the whole
+      affair, afterwards had treated it, indeed, as a huge practical joke.
+      Tavernake, remembering that little group as he had first seen it, remained
+      doubtful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      By degrees, his own personal characteristics began to assert themselves.
+      He began to wonder how his action would affect his commercial interests.
+      He had probably made an enemy of this wonderful sister of Beatrice's, the
+      woman who had so completely filled his thoughts during the last few days,
+      the woman, too, who was to have found the money by means of which he was
+      to set his feet upon the first rung of the ladder. This was a thing, he
+      decided, which must be settled at once. He must see her and know exactly
+      what terms they were on, whether or not she meant to be off with her
+      bargain. The thought of action of any sort was stimulating. He rose and
+      dressed, had his breakfast, and set out on his pilgrimage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Soon after eleven o'clock, he presented himself at the Milan Court and
+      asked for Mrs. Wenham Gardner. For several minutes he waited about in
+      nervous anticipation, then he was told that she was not at home. More than
+      a little disappointed, he pressed for news of her. The hall porter thought
+      that she had gone down into the country, and if so it was doubtful when
+      she would be back. Tavernake was now seriously disconcerted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I want particularly to wire to her,&rdquo; he insisted. &ldquo;Please find out from
+      her maid how I shall direct a telegram.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The hall porter, who was a most superior person, regarded him blandly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We do not give addresses, sir,&rdquo; he explained, &ldquo;unless at the expressed
+      wish of our clients. If you leave a telegram here, I will send it up to
+      Mrs. Gardner's rooms to be forwarded.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake scribbled one out, begging for news of her return, added his
+      address and left the place. Then he wandered aimlessly about the streets.
+      There seemed something flat about the morning, some aftermath of the
+      excitement of the previous night was still stirring in his blood.
+      Nevertheless, he pulled himself together with an effort, called for a
+      young surveyor whom he had engaged to assist him, and spent the rest of
+      the day out upon the hill. Religiously he kept his thoughts turned upon
+      his work until the twilight came. Then he hurried home to meet the
+      disappointment which he had more than half anticipated. There was no
+      telegram for him! He ate his dinner and sat with folded arms, looking out
+      into the street. Still no telegram! The restlessness came back once more.
+      Soon after ten o'clock it became unbearable. He found himself longing for
+      company, the loneliness of his little room since the departure of Beatrice
+      had never seemed so real a thing. He stood it as long as he could and
+      then, catching up his hat and stick, he set his face eastwards, walking
+      vigorously, and with frequent glances at the clocks he passed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A few minutes past eleven o'clock, he found himself once more in that dark
+      thoroughfare at the back of the theatre. The lamp over the stage-door was
+      flickering in the same uncertain manner, the same motor-cars were there,
+      the same crowd of young men, except that each night they seemed to grow
+      larger. This time he had a few minutes only to wait. Beatrice came out
+      among the earliest. At the sight of her he was suddenly conscious that he
+      had, after all, no excuse for coming, that she would probably
+      cross-examine him about Elizabeth, would probably guess the secret of his
+      torments. He shrank back, but he was a moment too late for she had seen
+      him. With a few words of excuse to the others with whom she was talking,
+      she picked up her skirts and came swiftly across the muddy street.
+      Tavernake had no time to escape. He remained there until she came, but his
+      cheeks were hot, and he had an uncomfortable feeling that his presence,
+      that their meeting like this, was an embarrassment to both of them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear Leonard,&rdquo; she exclaimed, &ldquo;why do you hide over there?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't know,&rdquo; he answered simply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It looks as though you didn't want to see me,&rdquo; she remarked. &ldquo;If you
+      didn't, why are you here?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose I did want to see you,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;Anyhow, I was lonely. I
+      wanted to talk to some one. I walked all the way up here from Chelsea.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have something to tell me?&rdquo; she suggested.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There was something,&rdquo; he admitted. &ldquo;I thought perhaps you ought to know.
+      I had supper with your father last night. We talked about you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She started as though he had struck her; her face was suddenly pale and
+      anxious.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you serious, Leonard?&rdquo; she asked. &ldquo;My father?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I ought not to have blundered it out like that. I
+      forgot that you&mdash;you were not seeing anything of him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How did you meet him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By accident,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;I was sitting alone up in the balcony at
+      Imano's, and he wanted my table because he could see you from there, so we
+      shared it, and then we began talking. I knew who he was, of course; I had
+      seen him in your sister's room. He told me that he had engaged the table
+      for every night this week.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked across the road.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I can't go out with those people now,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;Wait here for me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She went back to her friends and talked to them for a moment or two.
+      Tavernake could hear Grier's protesting voice and Beatrice's light laugh.
+      Evidently they were trying uselessly to persuade her to change her mind.
+      Soon she came back to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry,&rdquo; he said reluctantly. &ldquo;I am afraid that I have spoiled your
+      evening.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't be foolish, please,&rdquo; she replied taking his arm. &ldquo;Do you believe
+      that my father will be up in the balcony at Imano's to-night?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He told me so.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We will go and sit up there,&rdquo; she decided. &ldquo;He knows where I am to be
+      found now so it doesn't matter. I should like to see him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They walked off together. Though she was evidently absent and distressed,
+      Tavernake felt once more that sense of pleasant companionship which her
+      near presence always brought him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is something else I must ask you,&rdquo; she began presently. &ldquo;I want to
+      know if you have seen Pritchard lately.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was with him last night,&rdquo; Tavernake answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She shivered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He was asking questions?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not about you,&rdquo; Tavernake assured her quickly. &ldquo;It is your sister in whom
+      he is interested.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice nodded, but she seemed very little relieved. Tavernake could see
+      that the old look of fear was back in her face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry, Beatrice,&rdquo; he said, regretfully. &ldquo;I seem just now to be
+      always bringing you reminiscences of the people whom it terrifies you to
+      hear about.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It isn't your fault, Leonard,&rdquo; she declared, &ldquo;only it is rather strange
+      that you should be mixed up with them in any way, isn't it? I suppose some
+      day you'll find out everything about me. Perhaps you'll be sorry then that
+      you ever even called yourself my brother.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't be foolish,&rdquo; he answered, brusquely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She patted his hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is the speculation going all right?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am hoping to get the money together this week,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;If I get
+      it, I shall be well off in a year, rich in five years.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is just a doubt about your getting it, then?&rdquo; she inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Just a doubt,&rdquo; he admitted. &ldquo;I have a solicitor who is doing his best to
+      raise a loan, but I have not heard from him for two days. Then I have also
+      a friend who has promised it to me, a friend upon whom I am not quite sure
+      if I can rely.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They turned into the Strand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me about my father, Leonard,&rdquo; she begged.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He hesitated; it was hard to know exactly how to speak of the professor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps if you have talked with him at all,&rdquo; she went on, &ldquo;it will help
+      you to understand one of the difficulties I had to face in life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is, I should imagine, a little weak,&rdquo; Tavernake suggested,
+      hesitatingly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;My mother left him in my charge, but I cannot keep
+      him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your sister&mdash;&rdquo; he began.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My sister has more influence than I. She makes life easier for him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They reached the restaurant and made their way upstairs. Tavernake
+      appropriated the same table and once more the head waiter protested.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If the gentleman comes again to-night,&rdquo; Tavernake said, &ldquo;you will find
+      that he will be only too glad to have supper with us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then the professor came. He made his usual somewhat theatrical entrance,
+      carrying his broad-brimmed hat in his hand, brandishing his silver-topped
+      cane. When he saw Tavernake and Beatrice, he stopped short. Then he held
+      out both hands, which Beatrice immediately seized. There were tears in his
+      eyes, tears running down his cheeks. He sat down heavily in the chair
+      which Tavernake was holding for him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice,&rdquo; he exclaimed, &ldquo;why, this is most affecting! You have come here
+      to have supper with your old father. You trust me, then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Absolutely,&rdquo; she replied, still clasping his hands. &ldquo;If you give me away
+      to Elizabeth, it will be the end. The next time I shall never be found.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;For some days,&rdquo; he assured her, &ldquo;I have known exactly where you were to
+      be found. I have never spoken of it. You are safe. My meals up here,&rdquo; he
+      added, with a little sigh, &ldquo;have been sad feasts. To-night we will be
+      cheerful. Some quails, I think, quails and some Clicquot for you, my dear.
+      You need it. Ah, this is a happiness indeed!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know Mr. Tavernake, father,&rdquo; she remarked, after he had given a
+      somewhat lengthy order to the waiter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I met and talked with Mr. Tavernake here the other night,&rdquo; the professor
+      admitted, with condescension.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake was very good to me at a time when I needed help,&rdquo; Beatrice
+      told him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor grasped Tavernake's hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You were good to my child,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you were good to me. Waiter, three
+      cocktails immediately,&rdquo; he ordered, turning round. &ldquo;I must drink your
+      health, Mr. Tavernake&mdash;I must drink your health at once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake leaned forward towards Beatrice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wonder,&rdquo; he suggested, &ldquo;whether you would not rather be alone with your
+      father.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know so much,&rdquo; she replied, &ldquo;and it really doesn't seem to matter.
+      Tell me, father, how do you spend your time?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I must confess, dear,&rdquo; the professor said, &ldquo;that I have little to do.
+      Your sister Elizabeth is quite generous.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice sat back in her chair as though she had been struck.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Father,&rdquo; she exclaimed, &ldquo;listen! You are living on that money! Doesn't it
+      seem terrible to you? Oh, how can you do it!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor looked at his daughter with an expression of pained
+      surprise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear,&rdquo; he explained, &ldquo;your sister Elizabeth has always been the
+      moneyed one of the family. She has brains and I trust her. It is not for
+      me to inquire as to the source of the comforts she provides for me. I feel
+      myself entitled to receive them, and so I accept.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, father,&rdquo; she went on, &ldquo;can't you see&mdash;don't you know that it's
+      his money&mdash;Wenham's?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is not a matter, this, my child,&rdquo; the professor observed, sharply,
+      &ldquo;which we can discuss before strangers. Some day we will speak of it, you
+      and I.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Has he&mdash;been heard of?&rdquo; she asked, in a whisper.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor frowned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A hot-tempered young man, my dear,&rdquo; he declared uneasily, &ldquo;a hot tempered
+      young man, indeed. Elizabeth gives me to understand that it was just an
+      ordinary quarrel and away he went.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice was white to the lips.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;An ordinary quarrel!&rdquo; she muttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She sat quite still. Tavernake unconsciously found himself watching her.
+      There were things in her eyes which frightened him. It seemed as though
+      she were looking out of the gay little restaurant, with its lights and
+      music and air of comfort, out into some distant quarter of the world, some
+      other and very different place. She was living through something which
+      chilled her heart, something terrifying. Tavernake saw those things in her
+      face and his eyes spelt them out mercilessly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Father,&rdquo; she whispered, leaning towards him, &ldquo;do you believe what you
+      have just been saying to me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was the professor's turn to be disturbed. He concealed his
+      discomfiture, however, with a gesture of annoyance.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is scarcely a proper question, Beatrice,&rdquo; he answered sharply. &ldquo;Ah,&rdquo;
+       he added, with more geniality, &ldquo;the cocktails! My young friend Tavernake,
+      I drink to our better acquaintance! You are English, as I can see, a real
+      Britisher. Some day you must come out to our own great country&mdash;my
+      daughter, of course, has told you that we are Americans. A great country,
+      sir,&mdash;the greatest I have ever lived in&mdash;room to breathe, room
+      to grow, room for a young man like you to plant his ambitions and watch
+      them blossom. To our better acquaintance, Mr. Tavernake, and may we meet
+      some day in the United States!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake drank the first cocktail in his life and wiped the tears from
+      his eyes. The professor found safety in conversation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;that I am a man of science. Physiognomy delights
+      me. Men and women as I meet them represent to me varying types of
+      humanity, all interesting, all appealing to my peculiar love of the
+      science of psychology. You, my dear Mr. Tavernake, if I may venture to be
+      so personal, represent to me, as you sit there, the exact prototype of the
+      young working Englishman. You are, I should judge, thorough, dogmatic,
+      narrow, persistent, industrious, and bound to be successful according to
+      the scope and nature of your ambitions. In this country you will never
+      develop. In my country, sir, we should make a colossus of you. We should
+      teach you not to be content with small things; we should raise your hand
+      which you yourself kept to your side, and we should point your finger to
+      the skies. Waiter,&rdquo; he added, turning abruptly round, &ldquo;if the quails are
+      not yet ready I will take another of these excellent cocktails.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was embarrassed. He saw that Beatrice was anxious to talk to her
+      father; he saw, also, that her father was determined not to talk to her.
+      With a little sigh, however, she resigned herself to the inevitable.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have lectured, sir,&rdquo; the professor continued, &ldquo;in most of the cities of
+      the United States, upon the human race. The tendencies of every unit of
+      the human race are my peculiar study. When I speak to you of phrenology,
+      sir, you smile, and you think, perhaps, of a man who sits in a back room
+      and takes your shilling for feeling the bumps of your head. I am not of
+      this order of scientific men, sir. I have diplomas from every university
+      worth mentioning. I blend the sciences which treat with the human race. I
+      know something of all of them. Character reading to me is at once a
+      passion and a science. Leave me alone with a man or a woman for five
+      minutes, paint me a map of Life, and I will set the signposts along which
+      that person will travel, and I shall not miss one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are doing no work over here, father, are you?&rdquo; Beatrice asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;None, my dear,&rdquo; he answered, with a faint note of regret in his tone.
+      &ldquo;Your sister Elizabeth seemed scarcely to desire it. Her movements are
+      very uncertain and she likes to have me constantly at hand. My daughter
+      Elizabeth,&rdquo; he continued, turning to Tavernake, &ldquo;is a very beautiful young
+      woman, left in my charge under peculiar circumstances. I feel it my duty,
+      therefore, to be constantly at hand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Again there was a flash of that strange look in the girl's face. She
+      leaned forward, but her father declined to meet her gaze.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;May I ask one or two personal questions?&rdquo; she faltered. &ldquo;Remember, I have
+      not seen or heard anything from either of you for seven months.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By all means, my dear,&rdquo; the professor declared. &ldquo;Your sister, I am glad
+      to say, is well. I myself am as you see me. We have had a pleasant time
+      and we have met some dear old friends from the other side. Our greatest
+      trouble is that you are temporarily lost to us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Elizabeth doesn't guess&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My child,&rdquo; the professor interrupted, &ldquo;I have been loyal to you. If
+      Elizabeth knew that I could tell her at any moment your exact whereabouts,
+      I think that she would be more angry with me than ever she has been in her
+      life, and, my dear,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;you know, when Elizabeth is angry, things
+      are apt to be unpleasant. But I have been dumb. I have not spoken, nor
+      shall I. Yet,&rdquo; the professor went on, &ldquo;you must not think, Beatrice, that
+      because I yield to your whim in this matter I recognize any sufficient
+      cause why you should voluntarily estrange yourself from those whose right
+      and privilege it is to look after you. You are able, I am glad to see, to
+      make your way in the world. I have attended the Atlas Theatre, and I am
+      glad to see that you have lost none of your old skill in the song and
+      dance. You are deservedly popular there. Soon, I have no doubt, you will
+      aspire to more important parts. Still, my dear child,&rdquo; the professor
+      continued, disposing of his second cocktail, &ldquo;I see no reason why your
+      very laudable desire to remain independent should be incompatible with a
+      life under your sister's roof and my protection. Mr. Tavernake here, with
+      his British instincts, will, I am sure, agree with me that it is not well
+      for a young lady&mdash;my own daughter, sir, but I may say it&mdash;of
+      considerable personal attractions, to live alone or under the chaperonage
+      merely of these other young ladies of the theatre.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think,&rdquo;, Tavernake said, &ldquo;that your daughter must have very strong
+      reasons for preferring to live alone.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Imaginary ones, my dear sir,&rdquo; the professor assured him,&mdash;&ldquo;altogether
+      imaginary. The quails at last! And the Clicquot! Now this is really a
+      delightful little meeting. I drink to its repetition. This is indeed a
+      treat for me. Beatrice, my love to you! Mr. Tavernake, my best respects!
+      The only vintage, sir,&rdquo; he concluded, setting down his empty glass
+      appreciatively.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;To go back to what you were saying just now,&rdquo; Tavernake remarked, &ldquo;I
+      quite agree with you about Beatrice's living alone. I am very anxious for
+      her to marry me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor set down his knife and fork. His appearance was one of
+      ponderous theatricality.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sir,&rdquo; he declared, &ldquo;this is indeed a most momentous statement. Am I to
+      take it as a serious offer for my daughter's hand?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice leaned over and laid her fingers upon his.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Father,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;it doesn't matter please. I am not willing to marry
+      Mr. Tavernake.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor looked from one to the other and coughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are Mr. Tavernake's means,&rdquo; he asked, &ldquo;of sufficient importance to
+      warrant his entering into matrimony?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have no money at all to speak of,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;That really
+      isn't important. I shall very soon make all that your daughter can spend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I agree with my daughter, sir,&rdquo; the professor declared. &ldquo;The subject
+      might well be left until such time as you have improved your position. We
+      will dismiss it, therefore,&mdash;dismiss it at once. We will talk&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Father,&rdquo; Beatrice interrupted, &ldquo;let us talk about yourself. Don't you
+      think you would be more contented, happier, if you were to try to arrange
+      for a few&mdash;a few demonstrations or lectures over here, as you at
+      first intended? I know that you must find having nothing to do such a
+      strain upon you,&rdquo; she added.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      It was perhaps by accident that her eyes were fixed upon the glass which
+      the professor was carrying to his lips. He set it down at once.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My child,&rdquo; he said, in a low tone, &ldquo;I understand you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; she insisted, &ldquo;I didn't mean that, but you are always better
+      when you are working. A man like you,&rdquo; she went on, a little wistfully,
+      &ldquo;should not waste his talents.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are perhaps right, my child,&rdquo; he admitted. &ldquo;I will go and see my
+      agents to-morrow. Up till now,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;I have refused all offers. I
+      have felt that Elizabeth, the care of Elizabeth in her peculiar position,
+      demanded my whole attention. Perhaps you are right. Perhaps I have
+      over-estimated the necessity of being constantly at her right hand. She is
+      a very clever woman Elizabeth,&rdquo; he concluded, &ldquo;very clever indeed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where is she now, father?&rdquo; Beatrice asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She motored into the country early this morning with some friends,&rdquo; the
+      professor said. &ldquo;They went to a party last night with Walter Crease,
+      London correspondent to the New York Gazette,&rdquo; he explained, turning a
+      little away from Tavernake. &ldquo;They were all home very late, I understand,
+      and Elizabeth complained of a headache this morning. Personally, I regret
+      to say that I was not up when they left.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice leaned quite close to her father.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you see anything of the man Pritchard?&rdquo; she inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor was suddenly flabby. He set down his glass, spilling half
+      its contents. He stole a quick glance at Tavernake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My child,&rdquo; he exclaimed, &ldquo;you ought to consider my nerves! You know very
+      well that the sudden mention of any one whom I dislike so intensely is bad
+      for me. I am surprised at you, Beatrice. You show a culpable lack of
+      consideration for my infirmities.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry, father,&rdquo; she whispered, &ldquo;but is he here?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is,&rdquo; the professor admitted. &ldquo;Between ourselves,&rdquo; he added, a white,
+      scared look upon his pale face, &ldquo;he is spoiling my whole peace of mind. My
+      enjoyment of the comforts which Elizabeth is able to provide for me is
+      interfered with by that man's constant presence. He seldom speaks, and yet
+      he seems always to be watching. I do not trust him, Beatrice. I am a judge
+      of men and I tell you that I do not trust him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wish that Elizabeth would go away,&rdquo; Beatrice said in a low tone. &ldquo;Of
+      course, I have no right&mdash;to say things. Nothing serious has perhaps
+      ever happened. And yet&mdash;and yet, for her own sake, I do not think
+      that she should stay here in London with Pritchard close at hand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor raised his glass with shaking fingers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Elizabeth knows what is best,&rdquo; he declared, &ldquo;I am sure that Elizabeth
+      knows what is best, but I, too, am beginning to wish that she would go
+      away. Last night we met him at Walter Crease's.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Once more he turned a little nervously towards Tavernake, who was looking
+      down into the body of the restaurant with immovable face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We tried to persuade him then to go away. He is really in rather a
+      dangerous position here. Jimmy Post has sworn that he will not be taken
+      back to New York, and there are one or two others&mdash;a pretty desperate
+      crew. We tried last night to reason with Pritchard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was no good?&rdquo; she whispered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No good at all,&rdquo; the professor answered, drily. &ldquo;Perhaps, if we had not
+      been interrupted, we might have convinced him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me about it,&rdquo; she begged.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor shook his head. Tavernake still had that air of paying no
+      attention whatever to their conversation.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is not for you to know about, my dear,&rdquo; he concluded. &ldquo;You have chosen
+      very wisely to keep out of these matters. Elizabeth has such wonderful
+      courage. My own nerve, I regret to say, is not quite what it was. Waiter,
+      I will take a liqueur of the old brandy in a large glass.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The brandy was brought, but the professor seemed haunted by memories and
+      his spirits never wholly returned. Not until the lights were turned down
+      and Tavernake had paid the bill, did he partially recover his former
+      manner.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear child,&rdquo; he said, as they stood up together, &ldquo;I cannot tell you what
+      the pleasure has been of this brief reunion.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She rested her fingers upon his shoulders and looked up into his face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Father,&rdquo; she begged, softly, &ldquo;come to me. I can keep you, if you don't
+      mind for a short time being poor. You shall have all my salary except just
+      enough for my clothes, and anything will do for me to wear. I will try so
+      hard to make you comfortable.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked at her with an air of offended dignity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My child,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;you must not talk to me like that. If I did not
+      feel that my duty lay with Elizabeth, I should insist upon your coming to
+      me, and under those conditions it would be I who should provide, not you.
+      But for the moment I cannot leave your elder sister altogether. She needs
+      me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice turned away a little sadly. They all three descended the stairs.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall leave our young friend, Mr. Tavernake, to escort you to your
+      home,&rdquo; the professor announced. &ldquo;I myself shall telephone to see if
+      Elizabeth has returned. If she is still away, I shall spend an hour or
+      two, I think, with my friends at the Blue Room Club. Beatrice, this has
+      been a joy to me, a joy soon, I hope, to be repeated.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He took both her hands. She smiled at him with an attempt at cheerfulness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Good-night, father!&rdquo; she said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And to you, sir, also, good-night!&rdquo; the professor added, taking
+      Tavernake's hand and holding it for a minute in his, while he looked
+      impressively in his face. &ldquo;I will not say too much, but I will say this:
+      so much as I have seen of you, I like. Good-night!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He turned and strode away. Both Beatrice and Tavernake watched him until
+      he disappeared. Then, with a sigh, she picked up her skirts with her right
+      hand, and took Tavernake's arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you mind walking home?&rdquo; she asked. &ldquo;My head aches.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake looked for a moment wistfully across the road toward the Milan
+      Court. Beatrice's hand, however, only held his arm the tighter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am going to make you come with me every step of the way,&rdquo; she declared,
+      &ldquo;so you can just as well make the best of it. Afterwards&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What about afterwards?&rdquo; he interrupted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Afterwards,&rdquo; she continued, with decision, &ldquo;you are to go straight home!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0021" id="link2HCH0021">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXI. SOME EXCELLENT ADVICE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake, in response to a somewhat urgent message, walked into his
+      solicitor's office almost as soon as they opened on the following morning.
+      The junior partner of the firm, who took an interest in him, and was
+      anxious, indeed, to invest a small amount in the Marston Rise Building
+      Company, received him cordially but with some concern.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look here, Tavernake,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I thought I'd better write a line and
+      ask you to come down. You haven't forgotten, have you, that our option of
+      purchase lasts only three days longer?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, what of it?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It's just as well that you should understand the situation,&rdquo; the lawyer
+      continued. &ldquo;Your old people are hard upon our heels in this matter, and
+      there will be no chance of any extension&mdash;not even for an hour. Mr.
+      Dowling has already put in an offer a thousand pounds better than yours; I
+      heard that incidentally yesterday afternoon; so you may be sure that the
+      second your option has legally expired, the thing will be off altogether
+      so far as you're concerned.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That's all very well,&rdquo; Tavernake remarked, &ldquo;but what about the plots that
+      already belong to me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They have some sort of scheme for leaving those high and dry,&rdquo; the
+      solicitor explained. &ldquo;You see, the drainage and lighting will be largely
+      influenced by the purchaser of the whole estate. If Dowling gets it, he
+      means to treat your plots so that they will become practically valueless.
+      It's rather a mean sort of thing, but then he's a mean little man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; he announced, &ldquo;I was coming to see you, anyhow, this morning, to
+      talk to you about the money.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your friend isn't backing out?&rdquo; the lawyer asked, quickly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My friend has not said anything about backing out yet,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      replied, &ldquo;but circumstances have arisen during the last few days which
+      have altered my own views as to the expediency of business relations with
+      this person. I haven't any reason to suppose that the money won't be
+      forthcoming, but if I could get it from any other source, I should prefer
+      it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The solicitor looked blank.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I'll do what I can, if you like, but I may as well
+      tell you at once that I don't think I should have a ghost of a chance of
+      raising the whole amount.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose,&rdquo; Tavernake inquired, thoughtfully, &ldquo;your firm couldn't do
+      anything?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We could do something, certainly,&rdquo; the solicitor answered, &ldquo;on account of
+      our own clients. We might, perhaps, manage up to five thousand pounds.
+      That would still leave us wanting seven, however, and I scarcely see where
+      we could get it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was silent for a few moments.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You haven't quarreled with your friend, have you?&rdquo; the solicitor asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, there has been no quarrel,&rdquo; Tavernake replied. &ldquo;I have another
+      reason.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If I were you, I'd try and forget it,&rdquo; his friend advised. &ldquo;To tell you
+      the truth, I have been feeling rather anxious about this affair. It's a
+      big thing, you know, and the profit is as sure as the dividend on Consols.
+      I should hate to have that little bounder Dowling get in and scoop it up.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It's a fine investment,&rdquo; admitted Tavernake, &ldquo;and, as you say, there
+      isn't the slightest risk. That's why I was hoping you might have been able
+      to manage it without my calling upon my friend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mr. Martin shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It isn't so easy to convince other people. All the same, I don't want to
+      get left. If you'll take my advice, you'll go and call on your friend at
+      once, and see exactly how matters stand. If everything's O.K. and you can
+      induce him to part a few hours before it is absolutely necessary, I must
+      confess that it would take a load off my mind. I don't like these affairs
+      that have to be concluded at the last possible moment.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; Tavernake agreed, &ldquo;I must try what I can do, then. There is
+      nothing else fresh, I suppose?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing,&rdquo; the solicitor answered. &ldquo;Come back, if you can make any
+      definite arrangement, or telephone. The matter is really bothering me a
+      little. I don't want to have the other people slip in now.&rdquo;...
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake, instead of obeying his first impulse and making his way direct
+      to the Milan Court, walked to the flat in Kingsway, climbed up the stone
+      steps, and asked for Beatrice. She met him at her own door, fully dressed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear Leonard!&rdquo; she exclaimed, in surprise. &ldquo;What an early caller!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I want a few words with you,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Can you spare me five minutes?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must walk with me to the theatre,&rdquo; she replied, &ldquo;I am just off to
+      rehearsal.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They descended the stairs together.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have something to tell you,&rdquo; Tavernake began, &ldquo;something to tell you
+      which you won't like to hear.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Something which I won't like to hear,&rdquo; she repeated, fearfully. &ldquo;Go on,
+      Leonard. It can't be worse than it sounds.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't know why I've come to tell you,&rdquo; he went on. &ldquo;I never meant to.
+      It came into my mind all of a sudden and I felt that I must. It has to do
+      with your sister and the Marston Rise affair.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My sister and the Marston Rise affair!&rdquo; Beatrice exclaimed,
+      incredulously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Then a sudden light broke in upon her. She stopped short and clutched at
+      his hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You don't mean that it was Elizabeth who was going to find you the
+      money?&rdquo; she cried.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;She offered it of her own accord. I do not know why
+      I talked to her of my own affairs, but she led me on to speak of them.
+      Your sister is a wonderful person,&rdquo; he continued, dropping his voice. &ldquo;I
+      don't know why, but she made me talk as no one else has ever made me talk
+      before. I simply had to tell her things. Then, when I had finished, she
+      showed me her bankbooks and suggested that she should invest some of her
+      money in the Rise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But do you mean to tell me,&rdquo; Beatrice persisted, &ldquo;that it is her money
+      upon which you are relying for this purchase?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You see,&rdquo; he explained, &ldquo;Mr. Dowling dropped upon us before I was
+      prepared. As soon as he found out, he went to the owners of the estate and
+      made them a bid for it. The consequence was that they shortened my option
+      and gave me very little chance indeed to find the money. When your sister
+      offered it, it certainly seemed a wonderful stroke of fortune. I could
+      give her eight or ten per cent, whereas she would only get four anywhere
+      else, and I should make a profit for myself of over ten thousand pounds,
+      which I cannot do unless I find the money to buy the estate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But you mustn't touch that money, you mustn't have anything to do with
+      it!&rdquo; Beatrice exclaimed, walking very fast and looking straight ahead.
+      &ldquo;You don't understand. How should you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you mean that the money was stolen?&rdquo; Tavernake asked, after a moment's
+      pause.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, not stolen,&rdquo; Beatrice replied, &ldquo;but it comes&mdash;oh! I can't tell
+      you, only Elizabeth has no right to it. My own sister! It is all too
+      awful!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you think that she has come by this money dishonestly?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not sure,&rdquo; Beatrice murmured. &ldquo;There are worse things, more terrible
+      things even than theft.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The practical side of Tavernake's nature was very much to the fore that
+      morning. He began to wonder whether women, after all, strange and
+      fascinating creatures though they were, possessed judgment which could be
+      relied upon&mdash;whether they were not swayed too much by sentiment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you must understand this. I have no time to raise
+      the money elsewhere. If I don't get it from your sister, supposing she is
+      still willing to let me have it, my chance has gone. I shall have to take
+      a situation in some one else's office as a clerk&mdash;probably not so
+      good a place as I held at Dowling &amp; Spence's. On the other hand, the
+      use of that money for a very short time would be the start of my career.
+      All that you say is so vague. Why need I know anything about it? I met
+      your sister in the ordinary way of business and she has made an ordinary
+      business proposition to me, one by which she will be, incidentally, very
+      greatly benefited. I never thought of telling you this at all, but when
+      the time came I hated to go and draw that money from your sister without
+      having said anything to you. So I came this morning, but I want you, if
+      you possibly can, to look at the matter from my point of view.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She was silent for several moments. Then she glanced at him curiously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why on earth,&rdquo; she asked, &ldquo;should my sister make this offer to you? She
+      isn't a fool. She doesn't usually trust strangers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She trusted me, apparently,&rdquo; Tavernake answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can you understand why?&rdquo; Beatrice demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think that I can,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;If one can rely upon one's perception,
+      she is surrounded by people whom she might find agreeable companions but
+      whom she is scarcely likely to have much confidence in. Perhaps she
+      realized that I wasn't like them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you want very much to take this money?&rdquo; she said, half to herself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I want to very much indeed,&rdquo; Tavernake admitted. &ldquo;I was on my way to see
+      her this morning and to ask her to let me have it a day or two before the
+      time, but I felt, somehow, that there seemed to be a certain amount of
+      deceit in going to her and taking it without saying a word to you. I felt
+      that I had to come here first. But Beatrice, don't ask me to give it up.
+      It means such a long time before I can move again. It's the first step
+      that's so difficult, and I must&mdash;I must make a start. It's such a
+      chance, this. I have spent so many hours thinking about it. I have planned
+      and worked and sketched it all out as no one else could do. I must have
+      that money.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They walked on in silence until they reached the stage door. Beatrice was
+      thinking of her companion as she had seen him so often, poring over his
+      plans, busy with ruler and india-rubber, absolutely absorbed in the
+      interest of his task. She remembered the first time he had talked about
+      this scheme of his, how his whole face had changed, the almost passionate
+      interest with which he had worked the thing out even to its smallest
+      details. She realized how great a part of his life the thing had become,
+      what a terrible blow it would be to him to have to abandon it. She turned
+      and faced him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;perhaps, after all, you are right. Perhaps I give
+      way too much to what, after all, is only a sentimental feeling. I am
+      thankful that you came and told me; I shall always be thankful for that.
+      Take the money, but pay it back as soon as you can.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall do that,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;I shall do that you may rely upon it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laid her hand upon his arm.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard,&rdquo; she begged, &ldquo;I know that Elizabeth is very beautiful and very
+      fascinating, and I don't wonder that you like to go and see her, but I
+      want to ask you to promise me one thing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He felt as though he were suddenly turned into stone. It was not possible&mdash;it
+      could not be possible that she had guessed his secret!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well?&rdquo; he demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't let her introduce you to her friends; don't spend too much time
+      there,&rdquo; she continued. &ldquo;Elizabeth is my sister and I don't&mdash;really I
+      don't want to say anything that doesn't sound kind, but her friends are
+      not fit people for you to know, and Elizabeth&mdash;well she hasn't very
+      much heart.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He was silent for several moments.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How did you know I liked going to see your sister?&rdquo; he asked, abruptly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear Leonard,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;you are not very clever at hiding your
+      feelings. When you came to see me the other day, do you imagine I believed
+      for a single moment that you asked me to marry you simply because you
+      cared? I think, Leonard, that it was because you were afraid, you were
+      afraid of something coming into your life so big, so terrifying, that you
+      were ready to clutch at the easiest chance of safety.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice, this is absurd!&rdquo; he exclaimed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, it isn't that,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;Do you know, my dear Leonard, what
+      there was about you from the very first which attracted me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was your honesty,&rdquo; she continued. &ldquo;You remember that night upon the
+      roof at Blenheim House? You were going to tell a lie for me, and I know
+      how you hated it. You love the truth, you are truthful naturally; I would
+      rely upon you wherever I was. I know that you would keep your word, I know
+      that you would be honest. A woman loves to feel that about a man&mdash;she
+      loves it&mdash;and I don't want you to be brought near the people who
+      sneer at honesty and all good things. I don't want you to hear their point
+      of view. You may be simple and commonplace in some respects; I want you to
+      stay just as you are. Do you understand?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I understand,&rdquo; Tavernake replied gravely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A call boy shouted her name down the stone passage. She patted him on the
+      shoulder and turned away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Run along now and get the money,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;Come and see me when it's
+      all over.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake left her with a long breath of relief and made his way towards
+      the Strand. At the corner of Wellington Street he came face to face with
+      Pritchard. They stopped at once. There seemed to be something embarrassing
+      about this meeting. Pritchard patted him familiarly on the shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How goes it, old man?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am all right,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, somewhat awkwardly. &ldquo;How are you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I guess I'd be the better for a drink,&rdquo; Pritchard declared. &ldquo;Come along.
+      Pretty well done up the other night, weren't we? We'll step into the
+      American Bar here and try a gin fizz.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They found themselves presently perched upon two high stools in a deserted
+      corner of the bar to which Pritchard had led the way. Tavernake sipped his
+      drink tentatively.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should like,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;to ask you a question or two about Wednesday
+      night.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go right ahead,&rdquo; he invited.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You seem to take the whole affair as a sort of joke,&rdquo; Tavernake remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, isn't that what it was?&rdquo; the detective asked, smiling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake shrugged his shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There didn't seem to me to be much joke about it!&rdquo; he exclaimed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard laughed gayly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are not used to Americans, my young friend,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Over on this
+      side you are all so fearfully literal. You are not seriously supposing
+      that they meant to dose me with that stuff the other night, eh?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I never thought that there was any doubt about it at all,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      declared deliberately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard stroked his moustache meditatively.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; he remarked, &ldquo;you are certainly green, and yet I don't know why
+      you shouldn't be. Americans are always up to games of that sort. I am not
+      saying that they didn't mean to give me a scare, if they could, or that
+      they wouldn't have been glad to get a few words of information out of me,
+      or a paper or two that I keep pretty safely locked up. It would have been
+      a better joke on me then. But as for the rest, as for really trying to
+      make me take that stuff, of course, that was all bunkum.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake sat quite still in his chair for several minutes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you take another gin fizz, Mr. Pritchard?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake gave the order. He sat on his stool whistling softly to himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then I suppose,&rdquo; he said at last, &ldquo;I must have looked a pretty sort of an
+      ass coming through the wall like a madman.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You looked just about what you were,&rdquo; he answered, &ldquo;a d&mdash;&mdash;d
+      good sort. I'm not playing up to you that it was all pretense. You can
+      never trust that gang. The blackguard outside was in earnest, anyway.
+      After all, you know, they wouldn't miss me if I were to drop quietly out.
+      There 's no one else they 're quite so much afraid of. There 's no one
+      else knows quite as much about them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, we'll let it go at that,&rdquo; Tavernake declared. &ldquo;You know so much of
+      all these people, though, that I rather wish you 'd tell me something I
+      want very much to know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It's by telling nothing,&rdquo; the detective replied quickly, &ldquo;that I know as
+      much as I do. Just one cocktail, eh?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I drank my first cocktail last night,&rdquo; he remarked. &ldquo;I had supper with
+      the professor and his daughter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not Elizabeth?&rdquo; Pritchard asked swiftly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;With Miss Beatrice,&rdquo; he answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard set down his glass.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say, Tavernake,&rdquo; he inquired, &ldquo;you are friendly with that young lady,
+      Miss Beatrice, aren't you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I certainly am,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I have a very great regard for
+      her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then I can tell you how to do her a good turn,&rdquo; Pritchard continued,
+      earnestly. &ldquo;Keep her away from that old blackguard. Keep her away from all
+      the gang. Believe me, she is looking for trouble by even speaking to
+      them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But the man's her father,&rdquo; Tavernake objected, &ldquo;and he seems fond of
+      her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't you believe it,&rdquo; Pritchard went on. &ldquo;He's fond of nothing and
+      nobody but himself and easy living. He's soft, mind you, he's got plenty
+      of sentiment, he 'll squeeze a tear out of his eye, and all that sort of
+      thing, but he'd sell his soul, or his daughter's soul, for a little extra
+      comfort. Now Elizabeth doesn't know exactly where her sister is, and she
+      daren't seem anxious, or go around making inquiries. Beatrice has her
+      chance to keep away, and I can tell you it will be a thundering sight
+      better for her if she does.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, I don't understand it at all,&rdquo; Tavernake declared. &ldquo;I hate
+      mysteries.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard set down his empty glass.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look here,&rdquo; he remarked, &ldquo;this affair is too serious, after all, for us
+      to talk round like a couple of gossips. I have given you your warning, and
+      if you're wise you 'll remember it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me this one thing,&rdquo; Tavernake persisted. &ldquo;Tell me what is the cause
+      of the quarrel between the two? Can't something be done to bring them
+      together again?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;As things are at present, they are better apart.
+      Coming my way?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake followed him out of the place. Pritchard took his arm as he
+      turned down toward the Strand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My young friend,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;here is a word of advice for you. The
+      Scriptures say that you cannot serve God and mammon. Paraphrase that to
+      the present situation and remember that you cannot serve Elizabeth and
+      Beatrice.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What then?&rdquo; Tavernake demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The detective waited until he had lit the long black cigar between his
+      teeth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I guess you'd better confine your attentions to Beatrice,&rdquo; he concluded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0022" id="link2HCH0022">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXII. DINNER WITH ELIZABETH
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The rest of that day was for Tavernake a period of feverish anxieties. He
+      received two telegrams from Mr. Martin, his solicitor, and he himself was
+      more uneasy than he cared to admit. At three o'clock in the afternoon, at
+      eight in the evening, and again at eleven o'clock at night, he presented
+      himself at the Milan Court, always with the same inquiry. On the last
+      occasion, the hall porter had cheering news for him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mrs. Wenham Gardner returned from the country an hour ago, sir,&rdquo; he
+      announced. &ldquo;I can send your name up now, if you wish to see her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was conscious of a sense of immense relief. Of course, he had
+      known that she had not really gone away for good, but all the same her
+      absence, especially after the event of the night before last, was a little
+      disquieting.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My name is Tavernake,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I do not wish to intrude at such an
+      hour, but if she could see me for a moment, I should be glad.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He sat down and waited patiently. Soon a message came that Mr. Tavernake
+      was to go up. He ascended in the lift and knocked at the door of her
+      suite. Her maid opened it grudgingly. She scarcely took the pains to
+      conceal her disapproval of this young man&mdash;so ordinary, so gauche.
+      Why Madame should waste her time upon such a one, she could not imagine!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mrs. Gardner will see you directly,&rdquo; she told him. &ldquo;Madame is dressing
+      now to go out for supper. She will be able to spare you only a few
+      seconds.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake remained alone in the luxurious little sitting-room for nearly
+      ten minutes. Then the door of the inner room was opened and Elizabeth
+      appeared. Tavernake, rising slowly to his feet, looked at her for a moment
+      in reluctant but wondering admiration. She was wearing an ivory satin
+      gown, without trimming or lace of any sort, a gown the fit of which seemed
+      to him almost a miracle. Her only jewelry was a long rope of pearls and a
+      small tiara. Tavernake had never been brought into close contact with any
+      one quite like this.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She was putting on her gloves as she entered and she gave him her left
+      hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What an extraordinary person you are, Mr. Tavernake!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;You
+      really do seem to turn up at the most astonishing times.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am very sorry to have intruded upon you to-night,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;As regards
+      the last occasion, however, upon which I made an unexpected appearance, I
+      make no apologies whatever,&rdquo; he added coolly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed softly. She was looking full into his eyes and yet he could
+      not tell whether she was angry with him or only amused.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You were by way of being a little melodramatic, were you not?&rdquo; she
+      remarked. &ldquo;Still, you were very much in earnest, and one forgives a great
+      deal to any one who is really in earnest. What do you want with me now? I
+      am just going downstairs to supper.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a matter of business,&rdquo; Tavernake replied. &ldquo;I have a friend who is a
+      partner with me in the Marston Rise building speculation, and he is
+      worried because there is some one else in the field wanting to buy the
+      property, and the day after to-morrow is our last chance of paying over
+      the money.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him as though puzzled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What money?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The money which you agreed to lend me, or rather to invest in our
+      building company,&rdquo; he reminded her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course! Why, I had forgotten all about it for the moment. You are
+      going to give me ten per cent interest or something splendid, aren't you?
+      Well, what about it? You don't want to take it away with you now, I
+      suppose?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he answered, &ldquo;it isn't that. To be honest with you, I came to make
+      sure that you hadn't changed your mind.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And why should I change my mind?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You might be angry with me,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;for interfering in your concerns
+      the night before last.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps I am,&rdquo; she remarked, indifferently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you wish to withdraw from your promise?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I really haven't thought much about it,&rdquo; she replied, carelessly.
+      &ldquo;By-the-bye, have you seen Beatrice lately?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We agreed, I think,&rdquo; he reminded her, &ldquo;that we would not talk about your
+      sister.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him over her shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not remember that I agreed to anything of the sort,&rdquo; she declared.
+      &ldquo;I think it was you who laid down the law about that. As a matter of fact,
+      I think that your silence about her is very unkind. I suppose you have
+      seen her?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I have seen her,&rdquo; Tavernake admitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She continues to be tragic,&rdquo; Elizabeth asked, &ldquo;whenever my name is
+      mentioned?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should not call it tragic,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, reluctantly. &ldquo;One
+      gathers, however, that something transpired between you before she left,
+      of a serious nature.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him earnestly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Really,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;you are a strange, stolid young man. I wonder,&rdquo; she
+      went on, smiling into his face, &ldquo;are you in love with my sister?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake made no immediate response, only something flashed for a moment
+      in his eyes which puzzled her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why do you look at me like that?&rdquo; she demanded. &ldquo;You are not angry with
+      me for asking?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, I am not angry,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;It isn't that. But you must know&mdash;you
+      must see!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then she indeed did see that he was laboring under a very great emotion.
+      She leaned towards him, laughing softly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now you are really becoming interesting,&rdquo; she murmured. &ldquo;Tell me&mdash;tell
+      me all about it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't know what love is!&rdquo; Tavernake declared fiercely. &ldquo;I don't know
+      what it means to be in love!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Again she laughed in his face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you so sure?&rdquo; she whispered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She saw the veins stand out upon his temples, watched the passion which
+      kept him at first tongue-tied.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sure!&rdquo; he muttered. &ldquo;Who can be sure when you look like that!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He held out his arms. With a swift little backward movement she flitted
+      away and leaned against the table.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What a brother-in-law you would make!&rdquo; she laughed. &ldquo;So steady, so
+      respectable, alas! so serious! Dear Mr. Tavernake, I wish you joy. As a
+      matter of fact, you and Beatrice are very well suited for one another.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The telephone bell rang. She moved over and held the receiver to her ear.
+      Her face changed. After the first few words to which she listened, it grew
+      dark with anger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mean to say that Professor Franklin has not been in since
+      lunch-time?&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;I left word particularly that I should
+      require him to-night. Is Major Post there, then? No? Mr. Crease&mdash;no?
+      Nor Mr. Faulkes? Not one of them! Very well, ring me up directly the
+      professor comes in, or any of them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She replaced the receiver with a gesture of annoyance. Tavernake was
+      astonished at the alteration in her expression. The smile had gone, and
+      with its passing away lines had come under her eyes and about her mouth.
+      Without a word to him she strode away into her bedroom. Tavernake was just
+      wondering whether he should retire, when she came back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Listen, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;how far away are your rooms?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Down at Chelsea,&rdquo; he answered, &ldquo;about two miles and a half.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take a taxi and drive there,&rdquo; she commanded, &ldquo;or stop. You will find my
+      car outside. I will telephone down to say that you are to use it. Change
+      into your evening clothes and come back for me. I want you to take me out
+      to supper.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked at her in amazement. She stamped her foot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't stand there hesitating!&rdquo; she ordered. &ldquo;Do as I say! You don't
+      expect I am going to help you to buy your wretched property if you refuse
+      me the simplest of favors? Hurry, I say! Hurry!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am really very sorry,&rdquo; Tavernake interposed, &ldquo;but I do not possess a
+      dress suit. I would go, with pleasure, but I haven't got such a thing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him for a moment incredulously. Then she broke into a fit of
+      uncontrollable laughter. She sat down upon the edge of a couch and wiped
+      the tears from her eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, you strange, you wonderful person!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;You want to buy
+      an estate and you want to borrow twelve thousand pounds, and you know
+      where Beatrice is and you won't tell me, and you are fully convinced,
+      because you burst into a house through the wall, that you saved poor
+      Pritchard from being poisoned, and you don't possess a dress suit! Never
+      mind, as it happens it doesn't matter about the dress suit. You shall take
+      me out as you are.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake felt in his pockets and remembered that he had only thirty
+      shillings with him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Here, carry my purse,&rdquo; she said carelessly. &ldquo;We are going downstairs to
+      the smaller restaurant. I have been traveling since six o'clock, and I am
+      starving.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But how about my clothes?&rdquo; Tavernake objected. &ldquo;Will they be all right?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It doesn't matter where we are going,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;You look very well
+      as you are. Come and let me put your tie straight.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She came close to him and her fingers played for a moment with his tie.
+      She was very near to him and she laughed deliberately into his face.
+      Tavernake held himself quite stiff and felt foolish. He also felt absurdly
+      happy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There,&rdquo; she remarked, when she had arranged it to her satisfaction, &ldquo;you
+      look all right now. I wonder,&rdquo; she added, half to herself, &ldquo;what you do
+      look like. Something Colonial and forceful, I think. Never mind, help me
+      on with my cloak and come along. You are a most respectable-looking
+      escort, and a very useful one.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Although Tavernake was nominally the host, it was Elizabeth who selected
+      the table and ordered the supper. There were very few other guests in the
+      room, the majority being down in the larger restaurant, but among these
+      few Tavernake noticed two of the girls from the chorus at the Atlas.
+      Elizabeth had chosen a table from which she had a view of the door, and
+      she took the seat facing it. From the first Tavernake felt certain that
+      she was watching for some one.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Talk to me now, please, about this speculation,&rdquo; she insisted. &ldquo;I should
+      like to know all about it, and whether you are sure that I shall get ten
+      per cent for my money.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was in no way reluctant. It was a safe topic for conversation,
+      and one concerning which he had plenty to say. But after a time she
+      stopped him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I have discovered at any rate one subject on which you
+      can be fluent. Now I have had enough of building properties, please, and
+      house building. I should like to hear a little about Beatrice.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was dumb.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not wish to talk about Beatrice,&rdquo; he declared, &ldquo;until I understand
+      the cause of this estrangement between you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her eyes flashed angrily and her laugh sounded forced.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not even talk of her! My dear friend,&rdquo; she protested, &ldquo;you scarcely repay
+      the confidence I am placing in you!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mean the money?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Precisely,&rdquo; she continued. &ldquo;I trust you, why I do not know&mdash;I
+      suppose because I am something of a physiognomist&mdash;with twelve
+      thousand pounds of my hard-earned savings. You refuse to trust me with
+      even a few simple particulars about the life of my own sister. Come, I
+      don't think that things are quite as they should be between us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you know where I first met your sister?&rdquo; Tavernake asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head pettishly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How should I? You told me nothing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She was staying in a boarding-house where I lived,&rdquo; Tavernake went on. &ldquo;I
+      think I told you that but nothing else. It was a cheap boarding-house but
+      she had not enough money to pay for her meals. She was tired of life. She
+      was in a desperate state altogether.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you trying to tell me, or rather trying not to tell me, that Beatrice
+      was mad enough to think of committing suicide?&rdquo; Elizabeth inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She was in the frame of mind when such a step was possible,&rdquo; he answered,
+      gravely. &ldquo;You remember that night when I first saw you in the chemist's
+      shop across the street? She had been very ill that evening, very ill
+      indeed. You could see for yourself the effect meeting you had upon her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth nodded, and crumbled a little piece of roll between her fingers.
+      Then she leaned over the table towards Tavernake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She seemed terrified, didn't she? She hurried you away&mdash;she seemed
+      afraid.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was very noticeable,&rdquo; he admitted. &ldquo;She was terrified. She dragged me
+      out of the place. A few minutes later she fainted in the cab.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice was always over-sensitive,&rdquo; she remarked. &ldquo;Any sudden shock
+      unnerved her altogether. Are you terrified of me, too, Mr. Tavernake?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't know,&rdquo; he answered, frankly. &ldquo;Sometimes I think that I am.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She laughed softly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why?&rdquo; she whispered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked into her eyes and he felt abject. How was it possible to sit
+      within a few feet of her and remain sane!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are so wonderful,&rdquo; he said, in a low tone, &ldquo;so different from any one
+      else in the world!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are glad that you met me, then&mdash;that you are here?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He raised his eyes once more.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't know,&rdquo; he answered simply. &ldquo;If I really believed&mdash;if you
+      were always kind like this&mdash;but, you see, you make two men of me.
+      When I am with you I am a fool, your fool, to do as you will with. When I
+      am away, some glimmerings of common sense come back, and I know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know what?&rdquo; she murmured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That you are not honest,&rdquo; he added.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake!&rdquo; she exclaimed, lifting her head a little.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I don t mean dishonest in the ordinary way!&rdquo; he protested, eagerly.
+      &ldquo;What I mean is that you look things which you don't feel, that you are
+      willing for any one who can't help admiring you very much to believe for a
+      moment that you, too, feel more kindly than you really do. This is so
+      clumsy,&rdquo; he broke off, despairingly, &ldquo;but you understand what I mean!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have an adorable way of making yourself understood,&rdquo; she laughed.
+      &ldquo;Come, do let us talk sense for a minute or two. You say that when you are
+      with me you are my slave. Then why is it that you do not bring Beatrice
+      here when I beg you to?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am your slave,&rdquo; he answered, &ldquo;in everything that has to do with myself
+      and my own actions. In that other matter it is for your sister to decide.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shrugged her shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I suppose I shall be able to endure life without her.
+      At any rate, we will talk of something else. Tell me, are you not curious
+      to know why I insisted upon bringing you here?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; he admitted, &ldquo;I am.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Spoken with your usual candor, my dear Briton!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;Well, I
+      will gratify your curiosity. This, as you see, is not a popular supping
+      place. A few people come in&mdash;mostly those who for some reason or
+      other don't feel smart enough for the big restaurants. The people from the
+      theatres come in here who have not time to change their clothes. As you
+      perceive; the place has a distinctly Bohemian flavor.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake looked around.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;They seem to come in all sorts of clothes,&rdquo; he remarked. &ldquo;I am glad.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is a man now in London,&rdquo; Elizabeth continued, &ldquo;whom I am just as
+      anxious to see as I am to find my sister. I believe that this is the most
+      likely place to find him. That is why I have come. My father was to have
+      been here to take me, but as you heard he has gone out somewhere and not
+      returned. None of my other friends were available. You happened to come in
+      just in time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And this man whom you want to see,&rdquo; Tavernake asked, &ldquo;is he here?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not yet,&rdquo; she answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There were, indeed, only a few scattered groups in the place, and most of
+      these were obviously theatrical. But even at that moment a man came in
+      alone through the circular doors, and stood just inside, looking around
+      him. He was a man of medium height, thin, and of undistinguished
+      appearance. His hair was light-colored and plastered a little in front
+      over his forehead. His face was thin and he walked with a slight stoop.
+      Something about his clothes and his manner of wearing them stamped him as
+      an American. Tavernake glanced at his companion, wondering whether this,
+      perhaps, might not be the person for whom she was watching. His first
+      glance was careless enough, then he felt his heart thump against his ribs.
+      A tragedy had come into the room! The woman at his side sat as though
+      turned to stone. There was a look in her face as of one who sees Death.
+      The small patch of rouge, invisible before, was now a staring daub of
+      color in an oasis of ashen white. Her eyes were as hard as stones; her
+      lips were twitching as though, indeed, she had been stricken with some
+      disease. No longer was he sitting with this most beautiful lady at whose
+      coming all heads were turned in admiration. It was as though an image of
+      Death sat there, a frozen presentment of horror itself!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0023" id="link2HCH0023">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXIII. ON AN ERRAND OF CHIVALRY
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The seconds passed; the woman beside him showed no sign of life. Tavernake
+      felt a fear run cold in his blood, such as in all his days he had never
+      known. This, indeed, was something belonging to a world of which he knew
+      nothing. What was it? Illness? Pain? Surprise? There was only his instinct
+      to tell him. It was terror, the terror of one who looks beyond the grave.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mrs. Gardner!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;Elizabeth!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The sound of his voice seemed to break the spell. A half-choked sob came
+      through her teeth; the struggle for composure commenced.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am ill,&rdquo; she murmured. &ldquo;Give me my glass. Give it to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her fingers were feeling for it but it seemed as though she dared not move
+      her head. He filled it with wine and placed the stem in her hand. Even
+      then she spilled some of it upon the tablecloth. As she raised it to her
+      lips, the man who stood still upon the threshold of the restaurant looked
+      into her face. Slowly, as though his quest were over, he came down the
+      room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go away,&rdquo; she said to Tavernake. &ldquo;Go away, please. He is coming to speak
+      to me. I want to be alone with him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Strangely enough, at that moment Tavernake saw nothing out of the common
+      in her request. He rose at once, without any formal leave-taking, and made
+      his way toward the other end of the cafe. As he turned the corner towards
+      the smoking-room, he glanced once behind. The man had approached quite
+      close to Elizabeth; he was standing before her table, they seemed to be
+      exchanging greetings.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake went on into the smoking-room and threw himself into an
+      easy-chair. He had been there perhaps for ten minutes when Pritchard
+      entered. Certainly it was a night of surprises! Even Pritchard, cool,
+      deliberate, slow in his movements and speech, seemed temporarily flurried.
+      He came into the room walking quickly. As the door swung back, he turned
+      round as though to assure himself that he was not being followed. He did
+      not at first see Tavernake. He sat on the arm of an easy-chair, his hands
+      in his pockets, his eternal cigar in the corner of his mouth, his eyes
+      fixed upon the doors through which he had issued. Without a doubt,
+      something had disturbed him. He had the look of a man who had received a
+      blow, a surprise of some sort over which he was still ruminating. Then he
+      glanced around the room and saw Tavernake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hullo, young man!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;So this is the way you follow my
+      advice!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I never promised to follow it,&rdquo; Tavernake reminded him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard wheeled an easy-chair across the room and called to the waiter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you shall stand me a drink. Two whiskies and sodas, Tim.
+      And now, Mr. Leonard Tavernake, you are going to answer me a question.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Am I?&rdquo; Tavernake muttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You came down in the lift with Mrs. Wenham Gardner half an hour ago, you
+      went into the restaurant and ordered supper. She is there still and you
+      are here. Have you quarreled?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, we did not quarrel,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;She explained that she was
+      supping in the cafe only for the sake of meeting one man. She wanted an
+      escort. I filled that post until the man came.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is there now?&rdquo; Pritchard asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is there now,&rdquo; Tavernake assented.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard withdrew the cigar from his mouth and watched it for a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say, Tavernake,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;is that man who is now having supper with
+      Mrs. Wenham Gardner the man whom she expected?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I imagine so,&rdquo; Tavernake replied.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Didn't she seem in any way scared or disturbed when he first turned up?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She looked as I have seen no one else on earth look before,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      admitted. &ldquo;She seemed simply terrified to death. I do not know why&mdash;she
+      didn't explain&mdash;but that is how she looked.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet she sent you away!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She sent me away. She didn't care what became of me. She was watching the
+      door all the time before he came. Who is he, Pritchard?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That sounds a simple question,&rdquo; Pritchard answered gravely, &ldquo;but it means
+      a good deal. There's mischief afoot to-night, Tavernake.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You seem to thrive on it,&rdquo; Tavernake retorted, drily. &ldquo;Any more bunkum?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you're a sensible chap. Take these things for what
+      they're worth. Believe me when I tell you now that there is a great deal
+      more in the coming of this man than Mrs. Wenham Gardner ever bargained
+      for.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wish you'd tell me who he is,&rdquo; Tavernake begged. &ldquo;All this mystery
+      about Beatrice and her sister, and that lazy old hulk of a father, is most
+      irritating.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard nodded sympathetically.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You'll have to put up with it a little longer, I'm afraid, my young
+      friend,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;You've done me a good turn; I'll do you one. I'll
+      give you some good advice. Keep out of this place so long as the old man
+      and his daughter are hanging out here. The girl 's clever&mdash;oh, she's
+      as clever as they make them&mdash;but she's gone wrong from the start.
+      They ain't your sort, Tavernake. You don't fit in anywhere. Take my advice
+      and hook it altogether.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I can't do that just now,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Good-night! I'm off for the present,
+      at any rate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard, too, rose to his feet. He passed his arm through Tavernake's.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Young man,&rdquo; he remarked, &ldquo;there are not many in this country whom I can
+      trust. You're one of them. There's a sort of solidity about you that I
+      rather admire. You are not likely to break out and do silly things. Do you
+      care for adventures?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I detest them,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, &ldquo;especially the sort I tumbled into
+      the other night.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard laughed softly. They had left the room now and were walking
+      along the open space at the end of the restaurant, leading to the main
+      exit.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That's the difference between us,&rdquo; he declared thoughtfully. &ldquo;Now
+      adventures to me are the salt of my life. I hang about here and watch
+      these few respectable-looking men and women, and there doesn't seem to be
+      much in it to an outsider, but, gee whiz! there's sometimes things
+      underneath which you fellows don't tumble to. A man asks another in there
+      to have a drink. They make a cheerful appointment to meet for lunch, to
+      motor to Brighton. It all sounds so harmless, and yet there are the seeds
+      of a conspiracy already sown. They hate me here, but they know very well
+      that wherever they went I should be around. I suppose some day they'll get
+      rid of me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;More bunkum!&rdquo; Tavernake muttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They stood in front of the door and passed through into the courtyard. On
+      their right, the interior of the smaller restaurant was shielded from view
+      by a lattice-work, covered with flowers and shrubs. Pritchard came to a
+      standstill at a certain point, and stooping down looked through. He
+      remained there without moving for what seemed to Tavernake an
+      extraordinarily long time. When he stood up again, there was a distinct
+      change in his face. He was looking more serious than Tavernake had ever
+      seen him. But for the improbability of the thing, Tavernake would have
+      thought that he had turned pale.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My young friend,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you've got to see me through this. You 've a
+      sort of fancy for Mrs. Wenham Gardner, I know. To-night you shall be on
+      her side.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't want any more mysteries,&rdquo; Tavernake protested. &ldquo;I'd rather go
+      home.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It can't be done,&rdquo; Pritchard declared, taking his arm once more. &ldquo;You've
+      got to see me through this. Come up to my rooms for a minute.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They entered the Court and ascended to the eighth floor. Pritchard turned
+      on the lights in his room, a plainly furnished and somewhat bare
+      apartment. From a cupboard he took out a pair of rubber-soled shoes and
+      threw them to Tavernake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Put those on,&rdquo; he directed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What are we going to do?&rdquo; Tavernake asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are going to help me,&rdquo; Pritchard answered. &ldquo;Take my word for it,
+      Tavernake, it's all right. I could tackle the job alone, but I'd rather
+      not. Now drink this whiskey and soda and light a cigarette. I shall be
+      ready in five minutes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But where are we going?&rdquo; Tavernake demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are going,&rdquo; Pritchard replied, &ldquo;on an errand of chivalry. You are
+      going to become once more a rescuer of woman in distress. You are going to
+      save the life of your beautiful friend Elizabeth.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0024" id="link2HCH0024">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXIV. CLOSE TO TRAGEDY
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The actual words of greeting which passed between Elizabeth and the man
+      whose advent had caused her so much emotion were unimpressive. The
+      newcomer, with the tips of his fingers resting upon the tablecloth, leaned
+      slightly towards her. At close quarters, he was even more unattractive
+      than when Tavernake had first seen him. He was faultily shaped; there was
+      something a little decadent about his deep-set eyes and receding forehead.
+      Neither was his expression prepossessing. He looked at her as a man looks
+      upon the thing he hates.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So, Elizabeth,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;this pleasure has come at last!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I heard that you were back in England,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;Pray sit down.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Even then her eyes never left his. All the time they seemed to be fiercely
+      questioning, seeking for something in his features which eluded them. It
+      was terrible to see the change which the last few minutes had wrought in
+      her. Her smooth, girlish face had lost its comeliness. Her eyes, always a
+      little narrow, seemed to have receded. It was such a change, this, as
+      comes to a brave man who, in the prime of life, feels fear for the first
+      time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am glad to find you at supper,&rdquo; he declared, taking up the menu. &ldquo;I am
+      hungry. You can bring me some grilled cutlets at once,&rdquo; he added to the
+      waiter who stood by his side, &ldquo;and some brandy. Nothing else.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The waiter bowed and hurried off. The woman played with her fan but her
+      fingers were shaking.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I fear,&rdquo; he remarked, &ldquo;that my coming is rather a shock to you. I am
+      sorry to see you looking so distressed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is not that,&rdquo; she answered with some show of courage. &ldquo;You know me too
+      well to believe me capable of seeking a meeting which I feared. It is the
+      strange thing which has happened to you during these last few months&mdash;this
+      last year. Do you know&mdash;has any one told you&mdash;that you seem to
+      have become even more like&mdash;the image of&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He nodded understandingly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of poor Wenham! Many people have told me that. Of course, you know that
+      we were always appallingly alike, and they always said that we should
+      become more so in middle-age. After all, there is only a year between us.
+      We might have been twins.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is the most terrible thing in likenesses I have ever seen,&rdquo; the woman
+      continued slowly. &ldquo;When you entered the room a few seconds ago, it seemed
+      to me that a miracle had happened. It seemed to me that the dead had come
+      to life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It must have been a shock,&rdquo; the man murmured, with his eyes upon the
+      tablecloth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was,&rdquo; she agreed, hoarsely. &ldquo;Can't you see it in my face? I do not
+      always look like a woman of forty. Can't you see the gray shadows that are
+      there? You see, I admit it frankly. I was terrified&mdash;I am terrified!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And why?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why?&rdquo; she repeated, looking at him wonderingly. &ldquo;Doesn't it seem to you a
+      terrible thing to think of the dead coming back to life?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He tapped lightly upon the tablecloth for a minute with the fingers of one
+      hand. Then he looked at her again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It depends,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;upon the manner of their death.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      An executioner of the Middle Ages could not have played with his victim
+      more skillfully. The woman was shivering now, preserving some outward
+      appearance of calm only by the most fierce and unnatural effort.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you mean by that, Jerry?&rdquo; she asked. &ldquo;I was not even with&mdash;Wenham,
+      when he was lost. You know all about it, I suppose,&mdash;how it
+      happened?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man nodded thoughtfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have heard many stories,&rdquo; he admitted. &ldquo;Before we leave the subject for
+      ever, I should like to hear it from you, from your own lips.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a bottle of champagne upon the table, ordered at the
+      commencement of the meal. She touched her glass; the waiter filled it. She
+      raised it to her lips and set it down empty. Her fingers were clutching
+      the tablecloth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You ask me a hard thing, Jerry,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;It is not easy to talk of
+      anything so painful. From the moment we left New York, Wenham was strange.
+      He drank a good deal upon the steamer. He used to talk sometimes in the
+      most wild way. We came to London. He had an attack of delirium tremens. I
+      nursed him through it and took him into the country, down into Cornwall.
+      We took a small cottage on the outskirts of a fishing village&mdash;St.
+      Catherine's, the place was called. There we lived quietly for a time.
+      Sometimes he was better, sometimes worse. The doctor in the village was
+      very kind and came often to see him. He brought a friend from the
+      neighboring town and they agreed that with complete rest Wenham would soon
+      be better. All the time my life was a miserable one. He was not fit to be
+      alone and yet he was a terrible companion. I did my best. I was with him
+      half of every day, sometimes longer. I was with him till my own health
+      began to suffer. At last I could stand the solitude no longer. I sent for
+      my father. He came and lived with us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The professor,&rdquo; her listener murmured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was a little better then for me,&rdquo; she went on, &ldquo;except that poor
+      Wenham seemed to take such a dislike to my father. However, he hated every
+      one in turn, even the doctors, who always did their best for him. One day,
+      I admit, I lost my temper. We quarreled; I could not help it&mdash;life
+      was becoming insupportable. He rushed out of the house&mdash;it was about
+      three o'clock in the afternoon. I have never seen him since.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man was looking at her, looking at her closely although he was
+      blinking all the time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you think became of him?&rdquo; he asked. &ldquo;What do people think?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The only thing he cared to do was swim,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;His clothes and hat
+      were found down in the little cove near where we had a tent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You think, then, that he was drowned?&rdquo; the man asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded. Speech seemed to be becoming too painful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Drowning,&rdquo; her companion continued, helping himself to brandy, &ldquo;is not a
+      pleasant death. Once I was nearly drowned myself. One struggles for a
+      short time and one thinks&mdash;yes, one thinks!&rdquo; he added.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He raised his glass to his lips and set it down.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is an easy death, though,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;quite an easy death. By the
+      way, were those clothes that were found of poor Wenham's identified as the
+      clothes he wore when he left the house?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;One could not say for certain,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;I never noticed how he was
+      dressed. He wore nearly always the same sort of things, but he had an
+      endless variety.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And this was seven months ago&mdash;seven months.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She assented.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poor Wenham,&rdquo; he murmured. &ldquo;I suppose he is dead. What are you going to
+      do, Elizabeth?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not know,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;Soon I must go to the lawyers and ask for
+      advice. I have very little more money left. I have written several times
+      to New York to you, to his friends, but I have had no answer. After all,
+      Jerry, I am his wife. No one liked my marrying him, but I am his wife. I
+      have a right to a share of his property if he is dead. If he has deserted
+      me, surely I shall be allowed something. I do not even know how rich he
+      was.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man at her side smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Much better off than I ever was,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;But, Elizabeth!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There were rumors that, before you left New York, Wenham converted very
+      large sums of money into letters of credit and bonds, very large sums
+      indeed.&rdquo; She shook her head. &ldquo;He had a letter of credit for about a
+      thousand pounds, I think,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;There is very little left of the
+      money he had with him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you find living here expensive, I dare say?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very expensive indeed,&rdquo; she agreed, with a sigh. &ldquo;I have been looking
+      forward to seeing you, Jerry. I thought, perhaps, for the sake of old
+      times you might advise me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of old times,&rdquo; he repeated to himself softly. &ldquo;Elizabeth, do you think of
+      them sometimes?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She was becoming more herself. This was a game she was used to playing. Of
+      old times, indeed! It seemed only yesterday that these two brothers, who
+      had the reputation in those days of being the richest young men in New
+      York, were both at her feet. So far, she had scarcely been fortunate.
+      There was still a chance, however. She looked up. It seemed to her that he
+      was losing his composure. Yes, there was something of the old gleam in his
+      eyes! Once he had been madly enough in love with her. It ought not to be
+      impossible!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jerry,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I have told you these things. It has been so very,
+      very painful for me. Won't you try now and be kind? Remember that I am all
+      alone and it is all very difficult for me. I have been looking forward to
+      your coming. I have thought so often of those times we spent together in
+      New York. Won't you be my friend again? Won't you help me through these
+      dark days?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her hand touched his. For a moment he snatched his away as though stung.
+      Then he caught her fingers in his and held them as though in a vice. She
+      smiled, the smile of conscious power. The flush of beauty was streaming
+      once more into her face. Poor fellow, he was still in love, then! The
+      fingers which had closed upon hers were burning. What a pity that he was
+      not a little more presentable!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; he muttered, &ldquo;we must be friends, Elizabeth. Wenham had all the
+      luck at first. Perhaps it's going to be my turn now, eh?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He bent towards her. She laughed into his face for a moment and then was
+      once more suddenly colorless, the smile frozen upon her lips. She began to
+      shiver.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is it?&rdquo; he asked. &ldquo;What is it, Elizabeth?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing,&rdquo; she faltered, &ldquo;only I wish&mdash;I do wish that you were not so
+      much like Wenham. Sometimes a trick of your voice, the way you hold your
+      head&mdash;it terrifies me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He laughed oddly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must get used to that, Elizabeth,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;I can't help being
+      like him, you know. We were great friends always until you came. I wonder
+      why you preferred Wenham.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't ask me&mdash;please don't ask me that,&rdquo; she begged. &ldquo;Really, I
+      think he happened to be there just at the moment I felt like making a
+      clean sweep of everything, of leaving New York and every one and starting
+      life again, and I thought Wenham meant it. I thought I should be able to
+      keep him from drinking and to help him start a new life altogether over
+      here or on the Continent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poor little woman,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you have been disappointed, I am afraid.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am only human, you know,&rdquo; she went on. &ldquo;Every one told me that Wenham
+      was a millionaire, too. See how much I have benefited by it. I am almost
+      penniless, I do not know whether he is dead or alive, I do not know what
+      to do to get some money. Was Wenham very rich, Jerry?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, he was very rich indeed!&rdquo; he assured her. &ldquo;It is terrible that you
+      should be left like this. We will talk about it together presently, you
+      and I. In the meantime, you must let me be your banker.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear Jerry,&rdquo; she whispered, &ldquo;you were always generous.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have not spoken of the little prude&mdash;dear Miss Beatrice,&rdquo; he
+      reminded her suddenly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice was a great trial from the first,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;You know how
+      she disliked you both&mdash;she was scarcely even civil to Wenham, and she
+      would never have come to Europe with us if father hadn't insisted upon it.
+      We took her down to Cornwall with us and there she became absolutely
+      insupportable. She was always interfering between Wenham and me and
+      imagining the most absurd things. One day she left us without a word of
+      warning. I have never seen her since.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man stared gloomily into his plate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She was a queer little thing,&rdquo; he muttered. &ldquo;She was good, and she seemed
+      to like being good.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth laughed, not quite pleasantly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You speak as though the rest of us,&rdquo; she remarked, &ldquo;were qualified to
+      take orders in wickedness.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He helped himself to more brandy.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Think back,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Think of those days in New York, the life we led,
+      the wild things we did week after week, month after month, the same
+      eternal round of turning night into day, of struggling everywhere to find
+      new pleasures, pulling vice to pieces like children trying to find the
+      inside of their playthings.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't like your mood in the least,&rdquo; she interrupted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He drummed for a moment upon the tablecloth with his fingers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We were talking of Beatrice. You don't even know where she is now, then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have no idea,&rdquo; Elizabeth declared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She was with you for long in Cornwall?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth toyed with her wineglass for a minute.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She was there about a month,&rdquo; she admitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And she didn't approve of the way you and Wenham behaved?&rdquo; he demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Apparently not. She left us, anyway. She didn't understand Wenham in the
+      least. I shouldn't be surprised,&rdquo; Elizabeth went on, &ldquo;to hear that she was
+      a hospital nurse, or learning typing, or a clerk in an office. She was a
+      young woman of gloomy ideas, although she was my sister.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He came a little closer towards her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Elizabeth,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;we will not talk any more about Beatrice. We will
+      not talk any more about anything except our two selves.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Are you really glad to see me again, Jerry?&rdquo; she asked softly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You must know it, dear,&rdquo; he whispered. &ldquo;You must know that I loved you
+      always, that I adored you. Oh, you knew it! Don't tell me you didn't. You
+      knew it, Elizabeth!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked down at the tablecloth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I knew it,&rdquo; she admitted, softly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Can't you guess what it is to me to see you again like this?&rdquo; he
+      continued.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is something for me, too, to feel that I have a friend close at hand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;they are turning out the lights here. You want to know
+      about Wenham's property. Let me come upstairs with you for a little time
+      and I will tell you as much as I can from memory.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He paid the bill, helped her on with her cloak. His fingers seemed like
+      burning spots upon her flesh. They went up in the lift. In the corridors
+      he drew her to him and she began to tremble.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is there strange about you, Jerry?&rdquo; she faltered, looking into his
+      face. &ldquo;You terrify me!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are glad to see me? Say you are glad to see me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I am glad,&rdquo; she whispered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Outside the door of her rooms, she hesitated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps,&rdquo; she suggested, faintly,&mdash;&ldquo;wouldn't it be better if you
+      came to-morrow morning?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Once more his fingers touched her and again that extraordinary sense of
+      fear seemed to turn her blood cold.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;I have been put off long enough! You must let me in,
+      you must talk with me for half an hour. I will go then, I promise. Half an
+      hour! Elizabeth, haven't I waited an eternity for it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He took the keys from her fingers and opened the door, closing it again
+      behind them. She led the way into the sitting-room. The whole place was in
+      darkness but she turned on the electric light. The cloak slipped from her
+      shoulders. He took her hands and looked at her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jerry,&rdquo; she whispered, &ldquo;you mustn't look at me like that. You terrify me!
+      Let me go!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She wrenched herself free with an effort. She stepped back to the corner
+      of the room, as far as she could get from him. Her heart was beating
+      fiercely. Somehow or other, neither of these two young men, over whose
+      lives she had certainly brought to bear a very wonderful influence, had
+      ever before stirred her pulses like this. What was it, she wondered? What
+      was the meaning of it? Why didn't he speak? He did nothing but look, and
+      there were unutterable things in his eyes. Was he angry with her because
+      she had married Wenham, or was he blaming her because Wenham had gone?
+      There was passion in his face, but such passion! Desire, perhaps, but what
+      else? She caught up a telegram which lay upon her writing desk, and tore
+      it open. It was an escape for a moment. She read the words, stared, and
+      read them aloud incredulously. It was from her father.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Jerry Gardner sailed for New York to-day.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked up at the man, and as she looked her face grew gray and the
+      thin sheet went quivering from her lifeless fingers to the floor. Then he
+      began to laugh, and she knew.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Wenham!&rdquo; she shrieked. &ldquo;Wenham!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was murder in his face, murder almost in his laugh.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your loving husband!&rdquo; he answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She sprang for the door but even as she moved she heard the click of the
+      bolt shot back. He touched the electric switch and the room was suddenly
+      in darkness. She heard him coming towards her, she felt his hot breath
+      upon her cheek.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My loving wife!&rdquo; he whispered. &ldquo;At last!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0025" id="link2HCH0025">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXV. THE MADMAN TALKS
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake turned on the light. Pritchard, with a quick leap forward,
+      seized Wenham around the waist and dragged him away. Elizabeth had
+      fainted; she lay upon the floor, her face the color of marble.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Get some water and throw over her,&rdquo; Pritchard ordered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake obeyed. He threw open the window and let in a current of air. In
+      a moment or two the woman stirred and raised her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look after her for a minute,&rdquo; Pritchard said. &ldquo;I Il lock this fierce
+      little person up in the bathroom.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard carried his prisoner out. Tavernake leaned over the woman who
+      was slowly coming back to consciousness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me about it,&rdquo; she asked, hoarsely. &ldquo;Where is he?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Locked up in the bathroom,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;Pritchard is taking care
+      of him. He won't be able to get out.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know who it was?&rdquo; she faltered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not,&rdquo; Tavernake replied. &ldquo;It isn't my business. I'm only here
+      because Pritchard begged me to come. He thought he might want help.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She held his fingers tightly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Where were you?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In the bathroom when you arrived. Then he bolted the door behind and we
+      had to come round through your bedroom.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How did Pritchard find out?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know nothing about it,&rdquo; Tavernake replied. &ldquo;I only know that he peered
+      through the latticework and saw you sitting there at supper.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled weakly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It must have been rather a shock to him,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;He has been
+      convinced for the last six months that I murdered Wenham, or got rid of
+      him by some means or other. Help me up.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She staggered to her feet. Tavernake assisted her to an easy chair. Then
+      Pritchard came in.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;He is quite safe,&rdquo; he announced, &ldquo;sitting on the edge of the bath playing
+      with a doll.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shivered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is he doing with it?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Showing me exactly, with a shawl pin, where he meant to have stabbed
+      you,&rdquo; Pritchard answered, drily. &ldquo;Now, my dear lady,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;it
+      seems to me that I have done you one injustice, at any rate. I certainly
+      thought you'd helped to relieve the world of that young person. Where did
+      he come from? Perhaps you can tell me that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shrugged her shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose I may as well,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;Listen, you have seen what he was
+      like to-night, but you don't know what it was to live with him. It was
+      Hell!&rdquo;&mdash;she sobbed&mdash;&ldquo;absolute Hell! He drank, he took drugs, it
+      was all his servant could do to force him even to make his toilet. It was
+      impossible. It was crushing the life out of me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go on,&rdquo; Pritchard directed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There isn't much more to tell,&rdquo; she continued. &ldquo;I found an old farmhouse&mdash;the
+      loneliest spot in Cornwall. We moved there and I left him&mdash;with
+      Mathers. I promised Mathers that he should have twenty pounds a week for
+      every week he kept his master away from me. He has kept him away for seven
+      months.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What about that story of yours&mdash;about his having gone in swimming?&rdquo;
+       Pritchard asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wanted people to believe that he was dead,&rdquo; she declared defiantly. &ldquo;I
+      was afraid that if you or his relations found him, I should have to live
+      with him or give up the money.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And to-night you thought&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I thought he was his brother Jerry,&rdquo; she went on. &ldquo;The likeness was
+      always amazing, you know that. I was told that Jerry was in town. I felt
+      nervous, somehow, and wired to Mathers. I had his reply only last night.
+      He wired that Wenham was quite safe and contented, not even restless.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That telegram was sent by Wenham himself,&rdquo; Pritchard remarked. &ldquo;I think
+      you had better hear what he has to say.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shrank back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No. I couldn't bear the sight of him again!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think you had better,&rdquo; Pritchard insisted. &ldquo;I can assure you that he is
+      quite harmless. I will guarantee that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He left the room. Soon he returned, his arm locked in the arm of Wenham
+      Gardner. The latter had the look of a spoilt child who is in disgrace. He
+      sat sullenly upon a chair and glared at every one. Then he produced a
+      small crumpled doll, with a thread of black cotton around its neck, and
+      began swinging it in front of him, laughing at Elizabeth all the time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell us,&rdquo; Pritchard asked, &ldquo;what has become of Mathers?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He stopped swinging the doll, shivered for a moment, and then laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't mind,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;I guess I don't mind telling. You see,
+      whatever I was when I did it, I am mad now&mdash;quite mad. My friend
+      Pritchard here says I am mad. I must have been mad or I shouldn't have
+      tried to hurt that dear beautiful lady over there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He leered at Elizabeth, who shrank back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She ran away from me some time ago,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;sick to death of me she
+      was. She thought she'd got all my money. She hadn't. There's plenty more,
+      plenty more. She ran away and left me with Mathers. She was paying him so
+      much a week to keep me quiet, not to let me go anywhere where I should
+      talk, to keep me away from her so that she could live up here and see all
+      her friends and spend my money. And at first I didn't mind, and then I did
+      mind, and I got angry with Mathers, and Mathers wouldn't let me come away,
+      and three nights ago I killed Mathers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a little thrill of horror. He looked from one to the other. By
+      degrees their fear seemed to become communicated to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you mean by looking like that, all of you?&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;What
+      does it matter? He was only my man-servant. I am Wenham Gardner,
+      millionaire. No one will put me in prison for that. Besides, he shouldn't
+      have tried to keep me away from my wife. Anyway, it don't matter. I am
+      quite mad. Mad people can do what they like. They have to stop in an
+      asylum for six months, and then they're quite cured and they start again.
+      I don't mind being mad for six months. Elizabeth,&rdquo; he whined, &ldquo;come and be
+      mad, too. You haven't been kind to me. There's plenty more money&mdash;plenty
+      more. Come back for a little time and I'll show you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How did you kill Mathers?&rdquo; Pritchard asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I stabbed him when he was stooping down,&rdquo; Wenham Gardner explained. &ldquo;You
+      see, when I left college my father thought it would be good for me to do
+      something. I dare say it would have been but I didn't want to. I studied
+      surgery for six months. The only thing I remember was just where to kill a
+      man behind the left shoulder. I remembered that. Mathers was a fat man,
+      and he stooped so that his coat almost burst. I just leaned over, picked
+      out the exact spot, and he crumpled all up. I expect,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;you'll
+      find him there still. No one comes near the place for days and days.
+      Mathers used to leave me locked up and do all the shopping himself. I
+      expect he's lying there now. Some one ought to go and see.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth was sobbing quietly to herself. Tavernake felt the perspiration
+      break out upon his forehead. There was something appalling in the way this
+      young man talked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't understand why you all look so serious,&rdquo; he continued. &ldquo;No one is
+      going to hurt me for this. I am quite mad now. You see, I am playing with
+      this doll. Sane men don't play with dolls. I hope they'll try me in New
+      York, though. I am well-known in New York. I know all the lawyers and the
+      jurymen. Oh, they're up to all sorts of tricks in New York! Say, you don't
+      suppose they'll try me over here?&rdquo; he broke off suddenly, turning to
+      Pritchard. &ldquo;I shouldn't feel so much at home here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take him away,&rdquo; Elizabeth begged. &ldquo;Take him away.&rdquo; Pritchard nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I thought you'd better hear,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I am going to take him away now.
+      I shall send a telegram to the police-station at St. Catherine's. They had
+      better go up and see what's happened.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard took his captive once more by the arm. The young man struggled
+      violently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't like you, Pritchard,&rdquo; he shrieked. &ldquo;I don't want to go with you.
+      I want to stay with Elizabeth. I am not really afraid of her. She'd like
+      to kill me, I know, but she's too clever&mdash;oh, she's too clever! I'd
+      like to stay with her.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard led him away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We'll see about it later on,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;You'd better come with me just
+      now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The door closed behind them. Tavernake staggered up.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I must go,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;I must go, too.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth was sobbing quietly to herself. She seemed scarcely to hear him.
+      On the threshold Tavernake turned back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That money,&rdquo; he asked, &ldquo;the money you were going to lend me&mdash;was
+      that his?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked up and nodded. Tavernake went slowly out.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0026" id="link2HCH0026">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXVI. A CRISIS
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard was the first visitor who had ever found his way into
+      Tavernake's lodgings. It was barely eight o'clock on the same morning.
+      Tavernake, hollow-eyed and bewildered, sat up upon the sofa and gazed
+      across the room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pritchard!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;Why, what do you want?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard laid his hat and gloves upon the table. Already his first swift
+      glance had taken in the details of the little apartment. The overcoat and
+      hat which Tavernake had worn the night before lay by his side. The table
+      was still arranged for some meal of the previous day. Apart from these
+      things, a single glance assured him that Tavernake had not been to bed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard drew up an easy-chair and seated himself deliberately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My young friend,&rdquo; he announced, &ldquo;I have come to the conclusion that you
+      need some more advice.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake rose to his feet. His own reflection in the looking-glass
+      startled him. His hair was crumpled, his tie undone, the marks of his
+      night of agony were all too apparent. He felt himself at a disadvantage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How did you find me out?&rdquo; he asked. &ldquo;I never gave you my address.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Even in this country, with a little help,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;those things are
+      easy enough. I made up my mind that this morning would be to some extent a
+      crisis with you. You know, Tavernake, I am not a man who says much, but
+      you are the right sort. You've been in with me twice when I should have
+      missed you if you hadn't been there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake seemed to have lost the power of speech. He had relapsed again
+      into his place upon the sofa. He simply waited.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How in the name of mischief,&rdquo; Pritchard continued, impressively, &ldquo;you
+      came to be mixed up in the lives of this amiable trio, I cannot imagine! I
+      am not saying a word against Miss Beatrice, mind. All that surprises me is
+      that you and she should ever have come together, or, having come together,
+      that you should ever have exchanged a word. You see, I am here to speak
+      plain truths. You are, I take it, a good sample of the hard, stubborn,
+      middle-class Briton. These three people of whom I have spoken, belong&mdash;Miss
+      Beatrice, perhaps, by force of circumstances&mdash;but still they do
+      belong to the land of Bohemia. However, when one has got over the surprise
+      of finding you on intimate terms with Miss Beatrice, there comes a more
+      amazing thing. You, with hard common sense written everywhere in your
+      face, have been prepared at any moment, for all I know are prepared now,
+      to make an utter and complete idiot of yourself over Elizabeth Gardner.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Still Tavernake did not speak. Pritchard looked at him curiously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;I have come here to do you a service, if I can. So far
+      as I know at present, this very wonderful young lady has kept on the right
+      side of the law. But see here, Tavernake, she's been on the wrong side of
+      everything that's decent and straight all her days. She married that poor
+      creature for his money, and set herself deliberately to drive him off his
+      head. Last night's tragedy was her doing, not his, though he, poor devil,
+      will have to end his days in an asylum, and the lady will have his money
+      to make herself more beautiful than ever with. Now I am going to let you
+      behind the scenes, my young friend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Tavernake rose to his feet. In the shabby little room he seemed to
+      have grown suddenly taller. He struck the crazy table with his clenched
+      fist so that the crockery upon it rattled. Pritchard was used to seeing
+      men&mdash;strong men, too&mdash;moved by various passions, but in
+      Tavernake's face he seemed to see new things.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pritchard,&rdquo; Tavernake exclaimed, &ldquo;I don't want to hear another word!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look here,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;what I am going to tell you is the truth. What I am
+      going to tell you I'd as soon say in the presence of the lady as here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake took a step forward and Pritchard suddenly realized the man who
+      had thrown himself through that little opening in the wall, one against
+      three, without a thought of danger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you say a single word more against her,&rdquo; Tavernake shouted hoarsely,
+      &ldquo;I shall throw you out of the room!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard stared at him. There was something amazing about this young
+      man's attitude, something which he could not wholly grasp. He could see,
+      too, that Tavernake's words were so few simply because he was trembling
+      under the influence of an immense passion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you won't listen,&rdquo; Pritchard declared, slowly, &ldquo;I can't talk. Still,
+      you've got common sense, I take it. You've the ordinary powers of judging
+      between right and wrong, and knowing when a man or a woman's honest. I
+      want to save you&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Silence!&rdquo; Tavernake exclaimed. &ldquo;Look here, Pritchard,&rdquo; he went on,
+      breathing a little more naturally now, &ldquo;you came here meaning to do the
+      right thing&mdash;I know that. You're all right, only you don't
+      understand. You don't understand the sort of person I am. I am twenty-four
+      years old, I have worked for my own living up here in London since I was
+      twelve. I was a man, so far as work and independence went, at fifteen.
+      Since then I have had my shoulder to the wheel; I have lived on nothing; I
+      have made a little money where it didn't seem possible. I have worried my
+      way into posts which it seemed that no one could think of giving me, but
+      all the time I have lived in a little corner of the world&mdash;like
+      that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      His finger suddenly described a circle in the air.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You don't understand&mdash;you can't,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;but there it is. I
+      never spoke to a woman until I spoke to Beatrice. Chance made me her
+      friend. I began to understand the outside of some of those things which I
+      had never even dreamed of before. She set me right in many ways. I began
+      to read, think, absorb little bits of the real world. It was all
+      wonderful. Then Elizabeth came. I met her, too, by accident&mdash;she came
+      to my office for a house&mdash;Elizabeth!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard found something almost pathetic in the sudden dropping of
+      Tavernake's voice, the softening of his face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't know how to talk about these things,&rdquo; Tavernake said, simply.
+      &ldquo;There's a literature that's reached from before the Bible to now, full of
+      nothing else. It's all as old as the hills. I suppose I am about the only
+      sane man in this city who knew nothing of it; but I did know nothing of
+      it, and she was the first woman. Now you understand. I can't hear a word
+      against her&mdash;I won't! She may be what you say. If so, she's got to
+      tell me so herself!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mean that you are going to believe any story she likes to put up?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I mean that I am going to her,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, &ldquo;and I have no idea
+      in the world what will happen&mdash;whether I shall believe her or not. I
+      can see what you think of me,&rdquo; he went on, becoming a little more himself
+      as the stress of unaccustomed speech passed him by. &ldquo;I will tell you
+      something that will show you that I realize a good deal. I know the
+      difference between Beatrice and Elizabeth. Less than a week ago, I asked
+      Beatrice to marry me. It was the only way I could think of, the only way I
+      could kill the fever.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And Beatrice?&rdquo; Pritchard asked, curiously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She wouldn't,&rdquo; Tavernake replied. &ldquo;After all, why should she? I have my
+      way to make yet. I can't expect others to believe in me as I believe in
+      myself. She was kind but she wouldn't.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard lit a cigar.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look here, Tavernake,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you are a young man, you've got your
+      life before you and life's a biggish thing. Empty out those romantic
+      thoughts of yours, roll up your shirt sleeves and get at it. You are not
+      one of these weaklings that need a woman's whispers in their ears to spur
+      them on. You can work without that. It's only a chapter in your life&mdash;the
+      passing of these three people. A few months ago, you knew nothing of them.
+      Let them go. Get back to where you were.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Tavernake for the first time laughed&mdash;a laugh that sounded even
+      natural.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you ever found a man who could do that?&rdquo; he asked. &ldquo;The candle gives
+      a good light sometimes, but you'll never think it the finest illumination
+      in the world when you've seen the sun. Never mind me, Pritchard. I'm going
+      to do my best still, but there's one thing that nothing will alter. I am
+      going to make that woman tell me her story, I am going to listen to the
+      way she tells it to me. You think that where women are concerned I am a
+      fool. I am, but there is one great boon which has been vouchsafed to fools&mdash;they
+      can tell the true from the false. Some sort of instinct, I suppose.
+      Elizabeth shall tell me her story and I shall know, when she tells it,
+      whether she is what you say or what she has seemed to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard held out his hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You're a queer sort, Tavernake,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;You take life plaguy
+      seriously. I only hope you 'll get all out of it you expect to. So long!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake opened the window after his visitor had gone, and leaned out for
+      some few minutes, letting the fresh air into the close, stifling room.
+      Then he went upstairs, bathed and changed his clothes, made some pretense
+      at breakfast, went through his letters with methodical exactness. At
+      eleven o'clock he set out upon his pilgrimage.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0027" id="link2HCH0027">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER XXVII. TAVERNAKE CHOOSES
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was kept waiting in the hall of the Milan Court for at least
+      half an hour before Elizabeth was prepared to see him. He wandered
+      aimlessly about watching the people come and go, looking out into the
+      flower-hung courtyard, curiously unconscious of himself and of his errand,
+      unable to concentrate his thoughts for a moment, yet filled all the time
+      with the dull and uneasy sensation of one who moves in a dream. Every now
+      and then he heard scraps of conversation from the servants and passers-by,
+      referring to the last night's incident. He picked up a paper but threw it
+      down after only a casual glance at the paragraph. He saw enough to
+      convince him that for the present, at any rate, Elizabeth seemed assured
+      of a certain amount of sympathy. The career of poor Wenham Gardner was set
+      down in black and white, with little extenuation, little mercy. His
+      misdeeds in Paris, his career in New York, spoke for themselves. He was
+      quoted as a type, a decadent of the most debauched instincts, to whom
+      crime was a relaxation and vice a habit. Tavernake would read no more. He
+      might have been all these things, and yet she had become his wife!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At last came the message for which he was waiting. As usual, her maid met
+      him at the door of her suite and ushered him in. Elizabeth was dressed for
+      the part very simply, with a suggestion even of mourning in her gray gown.
+      She welcomed him with a pathetic smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Once more, my dear friend,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I have to thank you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her fingers closed upon his and she smiled into his face. Tavernake found
+      himself curiously unresponsive. It was the same smile, and he knew very
+      well that he himself had not changed, yet it seemed as though life itself
+      were in a state of suspense for him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You, too, are looking grave this morning, my friend,&rdquo; she continued. &ldquo;Oh,
+      how horrible it has all been! Within the last two hours I have had at
+      least five reporters, a gentleman from Scotland Yard, another from the
+      American Ambassador to see me. It is too terrible, of course,&rdquo; she went
+      on. &ldquo;Wenham's people are doing all they can to make it worse. They want to
+      know why we were not together, why he was living in the country and I in
+      town. They are trying to show that he was under restraint there, as if
+      such a thing were possible! Mathers was his own servant&mdash;poor
+      Mathers!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She sighed and wiped her eyes. Still Tavernake said nothing. She looked at
+      him, a little surprised.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are not very sympathetic,&rdquo; she observed. &ldquo;Please come and sit down by
+      my side and I will show you something.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He moved towards her but he did not sit down. She stretched out her hand
+      and picked something up from the table, holding it towards him. Tavernake
+      took it mechanically and held it in his fingers. It was a cheque for
+      twelve thousand pounds.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You see,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I have not forgotten. This is the day, isn't it? If
+      you like, you can stay and have lunch with me up here and we will drink to
+      the success of our speculation.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake held the cheque in his fingers; he made no motion to put it in
+      his pocket. She looked at him with a puzzled frown upon her face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do talk or say something, please!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;You look at me like
+      some grim figure. Say something. Sit down and be natural.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;May I ask you some questions?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course you may,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;You may do anything sooner than stand
+      there looking so grim and unbending. What is it you want to know?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Did you understand that Wenham Gardner was this sort of man when you
+      married him?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shrugged her shoulders slightly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose I did,&rdquo; she admitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You married him, then, only because he was rich?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What else do women marry for, my dear moralist?&rdquo; she demanded. &ldquo;It isn't
+      my fault if it doesn't sound pretty. One must have money!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake inclined his head gravely; he made no sign of dissent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You two came over to England,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;with Beatrice and your
+      father. Beatrice left you because she disapproved of certain things.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You may as well know the truth,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;Beatrice has the most absurd
+      ideas. After a week with Wenham, I knew that he was not a person with whom
+      any woman could possibly live. His valet was really only his keeper; he
+      was subject to such mad fits that he needed some one always with him. I
+      was obliged to leave him in Cornwall. I can't tell you everything, but it
+      was absolutely impossible for me to go on living with him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice,&rdquo; Tavernake remarked, &ldquo;thought otherwise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth looked at him quickly from below her eyelids. It was hard,
+      however, to gather anything from his face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice thought otherwise,&rdquo; Elizabeth admitted. &ldquo;She thought that I
+      ought to nurse him, put up with him, give up all my friends, and try and
+      keep him alive. Why, it would have been absolute martyrdom, misery for
+      me,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;How could I be expected to do such a thing?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake nodded gravely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And the money?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, perhaps there I was a trifle calculating,&rdquo; she confessed. &ldquo;But
+      you,&rdquo; she added, nodding at the cheque in his hand, &ldquo;shouldn't grumble at
+      that. I knew when we were married that I should have trouble. His people
+      hated me, and I knew that in the event of anything happening like this
+      thing which has happened, they would try to get as little as possible
+      allowed me. So before we left New York, I got Wenham to turn as much as
+      ever he could into cash. That we brought away with us.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And who took care of it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I did,&rdquo; she answered, &ldquo;naturally.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me about last night,&rdquo; Tavernake said. &ldquo;I suppose I am stupid but I
+      don't quite understand.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How should you?&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;Listen, then. Wenham, I suppose got tired
+      of being shut up with Mathers, although I am sure I don't see what else
+      was possible. So he waited for his opportunity, and when the man wasn't
+      looking&mdash;well, you know what happened,&rdquo; she added, with a shiver. &ldquo;He
+      got up to London somehow and made his way to Dover Street.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why Dover Street?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I suppose you know,&rdquo; Elizabeth explained, &ldquo;that Wenham has a brother&mdash;Jerry&mdash;who
+      is exactly like him. These two had rooms in Dover Street always, where
+      they kept some English clothes and a servant. Jerry Gardner was over in
+      London. I knew that, and was expecting to see him every day. Wenham found
+      his way to the rooms, dressed himself in his brother's clothes, even wore
+      his ring and some of his jewelry, which he knew I should recognize, and
+      came here. I believed&mdash;yes, I believed all the time,&rdquo; she went on,
+      her voice trembling, &ldquo;that it was Jerry who was sitting with me. Once or
+      twice I had a sort of terrible shiver. Then I remembered how much they
+      were alike and it seemed to me ridiculous to be afraid. It was not till we
+      got upstairs, till the door was closed behind me, that he turned round and
+      I knew!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her head fell suddenly into her hands. It was almost the first sign of
+      emotion. Tavernake analyzed it mercilessly. He knew very well that it was
+      fear, the coward's fear of that terrible moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now,&rdquo; she went on, more cheerfully, &ldquo;no one will venture to deny that
+      Wenham is mad. He will be placed under restraint, of course, and the
+      courts will make me an allowance. One thing is absolutely certain, and
+      that is that he will not live a year.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake half closed his eyes. Was there no sign of his suffering, no
+      warning note of the things which were passing out of his life! The woman
+      who smiled upon him seemed to see nothing. The twitching of his fingers,
+      the slight quivering of his face, she thought was because of his fear for
+      her.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now,&rdquo; she declared, in a suddenly altered tone, &ldquo;this is all over and
+      done with. Now you know everything. There are no more mysteries,&rdquo; she
+      added, smiling at him delightfully. &ldquo;It is all very terrible, of course,
+      but I feel as though a great weight had passed away. You and I are going
+      to be friends, are we not?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She rose slowly to her feet and came towards him. His eyes watched her
+      slow, graceful movements as though fascinated. He remembered on that first
+      visit of his how wonderful he had thought her walk. She was still smiling
+      up at him; her fingers fell upon his shoulders.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are such a strange person,&rdquo; she murmured. &ldquo;You aren't a little bit
+      like any of the men I've ever known, any of the men I have ever cared to
+      have as friends. There is something about you altogether different. I
+      suppose that is why I rather like you. Are you glad?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      For a single wild moment Tavernake hesitated. She was so close to him that
+      her hair touched his forehead, the breath from her upturned lips fell upon
+      his cheeks. Her blue eyes were half pleading, half inviting.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are going to be my very dear friend, are you not&mdash;Leonard?&rdquo; she
+      whispered. &ldquo;I do feel that I need some one strong like you to help me
+      through these days.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake suddenly seized the hands that were upon his shoulders, and
+      forced them back. She felt herself gripped as though by a vice, and a
+      sudden terror seized her. He lifted her up and she caught a glimpse of his
+      wild, set face. Then the breath came through his teeth. He shook all over
+      but the fit had passed. He simply thrust her away from him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;we cannot be friends! You are a woman without a heart, you
+      are a murderess!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He tore her cheque calmly in pieces and flung them scornfully away. She
+      stood looking at him, breathing quickly, white to the lips though the
+      murder had gone from his eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice warned me,&rdquo; he went on; &ldquo;Pritchard warned me. Some things I saw
+      for myself, but I suppose I was mad. Now I know!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He turned away. Her eyes followed him wonderingly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard,&rdquo; she cried out, &ldquo;you are not going like this? You don't mean
+      it!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Ever afterwards his restraint amazed him. He did not reply. He closed both
+      doors firmly behind him and walked to the lift. She came even to the
+      outside door and called down the corridor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard, come back for one moment!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He turned his head and looked at her, looked at her from the corner of the
+      corridor, steadfastly and without speech. Her fingers dropped from the
+      handle of the door. She went back into her room with shaking knees, and
+      began to cry softly. Afterwards she wondered at herself. It was the first
+      time she had cried for many years.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake walked to the city and in less than half an hour's time found
+      himself in Mr. Martin's office. The lawyer welcomed him warmly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I'm jolly glad to see you, Tavernake,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;I hope you've got
+      the money. Sit down.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake did not sit down; he had forgotten, indeed, to take of his hat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Martin,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I am sorry for you. I have been fooled and you have to
+      pay as well as I have. I can't take up the option on the property. I
+      haven't a penny toward it except my own money, and you know how much that
+      is. You can sell my plots, if you like, and call the money your costs.
+      I've finished.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The lawyer looked at him with wide-open mouth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What on earth are you talking about, Tavernake?&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;Are you
+      drunk, by any chance?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, I am quite sober,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I have made one or two bad
+      mistakes, that's all. You have a power of attorney for me. You can do what
+      you like with my land, make any terms you please. Good-day!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, Tavernake, look here!&rdquo; the lawyer protested, springing to his feet.
+      &ldquo;I say, Tavernake!&rdquo; he called out.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      But Tavernake heard nothing, or, if he heard, he took no notice. He walked
+      out into the street and was lost among the hurrying throngs upon the
+      pavements.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2H_4_0029" id="link2H_4_0029">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      BOOK TWO
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0028" id="link2HCH0028">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER I. NEW HORIZONS
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Towards the sky-line, across the level country, stumbling and crawling
+      over the deep-hewn dikes, wading sometimes through the mud-oozing swamp,
+      Tavernake, who had left the small railway terminus on foot, made his way
+      that night steadily seawards, as one pursued by some relentless and
+      indefatigable enemy. Twilight had fallen like a mantle around him, fallen
+      over that great flat region of fens and pastureland and bog. Little
+      patches of mist, harbingers of the coming obscurity, were being drawn now
+      into the gradual darkness. Lights twinkled out from the far-scattered
+      homesteads. Here and there a dog barked, some lonely bird seeking shelter
+      called to its mate, but of human beings there seemed to be no one in sight
+      save the solitary traveler.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was in grievous straits. His clothes were caked with mud, his
+      hair tossed with the wind, his cheeks pale, his eyes set with the despair
+      of that fierce upheaval through which he had passed. For many hours the
+      torture which had driven him back towards his birthplace had triumphed
+      over his physical exhaustion. Now came the time, however, when the latter
+      asserted itself. With a half-stifled moan he collapsed. Sheer fatigue
+      induced a brief but merciful spell of uneasy slumber. He lay upon his back
+      near one of the broader dikes, his arms outstretched, his unseeing eyes
+      turned toward the sky. The darkness deepened and passed away again before
+      the light of the moon. When at last he sat up, it was a new world upon
+      which he looked, a strange land, moonlit in places, yet full of shadowy
+      somberness. He gazed wonderingly around&mdash;for the moment he had
+      forgotten. Then memory came, and with memory once more the stab at his
+      heart. He rose to his feet and went resolutely on his way.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Almost until the dawn he walked, keeping as near as he could to that long
+      monotonous line of telegraph posts, yet avoiding the road as much as
+      possible. With the rising of the sun, he crept into a wayside hovel and
+      lay there hidden for hours. Hunger and thirst seemed like things which had
+      passed him by. It was sleep only which he craved, sleep and forgetfulness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Dusk was falling again before he found himself upon his feet, starting out
+      once more upon this strangely thought-of pilgrimage. This time he kept to
+      the road, plodding along with tired, dejected footsteps, which had in them
+      still something of that restless haste which drove him ceaselessly onward
+      as though he were indeed possessed of some unquiet spirit. He was
+      recovering now, however, a little of his natural common sense. He
+      remembered that he must have food and drink, and he sought them from the
+      wayside public-house like an ordinary traveler, conquering without any
+      apparent effort that first invincible repugnance of his toward the face of
+      any human being. Then on again across this strange land of windmills and
+      spreading plains, until the darkness forced him to take shelter once more.
+      That night he slept like a child. With the morning, the fever had passed
+      from his blood. A great wind blew in his face even as he opened his eyes,
+      touched to wakefulness by the morning sun, a wind that came booming over
+      the level places, salt with the touch of the ocean and fragrant with the
+      perfume of many marsh plants. He was coming toward the sea now, and within
+      a very short distance from where he had spent the night, he found a broad,
+      shining river stealing into the land. With eager fingers he stripped
+      himself and plunged in, diving again and again below the surface, swimming
+      with long, lazy strokes backwards and forwards. Afterwards he lay down in
+      the warm, dry grass, dressed himself slowly, and went on his way. The
+      wind, which had increased now since the early morning, came thundering
+      across the level land, bending the tops of the few scattered trees,
+      sending the sails of the windmills spinning, bringing on its bosom now
+      stronger than ever the flavor of the sea itself, salt and stimulating.
+      Tavernake told himself that this was a new world into which he was coming.
+      He would pass into its embrace and life would become a new thing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Towards evening with many a thrill of reminiscence, he descended a steep
+      hill and walked into a queer time-forgotten village, whose scattered
+      red-tiled cottages were built around an arm of the sea. Boldly enough now
+      he entered the one inn which flaunted its sign upon the cobbled street,
+      and, taking a seat in the stone-floored kitchen, ate and drank and bespoke
+      a bed. Later on, he strolled down to the quay and made friends with the
+      few fishermen who were loitering there. They answered his questions
+      readily, although he found it hard at first to pick up again the dialect
+      of which he himself had once made use. The little place was scarcely
+      changed. All progress, indeed, seemed to have passed it by. There were a
+      handful of fishermen, a boat-builder and a fish-curer in the village.
+      There was no other industry save a couple of small farmhouses on the
+      outskirts of the place, no railway within twelve miles. Tourists came
+      seldom, excursionists never. In the half contented, half animal-like
+      expression which seemed common to all the inhabitants, Tavernake read
+      easily enough the history of their uneventful days. It was such a shelter
+      as this, indeed, for which he had been searching.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      On the second night after his arrival, he walked with the boatbuilder upon
+      the wooden quay. The boatbuilder's name was Nicholls, and he was a man of
+      some means, deacon of the chapel, with a fair connection as a jobbing
+      carpenter, and possessor of the only horse and cart in the place.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nicholls,&rdquo; Tavernake said, &ldquo;you don't remember me, do you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The boat-builder shook his head slowly and ponderously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There was Richard Tavernake who farmed the low fields,&rdquo; he remarked,
+      reminiscently. &ldquo;Maybe you're a son of his. Now I come to think of it, he
+      had a boy apprenticed to the carpentering.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was the boy,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I soon had enough of it and went to
+      London.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You'm grown out of all knowledge,&rdquo; Nicholls declared, &ldquo;but I mind you
+      now. So you've been in London all these years?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I've been in London,&rdquo; Tavernake admitted, &ldquo;and I think, of the two, that
+      Sprey-by-the-Sea is the better place.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Sprey is well enough,&rdquo; the boat-builder confessed, &ldquo;well enough for a man
+      who isn't set on change.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Change,&rdquo; Tavernake asserted, grimly, &ldquo;is an overrated joy. I have had too
+      much of it in my life. I think that I should like to stay here for some
+      time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The boat-builder was surprised, but he was a man of heavy and deliberate
+      turn of mind and he did not commit himself to speech. Tavernake continued.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I used to know something of carpentering in my younger days,&rdquo; he said,
+      &ldquo;and I don't think that I have forgotten it all. I wonder if I could find
+      anything to do down here?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Matthew Nicholls stroked his beard thoughtfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;The folk round about are not over partial to strangers,&rdquo; he observed,
+      &ldquo;and you'm been away so long I reckon there's not many as'd recollect you.
+      And as for carpentering jobs, there's Tom Lake over at Lesser Blakeney and
+      his brother down at Brancaster, besides me on the spot, as you might say.
+      It's a poor sort of opening there'd be, if you ask my opinion, especially
+      for one like yourself, as 'as got education.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should be satisfied with very little,&rdquo; Tavernake persisted. &ldquo;I want to
+      work with my hands. I should like to forget for a time that I have had any
+      education at all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That do seem mightily queer to me,&rdquo; Nicholls remarked, thoughtfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;it isn't altogether unnatural. I want to make something
+      with my hands. I think that I could build boats. Why do you not take me
+      into your yard? I could do no harm and I should not want much pay.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Matthew Nicholls stroked his beard once more and this time he counted
+      fifty, as was his custom when confronted with a difficult matter. He had
+      no need to do anything of the sort, for nothing in the world would have
+      induced him to make up his mind on the spot as to so weighty a proposal.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It's not likely that you're serious,&rdquo; he objected. &ldquo;You are a young man
+      and strong-limbed, I should imagine, but you've education&mdash;one can
+      tell it by the way you pronounce your words. It's but a poor living, after
+      all, to be made here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I like the place,&rdquo; Tavernake declared doggedly. &ldquo;I am a man of small
+      needs. I want to work all through the day, work till I am tired enough to
+      sleep at night, work till my bones ache and my arms are sore. I suppose
+      you could give me enough to live on in a humble way?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Take a bite of supper with me,&rdquo; Nicholls answered. &ldquo;In these serious
+      affairs, my daughter has always her say. We will put the matter before her
+      and see what she thinks of it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They lingered about the quay until the light from Wells Lighthouse flashed
+      across the sea, and until in the distance they could hear the moaning of
+      the incoming tide as it rippled over the bar and began to fill the tidal
+      way which stretched to the wooden pier itself. Then the two men made their
+      way along the village street, through a field, and into the little yard
+      over which stood the sign of &ldquo;Matthew Nicholls, Boat-Builder.&rdquo; At one
+      corner of the yard was the cottage in which he lived.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You'll come right in, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; he said, the instincts of
+      hospitality stirring within him as soon as they had passed through the
+      gate. &ldquo;We will talk of this matter together, you and me and the daughter.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake seemed, on his introduction to the household, like a man unused
+      to feminine society. Perhaps he did not expect to find such a type of her
+      sex as Ruth Nicholls in such a remote neighborhood. She was thin, and her
+      cheeks were paler than those of any of the other young women whom he had
+      seen about the village. Her eyes, too, were darker, and her speech
+      different. There was nothing about her which reminded him in the least of
+      the child with whom he had played. Tavernake watched her intently.
+      Presently the idea came to him that she, too, was seeking shelter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Supper was a simple meal, but it was well and deftly served. The girl had
+      the gift of moving noiselessly. She was quick without giving the
+      impression of haste. To their guest she was courteous, but her
+      recollection of him appeared to be slight, and his coming but a matter of
+      slight interest. After she had cleared the cloth, however, and produced a
+      jar of tobacco, her father bade her sit down with them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; he began, ponderously, &ldquo;is thinking some of settling down
+      in these parts, Ruth.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She inclined her head gravely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It appears,&rdquo; her father continued, &ldquo;that he is sick and tired of the city
+      and of head-work. He is wishful to come into the yard with me, if so be
+      that we could find enough work for two.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The girl looked at their visitor, and for the first time there was a
+      measure of curiosity in her earnest gaze. Tavernake was, in his way, good
+      enough to look upon. He was well-built, his shoulders and physique all
+      spoke of strength. His features were firmly cut, although his general
+      expression was gloomy. But for a certain moroseness, an uncouthness which
+      he seemed to cultivate, he might even have been deemed good-looking.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake would make a great mistake,&rdquo; she said, hesitatingly. &ldquo;It is
+      not well for those who have brains to work with their hands. It is not a
+      place for those to live who have been out in the world. At most seasons of
+      the year it is but a wilderness. Sometimes there is little enough to do,
+      even for father.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am not ambitious for over-much work or for over-much money, Miss
+      Nicholls,&rdquo; Tavernake replied. &ldquo;I will be frank with you both. Things out
+      in the world there went ill with me; it was not my fault, but they went
+      ill with me. What ambitions I had are finished&mdash;for the present, at
+      any rate. I want to rest, I want to work with my hands, to grow my muscles
+      again, to feel my strength, to believe that there is something effective
+      in the world I can do. I have had a shock, a disappointment,&mdash;call it
+      what you like.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The old man Nicholls nodded deliberately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; he pronounced, &ldquo;it's a big change to make. I never thought of help
+      in the yard before. When there's been more than I could do, I've just let
+      it go. Come for a week on trial, Leonard Tavernake. If we are of any use
+      to one another, we shall soon know of it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The girl, who had been looking out into the night, came back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are making a mistake, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;You are too young
+      and strong to have finished your battle.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked at her steadily and sighed. It was only too obvious that hers
+      had been fought and lost.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps,&rdquo; he replied softly, &ldquo;you are right. Perhaps it is only the rest
+      I want. We shall see.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0029" id="link2HCH0029">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER II. THE SIMPLE LIFE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      So Tavernake became a boat-builder. Summer passed into winter and this
+      hamlet by the sea seemed, indeed, as though it might have been one of the
+      forgotten spots upon the earth. Save for that handful of cottages, the two
+      farmhouses a few hundred yards inland, and the deserted Hall half-hidden
+      in its grove of pine trees, there was no dwelling-place nor any sign of
+      human habitation for many miles. For eight hours a day Tavernake worked,
+      mostly out of doors, in the little yard which hung over the beach.
+      Sometimes he rested from his labors and looked seaward, looked around him
+      as though rejoicing in that unbroken solitude, the emptiness of the gray
+      ocean, the loneliness of the land behind. What things there were which lay
+      back in the cells of his memory, no person there knew, for he spoke of his
+      past to no one, not even to Ruth. He was a good workman, and he lived the
+      simple life of those others without complaint or weariness. There was
+      nothing in his manner to denote that he had been used to anything else.
+      The village had accepted him without question. It was only Ruth who still,
+      gravely but kindly enough, disapproved of his presence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One day she came and sat with him as he smoked his after-dinner pipe,
+      leaning against an overturned boat, with his eyes fixed upon that line of
+      gray breakers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You spend a good deal of your time thinking, Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she remarked
+      quietly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Too much,&rdquo; he admitted at once, &ldquo;too much, Miss Nicholls. I should be
+      better employed planing down that mast there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know that I did not mean that,&rdquo; she said, reprovingly, &ldquo;only
+      sometimes you make me&mdash;shall I confess it?&mdash;almost angry with
+      you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He took his pipe from his mouth and knocked out the ashes. As they fell on
+      the ground so he looked at them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;All thought is wasted time,&rdquo; he declared, grimly, &ldquo;all thought of the
+      past. The past is like those ashes; it is dead and finished.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not always,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;Sometimes the past comes to life again.
+      Sometimes the bravest of us quit the fight too soon.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked at her questioningly, almost fiercely. Her words, however,
+      seemed spoken without intent.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So far as mine is concerned,&rdquo; he pronounced, &ldquo;it is finished. There is a
+      memorial stone laid upon it, and no resurrection is possible.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You cannot tell,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;No one can tell.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He turned back to his work almost rudely, but she stayed by his side.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Once,&rdquo; she remarked, reflectively, &ldquo;I, too, went a little way into the
+      world. I was a school-teacher at Norwich. I was very fond of some one
+      there; we were engaged. Then my mother died and I had to come back to look
+      after father.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We are a long way from Norwich,&rdquo; she continued, quietly. &ldquo;Soon after I
+      left, the man whom I was fond of grew lonely. He found some one else.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You have forgotten him?&rdquo; Tavernake asked, quickly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall never forget him,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;That part of life is finished,
+      but if ever my father can spare me, I shall go back to my work again.
+      Sometimes those work the best and accomplish the most who carry the scars
+      of a great wound.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned away to the house, and after that it seemed to him that she
+      avoided him for a time. At any rate, she made no further attempt to win
+      his confidence. Propinquity, however, was too much for both of them. He
+      was a lodger under her father's roof. It was scarcely possible for them to
+      keep apart. Saturdays and Sundays they walked sometimes for miles across
+      the frost-bound marshes, in the quickening atmosphere of the darkening
+      afternoons, when the red sun sank early behind the hills, and the twilight
+      grew shorter every day. They watched the sea-birds together and saw the
+      wild duck come down to the pools; felt the glow of exercise burn their
+      cheeks; felt, too, that common and nameless exultation engendered by their
+      loneliness in the solitude of these beautiful empty places. In the
+      evenings they often read together, for Nicholls, although no drinker,
+      never missed his hour or so at the village inn. Tavernake, in time, began
+      to find a sort of comfort in her calm, sexless companionship. He knew very
+      well that he was to her as she was to him, something human, something that
+      filled an empty place, yet something without direct personality. Little by
+      little he felt the bitterness in his heart grow less. Then a late spring&mdash;late,
+      at any rate, in this quaint corner of the world&mdash;stole like some
+      wonderful enchantment across the face of the moors and the marshes. Yellow
+      gorse starred with golden clumps the brown hillside; wild lavender gleamed
+      in patches across the silver-streaked marshes; the dead hedges came
+      blossoming into life. Crocuses, long lines of yellow and purple crocuses,
+      broke from waxy buds into starlike blossoms along the front of Matthew
+      Nicholls's garden. And with the coming o spring, Tavernake found himself
+      suddenly able to thin of the past. It was a new phase of life. He could
+      sit down and think of those things that had happened to him, without
+      fearing to be wrecked by the storm. Often he sat out looking seaward,
+      thinking of the days when he had first met Beatrice, of those early days
+      of pleasant companionship, of the marvelous avidity with which he had
+      learned from her. Only when Elizabeth's face stole into the foreground did
+      he spring from his place and turn back to his work.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      One day Tavernake sat poring over the weekly local paper, reading it more
+      out of curiosity than from any real interest. Suddenly a familiar name
+      caught his eye. His heart seemed to stop beating for a moment, and the
+      page swam before his eyes. Quickly he recovered himself and read:
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+      THE QUEEN'S HALL, UNTHANK ROAD,
+                  NORWICH
+
+                TWICE DAILY.
+             PROFESSOR FRANKLIN
+          assisted by his daughter,
+           MISS BEATRICE FRANKLIN,
+     will give his REFINED and MARVELOUS
+     ENTERTAINMENT, comprising HYPNOTISM, feats
+     Of SECOND SIGHT never before attempted on
+     any stage, THOUGHT-READING, and a BRIEF
+     LECTURE upon the connection between ANCIENT
+     SUPERSTITIONS and the EXTRAORDINARY
+     DEVELOPMENTS OF THE NEW SCIENCE.
+
+     PROFESSOR FRANKLIN Can be CONSULTED PRIVATELY,
+     by letter or by appointment.  Address for this
+     week&mdash;The Golden Cow, Bell's Lane, Norwich.
+</pre>
+    <p>
+      Twice Tavernake read the announcement. Then he went out and found Ruth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ruth,&rdquo; he told her, &ldquo;there is something calling me back, perhaps for
+      good.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      For the first time she gave him her hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now you are talking like a man once more,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;Go and seek it.
+      Comeback and say good-bye to us, if you will, but throw your tools into
+      the sea.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake laughed and looked across at his workshop.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't believe,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;that you've any confidence in my boat.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I'm not sure that I would sail with you,&rdquo; she answered, &ldquo;even if you ever
+      finished it. A laborer's work for a laborer's hand. You must go back to
+      the other things.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0030" id="link2HCH0030">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER III. OLD FRIENDS MEET
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      The professor set down his tumbler upon the zinc-rimmed counter. He was
+      very little changed except that he had grown a shade stouter, and there
+      was perhaps more color in his cheeks. He carried himself, too, like a man
+      who believes in himself. In the small public-house he was, without doubt,
+      an impressive figure.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My friends,&rdquo; he remarked, &ldquo;our host's whiskey is good. At the same time,
+      I must not forget&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You'll have one with me, Professor,&rdquo; a youth at his elbow interrupted.
+      &ldquo;Two special whiskies, miss, if you please.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor shrugged his shoulders&mdash;it was a gesture which he
+      wished every one to understand. He was suffering now the penalty for a
+      popularity which would not be denied!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are very kind, sir,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;very kind, indeed. As I was about to
+      say, I must not forget that in less than half an hour I am due upon the
+      stage. It does not do to disappoint one's audience, sir. It is a poor
+      place, this music-hall, but it is full, they tell me packed from floor to
+      ceiling. At eight-thirty I must show myself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A marvelous turn, too, Professor,&rdquo; declared one of the young men by whom
+      he was surrounded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I thank you, sir,&rdquo; the professor replied, turning towards the speaker,
+      glass in hand. &ldquo;There have been others who have paid me a similar
+      compliment; others, I may say, not unconnected with the aristocracy of
+      your country&mdash;not unconnected either, I might add,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;with
+      the very highest in the land, those who from their exalted position have
+      never failed to shower favors upon the more fortunate sons of our
+      profession. The science of which I am to some extent the pioneer&mdash;not
+      a drop more, my young friend. Say, I'm in dead earnest this time! No more,
+      indeed.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The young man in knickerbockers who had just come in banged the head of
+      his cane upon the counter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You'll never refuse me, Professor,&rdquo; he asserted, confidently. &ldquo;I'm an old
+      supporter, I am. I've seen you in Blackburn and Manchester, and twice
+      here. Just as wonderful as ever! And that young lady of yours, Professor,
+      begging your pardon if she is your daughter, as no doubt she is, why,
+      she's a nut and no mistake.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor sighed. He was in his element but he was getting uneasy at
+      the flight of time.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My young friend,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;your face is not familiar to me but I cannot
+      refuse your kindly offer. It must be the last, however, absolutely the
+      last.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then Tavernake, directed here from the music-hall, pushed open the swing
+      door and entered. The professor set down his glass untasted. Tavernake
+      came slowly across the room.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You haven't forgotten me, then, Professor?&rdquo; he remarked, holding out his
+      hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor welcomed him a little limply; something of the bombast had
+      gone out of his manner. Tavernake's arrival had reminded him of things
+      which he had only too easily forgotten.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is very surprising,&rdquo; he faltered, &ldquo;very surprising indeed. Do you
+      live in these parts?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not far away,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I saw your announcement in the
+      papers.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I am on the war-path again. I tried resting but I got fat
+      and lazy, and the people wouldn't have it, sir,&rdquo; he continued, recovering
+      very quickly something of his former manner. &ldquo;The number of offers I got
+      through my agents by every post was simply astounding&mdash;astounding!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am looking forward to seeing your performance this evening,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      said politely. &ldquo;In the meantime&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I know what you are thinking of,&rdquo; the professor interrupted. &ldquo;Well, well,
+      give me your arm and we will walk down to the hall together. My friends,&rdquo;
+       the professor added, turning round, &ldquo;I wish you all a good-night!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then the door was pushed half-way open and Tavernake's heart gave a jump.
+      It was Beatrice who stood there, very pale, very tired, and much thinner
+      even than the Beatrice of the boardinghouse, but still Beatrice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Father,&rdquo; she exclaimed, &ldquo;do you know that it is nearly&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then she saw Tavernake and said no more. She seemed to sway a little, and
+      Tavernake, taking a quick step forward, grasped her by the hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear sister,&rdquo; he cried, &ldquo;you have been ill!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She was herself again almost in a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ill? Never in my life,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;Only I have been hurrying&mdash;we
+      are late already for the performance&mdash;and seeing you there, well, it
+      was quite a shock, you know. Walk down with us and tell me all about it.
+      Tell us what you are doing here&mdash;or rather, don't talk for a moment!
+      It is all so amazing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They turned down the narrow cobbled street, the professor walking in the
+      middle of the roadway, swinging his cane, a very imposing and wonderful
+      figure, with the tails of his frock-coat streaming in the wind, his long
+      hair only half-hidden by his hat. He hummed a tune to himself and affected
+      not to take any notice of the other two. Then Tavernake suddenly realized
+      that he had done a cowardly action in leaving her without a word.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There is so much to ask,&rdquo; she began at last, &ldquo;but you have come back.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at his workman's clothes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What have you been doing?&rdquo; she asked, sharply.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Working,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, &ldquo;good work, too. I am the better for it.
+      Don't mind my clothes, Beatrice. I have been mad for a time, but after all
+      it has been a healthy madness.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was a strange thing that you did,&rdquo; she said,&mdash;&ldquo;you disappeared.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He nodded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Some day,&rdquo; he told her, &ldquo;I may, perhaps, be able to make you understand.
+      Just now I don't think that I could.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was Elizabeth?&rdquo; she whispered, softly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was Elizabeth,&rdquo; he admitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They said no more then till they reached the hall. She stopped at the door
+      and put out her hand timidly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall see you afterwards?&rdquo; she ventured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you mind my coming to the performance?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She hesitated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A few moments ago,&rdquo; she remarked, smiling, &ldquo;I was dreading your coming.
+      Now I think that you had better. It will be all over at ten o'clock, and I
+      shall look for you outside. You are living in Norwich?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I shall be here for to-night, at any rate,&rdquo; he answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well, then,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;afterwards we will have a talk.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake passed through the scattered knot of loiterers at the door and
+      bought a seat for himself in the little music-hall, which, notwithstanding
+      the professor's boast, was none too well filled. It was a place of the
+      old-fashioned sort, with small tables in the front, and waiters hurrying
+      about serving drinks. The people were of the lowest order, and the
+      atmosphere of the room was thick with tobacco smoke. A young woman in a
+      flaxen wig and boy's clothes was singing a popular ditty, marching up and
+      down the stage, and interspersing the words o f her song with grimaces and
+      appropriate action. Tavernake sat down with a barely-smothered groan. He
+      was beginning to realize the tragedy upon which he had stumbled. A comic
+      singer followed, who in a dress suit several sizes too large for him gave
+      an imitation of a popular Irish comedian. Then the curtain went up and the
+      professor was seen, standing in front of the curtain and bowing solemnly
+      to a somewhat unresponsive audience. A minute later Beatrice came quietly
+      in and sat by his side. There was nothing new about the show. Tavernake
+      had seen the same thing before, with the exception that the professor was
+      perhaps a little behind the majority of his fellow-craftsmen. The
+      performance was finished in dead silence, and after it was over, Beatrice
+      came to the front and sang. She was a very unusual figure in such a place,
+      in a plain black evening gown, with black gloves and no jewelry, but they
+      encored her heartily, and she sang a song from the musical comedy in which
+      Tavernake had first seen her. A sudden wave of reminiscence stirred within
+      him. His thoughts seemed to go back to the night when he had waited for
+      her outside the theatre and they had had supper at Imano's, to the day
+      when he had left the boarding-house and entered upon his new life. It was
+      more like a dream than ever now.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He rose and quitted the place immediately she had finished, waiting in the
+      street until she appeared. She came out in a few minutes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Father is going to a supper,&rdquo; she announced, &ldquo;at the inn where he has a
+      room for receiving people. Will you come home with me for an hour? Then we
+      can go round and fetch him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should like to,&rdquo; Tavernake answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Her lodgings were only a few steps away&mdash;a strange little house in a
+      narrow street. She opened the front door and ushered him in.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You understand, of course,&rdquo; she said, smiling, &ldquo;that we have abandoned
+      the haunts of luxury altogether.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked around at the tiny room with its struggling fire and horsehair
+      sofa, linoleum for carpet, oleographs for pictures, and he shivered, not
+      for his own sake but for hers. On the sideboard were some bread and cheese
+      and a bottle of ginger beer.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Please imagine,&rdquo; she begged, taking the pins from her hat, &ldquo;that you are
+      in those dear comfortable rooms of ours down at Chelsea. Draw that
+      easy-chair up to what there is of the fire, and listen. You smoke still?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have taken to a pipe,&rdquo; he admitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then light it and listen,&rdquo; she went on, smoothing her hair for a minute
+      in front of the looking-glass. &ldquo;You want to know about Elizabeth, of
+      course.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I want to know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Elizabeth, on the whole,&rdquo; Beatrice continued, &ldquo;got out of all her
+      troubles very well. Her husband's people were wild with her, but Elizabeth
+      was very clever. They were never able to prove that she had exercised more
+      than proper control over poor Wenham. He died two months after they took
+      him to the asylum. They offered Elizabeth a lump sum to waive all claims
+      to his estate, and she accepted it. I think that she is now somewhere on
+      the Continent.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you?&rdquo; he asked. &ldquo;Why did you leave the theatre?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was a matter of looking after my father,&rdquo; she explained. &ldquo;You see,
+      while he was there with Elizabeth he had too much money and nothing to do.
+      The consequence was that he was always&mdash;well, I suppose I had better
+      say it&mdash;drinking too much, and he was losing all his desire for work.
+      I made him promise that if I could get some engagements he would come away
+      with me, so I went to an agent and we have been touring like this for
+      quite a long time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But what a life for you!&rdquo; Tavernake exclaimed. &ldquo;Couldn't you have stayed
+      on at the theatre and found him something in London?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;In London,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;he would never have got out of his old habits. And
+      then,&rdquo; she went on, hesitatingly, &ldquo;you understand that the public want
+      something else besides the hypnotism&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake interrupted her ruthlessly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course I understand,&rdquo; he declared, &ldquo;I was there to-night. I understood
+      at once why you were not very anxious for me to go. The people cared
+      nothing at all about your father's performance. They simply waited for
+      you. You would get the same money if you went round without him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded, a trifle shamefacedly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am so afraid some one will tell him,&rdquo; she confessed. &ldquo;They nearly
+      always ask me to leave out his part of the performance. They have even
+      offered me more money if I would come alone. But you see how it is. He
+      believes in himself, he thinks he is very clever and he believes that the
+      public like his show. It is the only thing which helps him to keep a
+      little self-respect. He thinks that my singing is almost unnecessary.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake looked into that faint glimmer of miserable fire. He was
+      conscious of a curious feeling in his throat. How little he knew of life!
+      The pathos of what she had told him, the thought of her bravely traveling
+      the country and singing at third-rate music-halls, never taking any credit
+      to herself, simply that her father might still believe himself a man of
+      talent, appealed to him irresistibly. He suddenly held out his hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Poor little Beatrice!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;Dear little sister!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The hand he gripped was cold, she avoided his eyes.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You&mdash;you mustn't,&rdquo; she murmured. &ldquo;Please don't!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He held out his other hand and half rose, but her lips suddenly ceased to
+      quiver and she waved him back.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, Leonard,&rdquo; she begged, &ldquo;please don't do or say anything foolish. Since
+      we do meet again, though, like this, I am going to ask you one question.
+      What made you come to me and ask me to marry you that day?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked away; something in her eyes accused him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice,&rdquo; he confessed, &ldquo;I was a thick-headed ignorant fool, without
+      understanding. I came to you for safety. I was afraid of Elizabeth, I was
+      afraid of what I felt for her. I wanted to escape from it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled piteously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It wasn't a very brave thing to do, was it?&rdquo; she faltered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It was mean,&rdquo; he admitted. &ldquo;It was worse than that. But, Beatrice,&rdquo; he
+      went on, &ldquo;I was missing you horribly. You did leave a big empty place when
+      you went away. I am not going to excuse myself about Elizabeth. I lived
+      through a time of the strangest, most marvelous emotions one could dream
+      of. Then the thing came to an end and I felt as though the bottom had gone
+      out of life. I suppose&mdash;I loved her,&rdquo; he continued hesitatingly. &ldquo;I
+      don't know. I only know that she filled every thought of my brain, that
+      she lived in every beat of my heart, that I would have gone down into Hell
+      to help her. And then I understood. That morning she told me something of
+      the truth about herself, not meaning to&mdash;unconsciously&mdash;justifying
+      herself all the time, not realizing that every word she said was damnable.
+      And then there didn't seem to be anything else left, and I had only one
+      desire. I turned my back upon everything and I went back to the place
+      where I was born, a little fishing village. For the last thirty miles I
+      walked. I shall never forget it. When I got there, what I wanted was work,
+      work with my hands. I wanted to build something, to create anything that I
+      could labor upon. I became a boat builder&mdash;I have been a boatbuilder
+      ever since.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She turned and faced him. She looked into his eyes very searchingly, very
+      wistfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I ask you once more, only differently. Will you
+      marry me now? I'll find some work, I'll make enough money for us. Do you
+      remember,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;how I used to talk, how I used to feel that I had
+      only to put forth my strength and I could win anything? I'll feel like
+      that again, Beatrice, if you'll come to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head slowly. She looked away from him with a sigh. She had
+      the air of one who has sought for something which she has failed to find.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mustn't think of that again, Leonard,&rdquo; she told him. &ldquo;It would be
+      quite impossible. This is the only way I can save my father. We have a
+      tour that will take us the best part of another year.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But you are sacrificing yourself!&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;I will keep your
+      father.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It isn't that only,&rdquo; she replied. &ldquo;For one thing, I couldn't let you; and
+      for another, it isn't only the money, it's the work. As long as he's made
+      to think that the public expect him every night, he keeps off drinking too
+      much. There is nothing else in the whole world which would keep him
+      steady. Don't look as though you didn't understand, Leonard. He is my
+      father, you know, and there isn't anything more terrible than to see any
+      one who has a claim on us give way to anything like that. You mayn't quite
+      approve, but please believe that I am doing what I feel to be right.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The little fire had gone out. Beatrice glanced at the clock and put on her
+      jacket again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry, Leonard,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;but I think I must go and fetch father
+      now. You can walk with me there, if you will. It has been very good to see
+      you again. For the rest I don't know what to say to you. Do you think that
+      it is quite what you were meant for&mdash;to build boats?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't seem to have any other ambition,&rdquo; he answered, wearily. &ldquo;When I
+      read in the paper this morning that you and your father were here, things
+      seemed suddenly different. I came at once. I didn't know what I wanted
+      until I saw you, but I know now, and it isn't any good.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No good at all,&rdquo; she declared cheerfully. &ldquo;It won't be very long,
+      Leonard, before something else comes along to stir you. I don't think you
+      were meant to build boats all your life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He rose and took up his hat. She was waiting for him at the door. Again
+      they passed down the narrow street.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell, me, Beatrice,&rdquo; he begged, &ldquo;is it because you don't like me well
+      enough that you won't listen to what I ask?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      For a moment she half closed her eyes as though in pain. Then she laughed,
+      not perhaps very naturally. They were standing now by the door of the
+      public house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;you are very young in years but you are a baby in
+      experience. Mind, there are other reasons why I could not&mdash;would not
+      dream of marrying you, other reasons which are absolutely sufficient, but&mdash;do
+      you know that you have asked me twice and you have never once said that
+      you cared, that you have never once looked as though you cared? No, don't,
+      please,&rdquo; she interrupted, &ldquo;don't explain anything. You see, a woman always
+      knows&mdash;too well, sometimes.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded, and passed in through the swinging-doors. Standing out there
+      in the narrow, crooked street, Tavernake heard the clapping and applause
+      which greeted her entrance, he heard her father's voice. Some one struck a
+      note at the piano&mdash;she was going to sing. Very slowly he turned away
+      and walked down the cobbled hill.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0031" id="link2HCH0031">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER IV. PRITCHARD'S GOOD NEWS
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Late in the afternoon of the following day, Ruth came home from the
+      village and found Tavernake hard at work on his boat. She put down her
+      basket and stopped by his side.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So you are back again,&rdquo; she remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I am back again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And nothing has happened?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing has happened,&rdquo; he assented, wearily. &ldquo;Nothing ever will happen
+      now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You mean that you will stay here and build boats all your life?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is what I mean to do,&rdquo; he announced.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She laid her hand upon his shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't believe it, Leonard,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;There is other work for you in the
+      world somewhere, just as there is for me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He shook his head and she picked up her basket again, smiling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Your time will come as it comes to the rest of us,&rdquo; she declared,
+      cheerfully. &ldquo;You won't want to sit here and bury your talents in the sands
+      all your days. Have you heard what is going to happen to me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No! Something good, I hope.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My father's favorite niece is coming to live with us&mdash;there are
+      seven of them altogether, and farming doesn't pay like it used to, so
+      Margaret is coming here. Father says that if she is as handy as she used
+      to be I may go back to the schools almost at once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was silent for a moment. Then he got up and threw down his
+      tools.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Great Heavens!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;If I am not becoming the most selfish
+      brute that ever breathed! Do you know, the first thought I had was that I
+      should miss you? You are right, young woman, I must get out of this.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She disappeared into the house, smiling, and Tavernake called out to
+      Nicholls, who was sitting on the wall.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Nicholls,&rdquo; he asked, &ldquo;how much notice do you want?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Matthew Nicholls removed his pipe from his mouth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, I don't know that I'm particular,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;being as you want to
+      go. Between you and me, I'm gettin' fat and lazy since you came. There
+      ain't enough work for two, and that's all there is to it, and being as
+      you're young and active, why, I've left it to you, and look at my arms.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He held them up.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Used to be all muscle, now they're nothin' but bloomin' pap. And no' but
+      two glasses of beer a day extra have I drunk, just to pass the time. You
+      can stay if you will, young man, but you can go out fishin' and leave me
+      the work, and I'll pay you just the same, for I'm not saying that I don't
+      like your company. Or you can go when you please, and that's the end of
+      it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Matthew Nicholls spat upon the stones and replaced his pipe in his mouth.
+      Tavernake came in and sat down by his side.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look here,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I believe you are right. I'll stay another week but
+      I'll take things easy. You get on with the boat now. I'll sit here and
+      have a smoke.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Nicholls grunted but obeyed, and for the next few days Tavernake loafed.
+      On his return one afternoon from a long walk, he saw a familiar figure
+      sitting upon the sea wall in front of the workshop, a familiar figure but
+      a strange one in these parts. It was Mr. Pritchard, in an American felt
+      hat, and smoking a very black cigar. He leaned over and nodded to
+      Tavernake, who was staring at him aghast.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hallo, old man!&rdquo; he called out. &ldquo;Run you to earth, you see!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I see!&rdquo; Tavernake exclaimed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come right along up here and let's talk,&rdquo; Pritchard continued.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake obeyed. Pritchard looked him over approvingly. Tavernake was
+      roughly dressed in those days, but as a man he had certainly developed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say, you're looking fine,&rdquo; his visitor remarked. &ldquo;What wouldn't I give
+      for that color and those shoulders!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is a healthy life,&rdquo; Tavernake admitted. &ldquo;Do you mean that you've come
+      down here to see me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That's so,&rdquo; Pritchard announced; &ldquo;down here to see you, and for no other
+      reason. Not but that the scenery isn't all it should be, and that sort of
+      thing,&rdquo; he went on, &ldquo;but I am not putting up any bluff about it. It's you
+      I am here to talk to. Are you ready? Shall I go straight ahead?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you please,&rdquo; Tavernake said, slowly filling his pipe.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You dropped out of things pretty sudden,&rdquo; Pritchard continued. &ldquo;It didn't
+      take me much guessing to reckon up why. Between you and me, you are not
+      the first man who's been up against it on account of that young woman.
+      Don't stop me,&rdquo; he begged. &ldquo;I know how you've been feeling. It was a right
+      good idea of yours to come here. Others before you have tried the shady
+      side of New York and Paris, and it's the wrong treatment. It's Hell,
+      that's what it is, for them. Now that young woman&mdash;we got to speak of
+      her&mdash;is about the most beautiful and the most fascinating of her sex&mdash;I'll
+      grant that to start with&mdash;but she isn't worth the life of a snail,
+      much less the life of a strong man.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are, quite right,&rdquo; Tavernake confessed, shortly. &ldquo;I know I was a fool&mdash;a
+      fool! If I could think of any adjective that would meet the case, I'd use
+      it, but there it is. I chucked things and I came here. You haven't come
+      down to tell me your opinion of me, I suppose?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not by any manner of means,&rdquo; Pritchard admitted. &ldquo;I came down first to
+      tell you that you were a fool, if it was necessary. Since you know it, it
+      isn't. We'll pass on to the next stage, and that is, what are you going to
+      do about it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is in my mind at the present moment,&rdquo; Tavernake announced, &ldquo;to leave
+      here. The only trouble is, I am not very keen about London.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard nodded thoughtfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That's all right,&rdquo; he agreed. &ldquo;London's no place for a man, anyway. You
+      don't want to learn the usual tricks of money-making. Money that's made in
+      the cities is mostly made with stained fingers. I have a different sort of
+      proposal to make.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Go ahead,&rdquo; Tavernake said. &ldquo;What is it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A new country,&rdquo; Pritchard declared, altering the angle of his cigar, &ldquo;a
+      virgin land, mountains and valleys, great rivers to be crossed, all sorts
+      of cold and heat to be borne with, a land rich with minerals&mdash;some
+      say gold, but never mind that. There is oil in parts, there's tin, there's
+      coal, and there's thousands and thousands of miles of forest. You're a
+      surveyor?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Passed all my exams,&rdquo; Tavernake agreed tersely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are the man for out yonder,&rdquo; Pritchard insisted. &ldquo;I've two years'
+      vacation&mdash;dead sick of this city life I am&mdash;and I am going to
+      put you on the track of it. You don't know much about prospecting yet, I
+      reckon?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Nothing at all!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You soon shall,&rdquo; Pritchard went on. &ldquo;We'll start from Winnipeg. A few
+      horses, some guides, and a couple of tents. We'll spend twenty weeks, my
+      friend, without seeing a town. What do you think of that?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Gorgeous!&rdquo; Tavernake muttered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Twenty weeks we'll strike westward. I know the way to set about the whole
+      job. I know one or two of the capitalists, too, and if we don't map out
+      some of the grandest estates in British Columbia, why, my name ain't
+      Pritchard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I haven't a penny in the world,&rdquo; Tavernake objected.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That's where you're lying,&rdquo; Pritchard remarked, pulling a newspaper from
+      his pocket. &ldquo;See the advertisement for yourself: 'Leonard Tavernake,
+      something to his advantage.' Well, down I went to those lawyers&mdash;your
+      old lawyer it was&mdash;Martin. I told him I was on your track, and he
+      said&mdash;'For Heaven's sake, send the fellow along!' Say, Tavernake, he
+      made me laugh the way he described your bursting in upon him and telling
+      him to take your land for his costs, and walking out of the room like
+      something almighty. Why, he worked that thing so that they had to buy your
+      land, and they took him into partnership. He's made a pot of money, and
+      needs no costs from you, and there's the money for your land and what he
+      had of yours besides, waiting for you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake smoked stolidly at his pipe. His eyes were out seaward, but his
+      heart was beating to a new and splendid music. To start life again, a
+      man's life, out in the solitudes, out in the great open spaces! It was
+      gorgeous, this! He turned round and grasped Pritchard by the shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I say,&rdquo; he exclaimed, &ldquo;why are you doing all this for me, Pritchard?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You did me a good turn,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;and you're a man. You've the pluck&mdash;that's
+      what I like. You knew nothing, you were as green and ignorant as a young
+      man from behind the counter of a country shop, but, my God! you'd got the
+      right stuff, and I meant getting even with you if I could. You'll leave
+      here with me to-morrow, and in three weeks we sail.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Ruth came smiling out from the house.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Won't you bring your friend in to supper, Mr. Tavernake?&rdquo; she begged.
+      &ldquo;It's good news, I hope?&rdquo; she added, lowering her voice a little.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It's the best,&rdquo; Tavernake declared, &ldquo;the best!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0032" id="link2HCH0032">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER V. BEATRICE REFUSES
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      A week later Tavernake was in London. A visit to his friend Mr. Martin had
+      easily proved the truth of Pritchard's words, and he found himself in
+      possession of a sum of money at least twice as great as he had
+      anticipated. He stayed at a cheap hotel in the Strand and made purchases
+      under Pritchard's supervision. For the first few days he was too busy for
+      reflection. Then Pritchard let him alone while he ran over to Paris, and
+      Tavernake suddenly realized that he was in the city to which he had
+      thought never to return. He passed the back of the theatre where he had
+      waited for Beatrice, he looked up at the entrance of the Milan Court; he
+      lunched alone, and with a curious mixture of feelings, at the little
+      restaurant where he had supped with Beatrice. It was over, that part of
+      his life, over and finished. Yet, with his natural truthfulness, he never
+      attempted to disguise from himself the pain at his heart. Three times in
+      one day he found himself, under some pretext or another, in Imano's
+      Restaurant. Once, in the middle of the street, he burst into a fit of
+      laughter. It was while Pritchard was in London, and he asked him a
+      question.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pritchard,&rdquo; he remarked, &ldquo;you area man of experience. Did any one ever
+      care for two women at the same time?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard removed his cigar from his teeth and stared at his companion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, my young friend,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;I've found no trouble myself in being
+      fond of a dozen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake smiled and said no more. Pritchard was one of the good fellows
+      of the world, but there were things which were hidden from him. Yet
+      Tavernake, who had fallen into a habit, during his solitude, of analyzing
+      his sensations, was puzzled by this one circumstance, that when he thought
+      of Elizabeth, though his heart never failed to beat more quickly, the
+      sense of shame generally stole over him; and when he thought of Beatrice,
+      a curious loneliness, a loneliness that brought with it a pain, seemed
+      suddenly to make the hours drag and his pleasures flavorless. For two days
+      he was puzzled. Then his habit of taking long walks helped him toward a
+      solution. In a small outlying music-hall in the east-end of London, he saw
+      the same announcement that he had noticed in the Norfolk newspaper,&mdash;&ldquo;Professor
+      Franklin&rdquo; in large type, and &ldquo;Miss Beatrice Franklin&rdquo; in small.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      That night he attended the music-hall. The scene was practically a
+      repetition of the one in Norwich, only with additions. The professor's
+      bombastic performance met with scarcely any applause. Its termination was,
+      indeed, interrupted by catcalls and whistles from the gallery. Beatrice's
+      songs, on the other hand, were applauded more vociferously than ever. She
+      had hard work to avoid a third encore.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      At the end of the performance, Tavernake made his way to the stage-door
+      and waited. The neighborhood was an unsavory one, and the building itself
+      seemed crowded in among a row of shops of the worst order, fish stalls,
+      and a glaring gin palace. Long before Beatrice came out, Tavernake could
+      hear the professor's voice down the covered passage, the professor's voice
+      apparently raised in anger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Undutiful behavior, that's what I call it&mdash;undutiful!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They emerged into the street, the professor very much the same as usual;
+      Beatrice paler, with a pathetic droop about her mouth. Tavernake came
+      eagerly forward.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice!&rdquo; he cried, holding out his hand.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor drew back. Beatrice stood still,&mdash;for a moment it
+      seemed as though she were about to faint. Tavernake grasped her hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am so sorry!&rdquo; he exclaimed, clumsily. &ldquo;I ought not to have come up like
+      that.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She smiled a little wan smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am quite all right,&rdquo; she replied, &ldquo;only the heat inside was rather
+      trying, and even out here the atmosphere isn't too good, is it? How did
+      you find us out?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;By chance again,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I have news. May I walk with you a
+      few steps?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She glanced timidly toward her father. The professor was holding aloof in
+      dignified silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps,&rdquo; Tavernake said quickly, &ldquo;you would take supper with me? I am
+      going abroad, and I should like to say good-bye properly. A bottle of
+      champagne and some supper. What do you say, Professor?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor suffered his features to relax.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A very admirable idea,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;Where shall we go?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is it too late to get to Imano's?&rdquo; Tavernake suggested.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor hesitated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A taxicab,&rdquo; he remarked, &ldquo;would do it, if&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He paused, and Tavernake smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;A taxicab it shall be,&rdquo; he decided. &ldquo;I am in funds just for the moment.
+      Come along, both of you, and I'll tell you all about it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He made her take his arm, although her fingers did no more than touch his
+      coat sleeve.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Pritchard came and dug me out,&rdquo; he continued. &ldquo;I am going abroad with
+      him. It's sort of prospecting in some new country at the back of British
+      Columbia. We see what we can find and then go to a financier's and start
+      companies, mining companies and oil fields&mdash;anything. I am off in a
+      week.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice half closed her eyes. They had hailed a passing cab and she sank
+      back among the cushions with a sigh of relief.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear Leonard,&rdquo; she murmured, &ldquo;I am so glad, so very happy for your sake.
+      This is the sort of thing which I hoped would happen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And now tell me about yourselves,&rdquo; he went on.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a sudden silence. Tavernake was conscious that Beatrice's
+      clothes were distinctly shabbier, that the professor's hat was shiny. The
+      professor cleared his throat.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I do not wish,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;to intrude our private matters upon one who,
+      although I will not call him a stranger, is assuredly not one of our old
+      friends. At the same time, I admit that a little trouble has arisen
+      between Beatrice and myself, and we were discussing it at the moment you
+      arrived. I shall appeal to you now. As an unprejudiced member of the
+      audience to-night, Mr. Tavernake, you will give me your honest opinion?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Certainly,&rdquo; Tavernake promised, with a sinking premonition of what was to
+      come.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What I complain of,&rdquo; the professor began, speaking with elaborate and
+      impressive slowness, &ldquo;is that my performance is hurried over and that too
+      long a time is taken up by Beatrice's songs. The management remark upon
+      the applause which her efforts occasionally ensure, but, as I would point
+      out to you, sir,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;a performance such as mine makes too deep
+      an impression for the audience to show their appreciation of it by such
+      vulgar methods as hand-clapping and whistling. You follow me, I trust, Mr.
+      Tavernake?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, yes, of course,&rdquo; Tavernake admitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I take a sincere and earnest interest in my work,&rdquo; the professor
+      declared, &ldquo;and I feel that when it has to be scamped that my daughter may
+      sing a music-hall ditty, the result is, to say the least of it,
+      undignified. For some reason or other, I have been unable to induce the
+      management to see entirely with me, but my point is that Beatrice should
+      sing one song only, and that the additional ten minutes should be occupied
+      by me in either a further exposition of my extraordinary powers as a
+      hypnotist, or in a little address to the audience upon the hidden
+      sciences. Now I appeal to you, Mr. Tavernake, as a young man of common
+      sense. What is your opinion?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake, much too honest to be capable in a general way of duplicity,
+      was on the point of giving it, but he caught Beatrice's imploring gaze.
+      Her lips were moving. He hesitated.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Of course,&rdquo; he began, slowly, &ldquo;you have to try and put yourself into the
+      position of the major part of the audience, who are exceedingly uneducated
+      people. It is very hard to give an opinion, Professor. I must say that
+      your entertainment this evening was listened to with rapt interest.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor turned solemnly towards his daughter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You hear that, Beatrice?&rdquo; he said severely. &ldquo;You hear what Mr. Tavernake
+      says? 'With rapt interest!'&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At the same time,&rdquo; Tavernake went on, &ldquo;without a doubt Miss Beatrice's
+      songs were also extremely popular. It is rather a pity that the management
+      could not give you a little more time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Failing that, sir,&rdquo; the professor declared, &ldquo;my point is, as I explained
+      before, that Beatrice should give up one of her songs. What you have said
+      this evening more than ever confirms me in my view.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice smiled thankfully at Tavernake.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; she suggested, &ldquo;at any rate we will leave it for the present.
+      Sometimes I think, though, father, that you frighten them with some of
+      your work, and you must remember that they come to be amused.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That,&rdquo; the professor admitted, &ldquo;is the most sensible remark you have
+      made, Beatrice. There is indeed something terrifying in some of my
+      manifestations, terrifying even to myself, who understand so thoroughly my
+      subject. However, as you say, we will dismiss the matter for the present.
+      The thought of this supper party is a pleasant one. Do you remember, Mr.
+      Tavernake, the night when you and I met in the balcony at Imano's?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perfectly well,&rdquo; Tavernake answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Now I shall test your memory,&rdquo; the professor continued, with a knowing
+      smile. &ldquo;Can you remember, sir, the brand of champagne which I was then
+      drinking, and which I declared, if you recollect, was the one which best
+      agreed with me, the one brand worth drinking?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am afraid I don't remember that,&rdquo; Tavernake confessed. &ldquo;Restaurant life
+      is a thing I know so little of, and I have only drunk champagne once or
+      twice in my life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear, dear me!&rdquo; the professor exclaimed. &ldquo;You do astonish me, sir. Well,
+      that brand was Veuve Clicquot, and you may take my word for it, Mr.
+      Tavernake, and you may find this knowledge useful to you when you have
+      made a fortune in America and have become a man of pleasure; there is no
+      wine equal to it. Veuve Clicquot, sir, if possible of the year 1899,
+      though the year 1900 is quite drinkable.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Veuve Clicquot,&rdquo; Tavernake repeated. &ldquo;I'll remember it for this evening.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor beamed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My dear,&rdquo; he said to Beatrice, &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake will think that I had a
+      purpose in testing his memory.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And hadn't you, father?&rdquo; she asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They all laughed together.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, it is pleasant,&rdquo; the professor admitted, &ldquo;to have one's weaknesses
+      ministered to, especially when one is getting on in life,&rdquo; he added, with
+      a ponderous sigh. &ldquo;Never mind, we will think only of pleasant subjects
+      this evening. It will be quite interesting, Mr. Tavernake, to hear you
+      order the supper.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I sha'n't attempt it,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I shall pass it on to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This reminds me,&rdquo; the professor declared, &ldquo;of the old days. I feel sure
+      that this is going to be a thoroughly enjoyable evening. We shall think of
+      it often, Mr. Tavernake, when you lie sleeping under the stars. Why, what
+      a wonderful thing these taxicabs are! You see, we have arrived.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They secured a small table in a corner at Imano's, and Tavernake found
+      himself curiously moved as he watched Beatrice take off her worn and much
+      mended gloves and look around uneasily at the other guests. Her clothes
+      were indeed shabby, and there were hollows now in her cheeks.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Again he felt that pain, a pain for which he could not account. Suddenly
+      America seemed so far away, the loneliness of the great continent became
+      an actual and appreciable thing. The professor was very much occupied
+      ordering the supper. Tavernake leaned across the table.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you remember our first supper here, Beatrice?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded, with an attempt at brightness which was a little pitiful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; she replied, &ldquo;I remember it quite well. And now, please, Leonard,
+      don't talk to me again until I have had a glass of wine. I am tired and
+      worn out, that is all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Even Tavernake knew that she was struggling against the tears which
+      already dimmed her eyes. He filled her glass himself. The professor set
+      his own down empty with the satisfied smile of a connoisseur.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I think,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;that you will agree with me about this vintage.
+      Beatrice, this is what will bring color into your cheeks. My little girl,&rdquo;
+       he continued, turning to Tavernake, &ldquo;will soon need a holiday. I am hoping
+      presently to be able to arrange a short tour by myself, and if so, I shall
+      send her to the seaside. Now I want you particularly to try the fish salad&mdash;the
+      second dish there. Beatrice, let me help you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Presently the orchestra began to play. The warmth of the room, the wine
+      and the food&mdash;Tavernake had a horrible idea once that she had eaten
+      nothing that day&mdash;brought back some of the color to Beatrice's cheeks
+      and a little of the light to her eyes. She began to talk something in the
+      old fashion. She avoided, however, any mention of that other supper they
+      had had together. As time went on, the professor, who had drunk the best
+      part of two bottles of wine and was talking now to a friend, became almost
+      negligible. Tavernake leaned across the table.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice,&rdquo; he whispered, &ldquo;you are not looking well. I am afraid that life
+      is getting harder with you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am doing what I must,&rdquo; she answered. &ldquo;Please don't sympathize with me.
+      I am hysterical, I think, tonight. It will pass off.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But, Beatrice,&rdquo; he ventured, timidly, &ldquo;could one do nothing for you? I
+      don't like these performances, and between you and me, we know they won't
+      stand your father's show much longer. It will certainly come to an end
+      soon. Why don't you try and get back your place at the theatre? You could
+      still earn enough to keep him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Already I have tried,&rdquo; she replied, sorrowfully. &ldquo;My place is filled up.
+      You see,&rdquo; she added, with a forced laugh, &ldquo;I have lost some of my looks,
+      Leonard. I am thinner, too. Of course, I shall be all right presently, but
+      it's rather against me at these west-end places.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Again he felt that pain at his heart. He was sure now that he was
+      beginning to understand!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Beatrice,&rdquo; he whispered, &ldquo;give it up&mdash;marry me I will take care of
+      him.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The flush of color faded from her cheeks. She shivered a little and looked
+      at him piteously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard,&rdquo; she pleaded, &ldquo;you mustn't. I really am not very strong just
+      now. We have finished with all that&mdash;it distresses me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But I mean it,&rdquo; he begged. &ldquo;Somehow, I have felt all sorts of things
+      since we came in here. I think of that night, and I believe&mdash;I do
+      believe that what came to me before was madness. It was not the same.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She was trembling now.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard,&rdquo; she implored, &ldquo;if you care for me at all, be quiet. Father will
+      turn round directly and I can't bear it. I shall be your very faithful
+      friend; I shall think of you through the long days before we meet again,
+      but don't&mdash;don't spoil this last evening.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The professor turned round, his face mottled, his eyes moist, a great
+      good-humor apparent in his tone.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, I must say,&rdquo; he declared, &ldquo;that this has been a most delightful
+      evening. I feel immensely better, and you, too, I hope, Beatrice?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She nodded, smiling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I trust that when Mr. Tavernake returns,&rdquo; the professor continued, &ldquo;he
+      will give us the opportunity of entertaining him in much the same manner.
+      It will give me very much pleasure, also Beatrice. And if, sir,&rdquo; he
+      proceeded, &ldquo;during your stay in New York you will mention my name at the
+      Goat's Club, or the Mosquito Club, you will, I think, find yourself
+      received with a hospitality which will surprise you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake thanked him and paid the bill. They walked slowly down the room,
+      and Tavernake was curiously reluctant to release the little hand which
+      clasped his.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have kept this to the last,&rdquo; Beatrice said, in a low tone. &ldquo;Elizabeth
+      is in London.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He was curiously unmoved.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes?&rdquo; he murmured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should like you&mdash;I think it would be well for you to go and see
+      her,&rdquo; she went on. &ldquo;You know, Leonard, you were such a strange person in
+      those days. You may imagine things. You may not realize where you are. I
+      think that you ought to go and see her now, now that you have lived
+      through some suffering, now that you understand things better. Will you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I will go,&rdquo; Tavernake promised.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice glanced round towards where her father was standing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't want him to know,&rdquo; she whispered. &ldquo;I don't want either him or
+      myself to be tempted to take any of her money. She is living at Claridge's
+      Hotel. Go there and see her before you leave for your new life.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He stood at the door and watched them go down the Strand, the professor,
+      flamboyant, walking erect with flying coat-tails, and his big cigar held
+      firmly between his teeth; Beatrice, a wan figure in her black clothes,
+      clinging to his arm. Tavernake watched them until they disappeared,
+      conscious of a curious excitement, a strange pain, a sense of revelation.
+      When at last they were out of sight and he turned back for his coat and
+      hat, his feet were suddenly leaden. The band was playing the last
+      selection&mdash;it was the air which Beatrice had sung only that night at
+      the east-end music-hall. With a sudden overpowering impulse he turned and
+      strode down the Strand in the direction where they had vanished. It was
+      too late. There was no sign of them.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0033" id="link2HCH0033">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER VI. UNDERSTANDING COMES TOO LATE
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake's first impression of Elizabeth was that he had never, even in
+      his wildest thoughts, done her justice. He had never imagined her so
+      wonderfully, so alluringly beautiful. She had received him, after a very
+      long delay, in her sitting-room at Claridge's Hotel&mdash;a large
+      apartment furnished more like a drawing-room. She was standing, when he
+      entered, almost in the center of the room, dressed in a long lace cloak
+      and a hat with a drooping black feather. She looked at him, as the door
+      opened, as though for a moment half puzzled. Then she laughed softly and
+      held out her hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, of course I remember you!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;And to think that when I
+      had your card I couldn't imagine where I had heard the name before! You
+      are my dear estate agent's clerk, who wouldn't take my money, and who was
+      so wretchedly rude to me twelve months ago.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake was quite cool. He found himself wondering whether this was a
+      pose, or whether she had indeed forgotten. He decided that it was a pose.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was also,&rdquo; he reminded her, &ldquo;one night in your rooms at the Milan Court
+      when your husband&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She stopped him with an imperative gesture.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Spare me, please,&rdquo; she begged. &ldquo;Those were such terrible days&mdash;so
+      dull, too! I remember that you were quite one of the brightest spots. You
+      were absolutely different from every one I had ever met before, and you
+      interested me immensely.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him and slowly shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You look very nice,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;Your clothes fit you and you are most
+      becomingly tanned, but you don't look half so awkward and so adorable.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry,&rdquo; he replied, shortly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you came to see me!&rdquo; she went on. &ldquo;That was really nice of you. You
+      were quite fond of me, once, you know. Tell me, has it lasted?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That is exactly what I came to find out,&rdquo; he answered deliberately. &ldquo;So
+      far, I am inclined to think that it has not lasted.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She made a little wry face and drew his arm through hers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come and sit down and tell me why,&rdquo; she insisted. &ldquo;Be honest, now. Is it
+      because you think I am looking older?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have thought of you for many hours a day for months,&rdquo; Tavernake said,
+      slowly, &ldquo;and I never imagined you so beautiful as you seem now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She clapped her hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And you mean it, too!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;There is just the same
+      delightfully convincing note in your tone. I am sure that you mean it.
+      Please go on adoring me, Mr. Tavernake. I have no one who interests me at
+      all just now. There is an Italian Count who wants to marry me, but he is
+      terribly poor; and a young Australian, who follows me everywhere, but I am
+      not sure about him. There is an English boy, too, who is going to commit
+      suicide if I don't say 'yes' to him this week. On the whole, I think I am
+      rather sorry that people know I am a widow. Tell me, Mr. Tavernake, are
+      you going to adore me, too?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't think so,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I rather believe that I am
+      cured.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She shrugged her shoulders and laughed musically.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But you say that you still think I am beautiful,&rdquo; she went on, &ldquo;and I am
+      sure my clothes are perfect&mdash;they came straight from Paris. I hope
+      you appreciate this lace,&rdquo; she added, drawing it through her fingers. &ldquo;My
+      figure is just as good, too, isn't it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She stood up and turned slowly round. Then she sat down suddenly, taking
+      his hand in hers.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Please don't say that you think I have grown less attractive,&rdquo; she
+      begged.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;As regards your personal attractions,&rdquo; Tavernake replied, &ldquo;I imagine that
+      they are at least as great as ever. If you want the truth, I think that
+      the reason I do not adore you any longer is because I saw your sister last
+      night.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Saw Beatrice!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;Where?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She was singing at a miserable east-end music-hall so that her father
+      might find some sort of employment,&rdquo; Tavernake said. &ldquo;The people only
+      forbore to hiss her father's turn for her sake. She goes about the country
+      with him. Heaven knows what they earn, but it must be little enough!
+      Beatrice is shabby and thin and pale. She is devoting the best years of
+      her life to what she imagines to be her duty.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And how does this affect me?&rdquo; Elizabeth asked, coldly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Only in this way,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;You asked me how it was that I
+      could find you as beautiful as ever and adore you no longer. The reason is
+      because I know you to be wretchedly selfish. I believed in you before.
+      Everything that you did seemed right. That was because I was a fool,
+      because you had filled my brain with impossible fancies, because I saw you
+      and everything that you did through a distorted mirror.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Have you come here to be rude?&rdquo; she asked him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not in the least,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;I came here to see whether I was cured.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She began to laugh, very softly at first, but soon she threw herself back
+      among the cushions and laid her hand caressingly upon his shoulder.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, you are just the same!&rdquo; she cried. &ldquo;Just the same dear, truthful
+      bundle of honesty and awkwardness and ignorance. So you are going to be
+      victim of Beatrice's bow and spear, after all.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have asked your sister to marry me,&rdquo; Tavernake admitted. &ldquo;She will
+      not.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She was very wise,&rdquo; Elizabeth declared, wiping the tears from her eyes.
+      &ldquo;As an experience you are delightful. As a husband you would be terribly
+      impossible. Are you going to stay and take me out to dinner this evening?
+      I'm sure you have a dress suit now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I have already an engagement.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She looked at him curiously. Was it really true that he had become
+      indifferent? She was not used to men who escaped.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tell me,&rdquo; she asked, abruptly, &ldquo;why did you come? I don't understand. You
+      are here, and you pass your time being rude to me. I ask you to take me to
+      dinner and you refuse. Do you know that scarcely a man in London would not
+      have jumped at such a chance?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very likely,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I have no experience in such matters.
+      I only know that I am going to do something else.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Something you want to do very much?&rdquo; she whispered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am going down to a little music-hall in Whitechapel,&rdquo; Tavernake said,
+      &ldquo;and I am going to meet your sister and I am going to put her in a cab and
+      take her to have some supper, and I am going to worry her until she
+      promises to be my wife.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are certainly a devoted admirer of the family,&rdquo; she laughed. &ldquo;Perhaps
+      you were in love with her all the time.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Perhaps I was,&rdquo; he admitted.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't believe it,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;I think you were quite fond of me once.
+      You have such absurdly old-fashioned ideas or I think that you would be
+      fond of me now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake rose to his feet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am going,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;This will be good-bye. To-morrow I am going to
+      British Columbia.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The laughter faded for a moment from her face. She was suddenly serious.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Don't go,&rdquo; she begged. &ldquo;Listen. I know I am not good like Beatrice, but I
+      do like you&mdash;I always did. I suppose it is that wonderful
+      truthfulness of yours. You are a different type from the men one meets. I
+      am rather a reckless person. It is such a comfort sometimes to meet any
+      one like you. You seem such an anchorage. Stay and talk to me for a little
+      time. Take me out to-night. You asked me to go with you once, you know,
+      and I would not. To-night it is I who ask you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He shook his head slowly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is good-bye!&rdquo; he said, firmly. &ldquo;I suppose, after all, you were not
+      unkind to me in those days, but you taught me a very bitter lesson. I came
+      to you to-day in fear and trembling. I was afraid, perhaps, that the worst
+      was not over, that there was more yet to come. Now I know that I am free.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She stamped her foot.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You shall not go away like that,&rdquo; she declared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you think I do not understand?&rdquo; he continued. &ldquo;It is only because I am
+      able to go, because the touch of your fingers, that look in your eyes, do
+      not drive me half mad now, that you want me to stay. You would like to try
+      your powers once more. I think not. I am satisfied that I am cured indeed,
+      but perhaps it is safer to risk nothing.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She pointed to the door.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Very well, then,&rdquo; she ordered, &ldquo;you can go.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He bowed, and already his fingers were on the handle. Suddenly she called
+      to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard! Leonard!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He turned round. She was coming towards him with her arms outstretched,
+      her eyes were full of tears, there were sobs in her voice.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am so lonely,&rdquo; she begged. &ldquo;I have thought of you so much. Don't go
+      away unkindly. Stay with me for this evening, at any rate. You can see
+      Beatrice at any time. It is I who need you most now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He looked around at the splendid apartment; he looked at the woman whose
+      fingers, glittering with jewels, rested upon his shoulders. Then he
+      thought of Beatrice in her shabby black gown and wan little face, and very
+      gently he removed her hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I do not think that you need me any more than I need you.
+      This is a caprice of yours. You know it and I know it. Is it worth while
+      to play with one another?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Her hands fell to her sides. She turned half away but she said nothing.
+      Tavernake, with a sudden impulse which had in it nothing of passion&mdash;very
+      little, indeed, of affection&mdash;lifted her fingers to his lips and
+      passed out of the room. He descended the stairs, filled with a wonderful
+      sense of elation, a buoyancy of spirit which he could not understand. As
+      he walked blithely to his hotel, however, he began to realize how much he
+      had dreaded this interview. He was a free man, after all. The spell was
+      broken. He could think of her now as she deserved to be thought of, as a
+      consummate woman of the world, selfish, heartless, conscienceless. He was
+      well out of her toils. It was nothing to him if even he had known that at
+      that moment she was lying upon the sofa to which she had staggered as he
+      left the room, weeping bitterly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      For over an hour Tavernake endured the smells and the bad atmosphere of
+      that miserable little music-hall, watching eagerly each time the numbers
+      were changed. Then at last, towards the end of the program, the manager
+      appeared in front.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Ladies and gentlemen,&rdquo; he announced, &ldquo;I regret very much to inform you
+      that owing to the indisposition of the young lady, Miss Beatrice Franklin
+      and her father are unable to appear to-night. I have pleasure in
+      announcing an extra turn, namely the Sisters De Vere in their wonderful
+      burlesque act.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      There was a murmur of disapprobation mingled with some cheering. Tavernake
+      left his place and walked around to the back of the hall. Presently the
+      manager came out to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am sorry to trouble you, sir,&rdquo; Tavernake said, &ldquo;but I heard your
+      announcement just now from the front. Can you give me the address of
+      Professor Franklin? I am a friend, and I should like to go and see them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The manager pointed to the stage-doorkeeper.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This man will give it you,&rdquo; he announced, shortly. &ldquo;It's quite close. I
+      shall look in myself after the show to know how the young lady is.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake procured the address and set out in the taxicab which he had
+      kept waiting. The driver listened to the direction doubtfully.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It's a poor sort of neighborhood, sir,&rdquo; he remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We've got to go there,&rdquo; Tavernake told him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      They reached it in a few minutes, a miserable street indeed. Tavernake
+      knocked at the door of the house to which he was directed, with sinking
+      heart. A man, collarless and half dressed, in carpet slippers, opened the
+      door after a few moments' waiting.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well, what is it?&rdquo; he asked, gruffly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Is Professor Franklin here?&rdquo; Tavernake inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The man seemed as though he were about to slam the door, but thought
+      better of it.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you're a friend of the professor's, as he calls himself,&rdquo; he said,
+      &ldquo;and you've any money to shell out, why, you're welcome, but if you're
+      only asking out of curiosity, let me tell you that he used to lodge here
+      but he's gone, and if I'd had my way he'd have gone a week ago, him and
+      his daughter, too.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I don't understand,&rdquo; Tavernake protested. &ldquo;I thought the young lady was
+      ill.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;She may be ill or she may not,&rdquo; the man replied, sulkily. &ldquo;All I know is
+      that they couldn't pay their rent, couldn't pay their food bill, couldn't
+      pay for the drinks the old man was always sending out for. So tonight I
+      spoke up and they've gone.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;At least you know where to!&rdquo; Tavernake exclaimed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I ain't no sort of an idea,&rdquo; the man declared. &ldquo;Take my word for it
+      straight, guvnor, I know no more about where they went to than the man in
+      the moon, except that I'm well shut of them, and there's a matter of
+      eighteen and sixpence, if you care to pay it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I'll give you a sovereign,&rdquo; Tavernake promised, &ldquo;if you will tell me
+      where they are now.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What's the good of making silly conditions like that!&rdquo; the man grumbled.
+      &ldquo;If I knew where they were, I'd earn the quid soon enough, but I don't,
+      and that's the long and the short of it! And if you ain't going to pay the
+      eighteen and six, well, I've answered all the questions I feel inclined
+      to.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I'll make it two pounds,&rdquo; Tavernake promised. &ldquo;I'm going to sail for
+      America to-morrow morning early, and I must see them first.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man leaned forward.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look here,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;if I knew where they was, a quid would be quite
+      good enough for me, but I don't, and that's straight. If you want to look
+      for them, I should try one of the doss houses. As likely there as
+      anywhere.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He slammed the door and Tavernake turned away. A sudden despair had seized
+      him. He looked up and down the street, he looked away beyond and thought
+      of the miles and miles of streets, the myriads of chimneys, the huge
+      branches of the great city stretching far and wide. At eight o'clock the
+      next morning, he must leave for Southampton. Was it too late, after all,
+      that he had discovered the truth?
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0034" id="link2HCH0034">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER VII. IN A VIRGIN COUNTRY
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      One night Tavernake began to laugh. He had grown a long brown beard and
+      the hair was over his ears. He was wearing a gray flannel shirt, a
+      handkerchief tied around his neck, and a pair of worn riding breeches held
+      up by a belt. He had kicked his boots off at the end of a long day, and
+      was lying in the moonlight before a fire of pine logs, whose smoke went
+      straight to the star-hung sky. No word had been spoken for the last hour.
+      Tavernake's fit of mirth came with as little apparent reason as the puffs
+      of wind which every now and then stole down from the mountain side and
+      made faint music in the virgin forests.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard turned over on his side and looked at him. Cigars had for many
+      weeks been an unknown thing, and he was smoking a corn-cob pipe full of
+      coarse tobacco.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Stumbled across a joke anywhere?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I'm afraid no one but myself would see the humor of it,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      answered. &ldquo;I was thinking of those days in London; I was thinking of
+      Beatrice's horror when she discovered that I was wearing ready-made
+      clothes, and the amazement of Elizabeth when she found that I hadn't a
+      dress suit. It's odd how cramped life gets back there.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard nodded, pressing the tobacco down into the bowl of his pipe with
+      his forefinger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You're right, Tavernake,&rdquo; he agreed. &ldquo;One loses one's sense of
+      proportion. Men in the cities are all alike. They go about in disguise.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I should like,&rdquo; Tavernake said, inconsequently, &ldquo;to have Mr. Dowling out
+      here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Amusing fellow?&rdquo; Pritchard inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake shook his head, smiling.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not in the least,&rdquo; he answered, &ldquo;only he was a very small man. Out here
+      it is difficult to keep small. Don't you feel it, Pritchard? These
+      mountains make our hills at home seem like dust-heaps. The skies seem
+      loftier. Look down into that valley. It's gigantic, immense.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard yawned.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There's a little place in the Bowery,&rdquo; he began,&mdash;
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I don't want to know any more about New York,&rdquo; Tavernake interrupted.
+      &ldquo;Lean back and close your eyes, smell the cinnamon trees, listen to that
+      night bird calling every now and then across the ravine. There's
+      blackness, if you like; there's depth. It's like a cloak of velvet to look
+      into. But you can't see the bottom&mdash;no, not in the daytime. Listen!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard sat up. For a few moments neither spoke. A dozen yards or so
+      off, a scattered group&mdash;the rest of the party&mdash;were playing
+      cards around a fire. The green wood crackled, an occasional murmur of
+      voices, a laugh or an exclamation, came to their ears, but for the rest,
+      an immense, a wonderful silence, a silence which seemed to spread far away
+      over that weird, half-invisible world! Tavernake listened reverently.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Isn't it marvelous!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;We haven't seen a human being except
+      our own party, for three days. There probably isn't one within hearing of
+      us now. Very likely no living person has ever set foot in this precise
+      spot.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, it's big,&rdquo; Pritchard admitted, &ldquo;it's big and it's restful, but it
+      isn't satisfying. It does for you for a time because you started life
+      wrong and you needed a reaction. But for me&mdash;ah, well!&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;I
+      hear the call right across these thousands of miles of forests and valley
+      and swamp. I hear the electric cars and the clash of the overhead railway,
+      I see the flaring lights of Broadway and I hear the babel of tongues. I am
+      going back to it, Tavernake. There's plenty to go on with. We've done more
+      than carry out our program.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Back to New York!&rdquo; Tavernake muttered, disconsolately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So you're not ready yet?&rdquo; Pritchard demanded.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Heavens, no!&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;Who would be? What is there in New
+      York to make up for this?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard was silent for a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;one of us must be getting back near civilization. The
+      syndicate will be expecting to hear from us. Besides, we've reports enough
+      already. It's time something was decided about that oil country. We've
+      done some grand work there, Tavernake.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake nodded. He was lying on his side and his eyes were fixed
+      wistfully southward, over the glimmering moonlit valley, over the great
+      wilderness of virgin pine woods which hung from the mountains on the other
+      side, away through the cleft in the hills to the plains beyond, chaotic, a
+      world unseen.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If you like to go on for a bit,&rdquo; Pritchard suggested, slowly, &ldquo;there's no
+      reason why you shouldn't take McCleod and Richardson with you, and Pete
+      and half the horses, and strike for the tin country on the other side of
+      the Yolite Hills. So long as we are here, it's quite worth it, if you can
+      stick it out.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake drew a long breath.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I'd like to go,&rdquo; he admitted, simply. &ldquo;I know McCleod is keen about
+      prospecting further south. You see, most of our finds so far have been
+      among the oil fields.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Settled,&rdquo; Pritchard declared. &ldquo;To-morrow, then, we part. I'm for the
+      valley, and I reckon I'll strike the railway to Chicago in a week. Gee
+      whiz! New York will seem good!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You think that the syndicate will be satisfied with what we have done so
+      far?&rdquo; Tavernake asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      His companion smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;If they aren't, they'll be fools. I reckon there's enough oil fields here
+      for seven companies. There'll be a bit for us, too, Tavernake, I guess.
+      Don't you want to come back to New York and spend it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake laughed once more, but this time his laugh was not wholly
+      natural.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Spend it!&rdquo; he repeated. &ldquo;What is there to spend it on? Uncomfortable
+      clothes, false plays, drinks that are bad for you, food that's half
+      poisoned, atmosphere that stifles. My God, Pritchard, is there anything in
+      the world like this! Stretch out your arms, man. Lie on your back, look up
+      at the stars, let that wind blow over your face. Listen.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They listened, and again they heard nothing, yet again there seemed to be
+      that peculiar quality about the silence which spoke of the vastness of
+      space.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard rose to his feet.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;New York and the fleshpots for me,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;Keep in touch, and good
+      luck old man!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Next day at dawn they parted, and Tavernake, with his three companions,
+      set his face towards an almost undiscovered tract of land. Their progress
+      was slow, for they were all the time in a country rich with possibilities.
+      For weeks they climbed, climbed till they reached the snows and the wind
+      stung their faces and they shivered in their rugs at night. They came to a
+      land of sparser vegetation, of fewer and wilder animals, where they heard
+      the baying of wolves at night, and saw the eyes of strange animals glisten
+      through the thicket as the flames of their evening fire shot up toward the
+      sky. Then the long descent began, the long descent to the great plain. Now
+      their faces were bronzed with a sun ever hotter, ever more powerful. No
+      longer the snow flakes beat their cheeks. They came slowly down into a
+      land which seemed to Tavernake like the biblical land of Canaan. Three
+      times in ten days they had to halt and make a camp, while Tavernake
+      prepared a geographical survey of likely-looking land.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      McCleod came up to Tavernake one day with a dull-looking lump in his hand,
+      glistening in places.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Copper,&rdquo; he announced, shortly. &ldquo;It's what I've been looking for all the
+      time. No end to it. There's something bigger than oil here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They spent a month in the locality, and every day McCleod became more
+      enthusiastic. After that it was hard work to keep him from heading
+      homeward at once.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I tell you, sir,&rdquo; he explained to Tavernake, &ldquo;there's millions there,
+      millions between those four stakes of yours. What's the good of more
+      prospecting? There's enough there in a square acre to pay the expenses of
+      our expedition a thousand times over. Let's get back and make reports. We
+      can strike the railway in ten days from here&mdash;perhaps sooner.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You go,&rdquo; Tavernake said. &ldquo;Leave me Pete and two of the horses.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The man stared at him in surprise.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What's the good of going on alone?&rdquo; he asked. &ldquo;You're not a mining expert
+      or an oil man. You can't go prospecting by yourself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I can't help it,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;It's something in my blood, I
+      suppose. I am going on. Think! You'll strike that railway and in a month
+      you will be back in New York. Don't you imagine, when you're there, when
+      you hear the clatter and turmoil of it, when you see the pale crowds
+      chivvying one another about to pick the dollars from each other's pockets,&mdash;don't
+      you believe you'll long for these solitudes, the big empty places, great
+      possibilities, the silence? Think of it, man. What is there beyond those
+      mountains, I wonder?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      McCleod sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You're right,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;One may never get so far out again. Our fortunes
+      will keep, I suppose, and anyhow we ought to strike a telegraph station in
+      about a fortnight. We'll go right ahead, then.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      In ten days they dropped ten thousand feet. They came to a land where
+      their throats were always dry, where the trees and shrubs seemed like
+      property affairs from a theatre, where they plunged their heads into every
+      pool that came to wash their noses and mouths from the red dust that
+      seemed to choke them up. They found tin and oil and more copper. Then, by
+      slow stages, they passed on to a land of great grassy plains, of blue
+      grass, miles and miles of it, and suddenly one day they came to the
+      telegraph posts, rough pine trees unstripped of their bark, with a few
+      sagging wires. Tavernake looked at them as Robinson Crusoe might have
+      looked at Man Friday's footsteps. It was the first sign of human life
+      which they had seen for months.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It's a real world we are in, after all!&rdquo; he sighed. &ldquo;Somehow or other, I
+      thought&mdash;I thought we'd escaped.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0035" id="link2HCH0035">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER VIII. BACK TO CIVILIZATION
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard, trim and neat, a New Yorker from the careful arrangement of his
+      tie to the tips of his patent boots, gazed with something like amazement
+      at the man whom he had come to meet at the Grand Central Station.
+      Tavernake looked, indeed, like some splendid bushman whose life has been
+      spent in the kingdom of the winds and the sun and the rain. He was inches
+      broader round the chest, and carried himself with a new freedom. His face
+      was bronzed right down to the neck. His beard was fullgrown, his clothes
+      travel-stained and worn. He seemed like a breath of real life in the great
+      New York depot, surrounded by streams of black-coated, pale-cheeked men.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard laughed softly as he passed his arm through his friend's.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Come, my Briton,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;my primitive man, I have rooms for you in a
+      hotel close here. A bath and a mint julep, then I'll take you to a
+      tailor's. What about the big country? It's better than your salt marshes,
+      eh? Better than your little fishing village? Better than building boats?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You know it,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I feel as though I'd been drawing in
+      life for month after month. Have I got to wear boots like yours&mdash;patent?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Got to be done,&rdquo; Pritchard declared.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And the hat&mdash;oh, my Heavens!&rdquo; Tavernake groaned. &ldquo;I'll never become
+      civilized again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We'll see,&rdquo; Pritchard laughed. &ldquo;Say, Tavernake, it was a great trip of
+      ours. Everything's turning out marvelously. The oil and the copper are
+      big, man&mdash;big, I tell you. I reckon your five thousand dollars will
+      be well on the way to half a million. I'm pretty near there myself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      It was not until later on, when he was alone, that Tavernake realized with
+      how little interest he listened to his companion's talk of their success.
+      It was so short a time ago since the building up of a fortune had been the
+      one aim upon which every nerve of his body was centered. Curiously enough,
+      now he seemed to take it as a matter of course.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;On second thoughts, I'll send a tailor round to the hotel,&rdquo; Pritchard
+      declared. &ldquo;I've rooms myself next yours. We can go out and buy boots and
+      the other things afterwards.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      By nightfall, Tavernake's wardrobe was complete. Even Pritchard regarded
+      him with a certain surprise. He seemed, somehow, to have gained a new
+      dignity.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say, but you look great!&rdquo; he exclaimed. &ldquo;They won't believe it at the
+      meeting to-morrow that you are the man who crossed the Yolite Mountains
+      and swam the Peraneek River. That's a wonderful country you were in,
+      Tavernake, after you left the tracks.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      They were in Broadway, with the roar of the city in their ears, and
+      Tavernake, lifting his face starwards, suddenly seemed to feel the silence
+      once more, the perfume of the pine woods, the scent of nature herself,
+      freed through all these generations of any presence of man.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I'll never keep away from it,&rdquo; he said, softly. &ldquo;I'll have to go back.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;When your report's in shape and the dollars are being scooped in, they'll
+      send you back fast enough&mdash;that is, if you still want to go,&rdquo; he
+      remarked. &ldquo;I tell you, Leonard Tavernake, our city men here are out for
+      the dollars. Over on your side, a man makes a million or so and he's had
+      enough. One fortune here only seems to whet the appetite of a New Yorker.
+      By the way,&rdquo; he added, after a moment's hesitation, &ldquo;does it interest you
+      to know that an old friend of yours is in New York?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake's head went round swiftly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Who is it?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mrs. Wenham Gardner.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake set his teeth.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he said, slowly, &ldquo;I don't know that that interests me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Glad of it,&rdquo; Pritchard went on. &ldquo;I can tell you I don't think things have
+      been going extra well with the lady. She's spent most of what she got from
+      the Gardner family, and she doesn't seem to have had the best of luck with
+      it, either. I came across her by accident. She is staying at a flashy
+      hotel, but it's in the wrong quarter&mdash;second-rate&mdash;quite
+      second-rate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wonder whether we shall see anything of her,&rdquo; Tavernake remarked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you want to?&rdquo; Pritchard asked. &ldquo;She'll probably be at Martin's for
+      lunch, at the Plaza for tea, and Rector's for supper. She's not exactly
+      the lady to remain hidden, you know.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We'll avoid those places, then, if you are taking me around,&rdquo; Tavernake
+      said.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You're cured, are you?&rdquo; Pritchard inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes, I am cured,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, &ldquo;cured of that and a great many
+      other things, thanks to you. You found me the right tonic.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Tonic,&rdquo; Pritchard repeated, meditatively. &ldquo;That reminds me. This way for
+      the best cocktail in New York.&rdquo;...
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The night was not to pass, however, without its own especial thrill for
+      Tavernake. The two men dined together at Delmonico's and went afterwards
+      to a roof garden, a new form of entertainment for Tavernake, and one which
+      interested him vastly. They secured one of the outside tables near the
+      parapets, and below them New York stretched, a flaming phantasmagoria of
+      lights and crude buildings. Down the broad avenues with their towering
+      blocks, their street cars striking fire all the time like toys below, the
+      people streamed like insects away to the Hudson, where the great ferry
+      boats, ablaze with lights, went screaming across the dark waters.
+      Tavernake leaned over and forgot. There was so much that was amazing in
+      this marvelous city for a man who had only just begun to find himself.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The orchestra, stationed within a few yards of him, commenced to play a
+      popular waltz, and Pritchard to talk. Tavernake turned his fascinated eyes
+      from the prospect below.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My young friend,&rdquo; Pritchard said, &ldquo;you are up against it to-night. Take a
+      drink of your wine and then brace yourself.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake did as he was told.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What is this danger?&rdquo; he asked. &ldquo;What's wrong, anyway?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard had no need to answer. As Tavernake set his glass down, his eyes
+      fell upon the little party who had just taken the table almost next to
+      theirs. There were Walter Crease, Major Post, two men whom he had never
+      seen before in his life&mdash;heavy of cheek, both, dull-eyed, but dressed
+      with a rigid observance of the fashion of the city, in short dinner coats
+      and black ties. And between them was Elizabeth. Tavernake gripped the
+      sides of his chair and looked. Yes, she had altered. Her eyebrows were a
+      trifle made up, there was a tinge in her hair which he did not recognize,
+      a touch of color in her cheeks which he doubted. Yet her figure and her
+      wonderful presence remained, that art of wearing her clothes as no other
+      woman could. She was easily the most noticeable-looking of her sex among
+      all the people there. Tavernake heard the sound of her voice and once more
+      the thrill came and passed. She was the same Elizabeth. Thank God, he
+      thought, that he was not the same Tavernake!
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Do you wish to go?&rdquo; Pritchard asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not I!&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;This place is far too fascinating. Can't we have
+      some more wine? This is my treat. And, Pritchard, why do you look at me
+      like that? You are not supposing for a moment that I am capable of making
+      an ass of myself again?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard smiled in a relieved fashion.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;My young friend,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I have lived in the world so long and seen so
+      many strange things, especially between men and women, that I am never
+      surprised at anything. I thought you'd shed your follies as your grip upon
+      life had tightened, but one is never sure.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake sighed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I have shed the worst of my follies!&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;I only wish&mdash;&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He never finished his sentence. Elizabeth had suddenly seen him. For a
+      moment she leaned forward as though to assure herself that she was not
+      mistaken. Then she half sprang to her feet and sat down again. Her lips
+      were parted&mdash;she was once more bewilderingly beautiful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Tavernake,&rdquo; she cried, &ldquo;come and speak to me at once.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake rose without hesitation, and walked firmly across the few yards
+      which separated them. She held out both her hands.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;This is wonderful!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;You in New York! And I have wondered
+      so often what became of you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is my first night here,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;For two years I have been
+      prospecting in the far west.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then I saw your name in the papers,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;It was for the
+      Manhattan Syndicate, wasn't it?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake nodded, and one of the men of the party leaned forward with
+      interest.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You're going to make millions and millions,&rdquo; she assured him. &ldquo;You always
+      knew you would, didn't you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am afraid that I was almost too confident,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;But certainly
+      we have been quite fortunate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      One of Elizabeth's companions intervened&mdash;he was the one who had
+      pricked up his ears at the mention of the Manhattan Syndicate.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say, Elizabeth,&rdquo; he remarked, &ldquo;I'd like to meet your friend.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth, with a frown, performed the introduction.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Mr. Anthony Cruxhall&mdash;Mr. Tavernake!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mr. Cruxhall held out a fat white hand, on the little finger of which
+      glittered a big diamond ring.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Say, are you the Mr. Tavernake that was surveyor to the prospecting party
+      sent out by the Manhattan Syndicate?&rdquo; he inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was,&rdquo; Tavernake admitted, briefly. &ldquo;I still am, I hope.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Then you're just the man I was hoping to meet,&rdquo; Mr. Cruxhall declared.
+      &ldquo;Won't you sit down with us right here? I'd like to talk some about that
+      trip. I'm interested in the Syndicate.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake shook his head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I've had enough of work for a time,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Besides, I couldn't talk
+      about it till after my report to the meeting to-morrow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Just a few words,&rdquo; Mr. Cruxhall persisted. &ldquo;We'll have a bottle of
+      champagne, eh?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You will excuse me, I am sure,&rdquo; Tavernake replied, &ldquo;when I tell you that
+      it would not be correct on my part to discuss my trip until after I have
+      handed in my report to the company. I am very glad to have seen you again,
+      Mrs. Gardner.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But you are not going!&rdquo; she exclaimed, in dismay.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have left Mr. Pritchard alone,&rdquo; Tavernake answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Elizabeth smiled, and waved her hand to the solitary figure.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Our friend Mr. Pritchard again,&rdquo; she remarked. &ldquo;Well, it is really a
+      curious meeting, isn't it? I wonder,&rdquo;&mdash;she lifted her head to his and
+      her eyes called him closer to hers&mdash;&ldquo;have you forgotten everything?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He pointed over the roofs of the houses. His back was to the river and he
+      pointed westward.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have been in a country where one forgets,&rdquo; he answered. &ldquo;I think that I
+      have thrown the knapsack of my follies away. I think that it is buried.
+      There are some things which I do not forget, but they are scarcely to be
+      spoken of.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are a strange young man,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;Was I wrong, or were you not
+      once in love with me?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I was terribly in love with you,&rdquo; Tavernake confessed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yet you tore up my cheque and flung yourself away when you found out that
+      my standard of morals was not quite what you had expected,&rdquo; she murmured.
+      &ldquo;Haven't you got over that quixoticism a little, Leonard?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He drew a deep sigh.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am thankful to say,&rdquo; he declared, earnestly, &ldquo;that I have not got over
+      it, that, if anything, my prejudices are stronger than ever.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She sat for a moment quite still, and her face had become hard and
+      expressionless. She was looking past him, past the line of lights, out
+      into the blue darkness.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Somehow,&rdquo; she said, softly, &ldquo;I always prayed that you might remember. You
+      were the one true thing I had ever met, you were in earnest. It is past,
+      then?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is past,&rdquo; Tavernake answered, bravely.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      The music of a Hungarian waltz came floating down to them. She half closed
+      her eyes. Her head moved slowly with the melody. Tavernake looked away.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you come and see me just once?&rdquo; she asked, suddenly. &ldquo;I am staying
+      at the Delvedere, in Forty-Second Street.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank you very much,&rdquo; Tavernake replied. &ldquo;I do not know how long I shall
+      be in New York. If I am here for a few days, I shall take my chance at
+      finding you at home.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He bowed, and returned to Pritchard, who welcomed him with a quiet smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You're wise, Tavernake,&rdquo; he said, softly. &ldquo;I could hear no words, but I
+      know that you have been wise. Between you and me,&rdquo; he added, in a lower
+      tone, &ldquo;she is going downhill. She is in with the wrong lot here. She can't
+      seem to keep away from them. They are on the very fringe of Bohemia, a
+      great deal nearer the arm of the law than makes for respectable society.
+      The man to whom I saw you introduced is a millionaire one day and a thief
+      the next. They're none of them any good. Did you notice, too, that she is
+      wearing sham jewelry? That always looks bad.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;No, I didn't notice,&rdquo; Tavernake answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      He was silent for a moment. Then he leaned a little forward.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wonder,&rdquo; he asked, &ldquo;do you know anything about her sister?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard finished his wine and knocked the ash from his cigar.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not much,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;I believe she had a very hard time. She took on
+      the father, you know, the old professor, and did her best to keep him
+      straight. He died about a year ago and Miss Beatrice tried to get back
+      into the theatre, but she'd missed her chance. Theatrical business has
+      been shocking in London. I heard she'd come out here. Wherever she is, she
+      keeps right away from that sort of set,&rdquo; he wound up, moving his head
+      towards Elizabeth's friends.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wonder if she is in New York,&rdquo; Tavernake said, with a strange thrill at
+      his heart.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard made no reply. His eyes were fixed upon the little group at the
+      next table. Elizabeth was leaning back in her chair. She seemed to have
+      abandoned the conversation. Her eyes were always seeking Tavernake's.
+      Pritchard rose to his feet abruptly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It's time we were in bed,&rdquo; he declared. &ldquo;Remember the meeting to-morrow.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake rose to his feet. As they passed the next table, Elizabeth
+      leaned over to him. Her eyes pleaded with his almost passionately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear Leonard,&rdquo; she whispered, &ldquo;you must&mdash;you must come and see me. I
+      shall stay in between four and six every evening this week. The Delvedere,
+      remember.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Thank you very much,&rdquo; Tavernake answered. &ldquo;I shall not forget.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      <a name="link2HCH0036" id="link2HCH0036">
+      <!--  H2 anchor --> </a>
+    </p>
+    <div style="height: 4em;">
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </div>
+    <h2>
+      CHAPTER IX. FOR ALWAYS
+    </h2>
+    <p>
+      Once again it seemed to Beatrice that history was repeating itself. The
+      dingy, oblong dining-room, with its mosquito netting, stained tablecloth,
+      and hard cane chairs, expanded until she fancied herself in the
+      drawing-room of Blenheim House. Between the landladies there was little
+      enough to choose. Mrs. Raithby Lawrence, notwithstanding her caustic
+      tongue and suspicious nature, had at least made some pretense at
+      gentility. The woman who faced her now&mdash;hard-featured, with narrow,
+      suspicious eyes and a mass of florid hair&mdash;was unmistakably and
+      brutally vulgar.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What's the good of your keeping on saying you hope to get an engagement
+      next week?&rdquo; she demanded, with a sneer. &ldquo;Who's likely to engage you? Why,
+      you've lost your color and your looks and your weight since you came to
+      stay here. They don't want such as you in the chorus. And for the rest,
+      you're too high and mighty, that's my opinion of you. Take what you can
+      get, and how you can get it, and be thankful,&mdash;that's my motto. Day
+      after day you tramp about the streets with your head in the air, and won't
+      take this and won't take that, and meanwhile my bill gets bigger and
+      bigger. Now where have you been to this morning, I should like to know?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice, who was faint and tired, shaking in every limb, tried to pass
+      out of the room, but her questioner barred the way.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have been up town,&rdquo; she answered, nervously.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Hear of anything?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice shook her head.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not yet. Please let me go upstairs and lie down. I am tired and I need to
+      rest.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;And I need my money,&rdquo; Mrs. Selina P. Watkins declared, without quitting
+      her position, &ldquo;and it's no good your going up to your room because the
+      door's locked.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo; Beatrice faltered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I mean that I've done with you,&rdquo; the lodging-house keeper announced.
+      &ldquo;Your room's locked up and the key's in my pocket, and the sooner you get
+      out of this, the better I shall be pleased.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But my box&mdash;my clothes,&rdquo; Beatrice cried.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I'll keep 'em a week for you,&rdquo; the woman answered. &ldquo;Bring me the money by
+      then and you shall have them. If I don't hear anything of you, they'll go
+      to the auction mart.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Something of her old spirit fired the girl for a moment. She was angry,
+      and she forgot that her knees were trembling with fatigue, that she was
+      weak and aching with hunger.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;How dare you talk like that!&rdquo; she exclaimed. &ldquo;You shall have your money
+      shortly, but I must have my clothes. I cannot go anywhere without them.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The woman laughed harshly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Look here, my young lady,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;you'll see your box again when I
+      see the color of your money, and not before. And now out you go, please,&mdash;out
+      you go! If you're going to make any trouble, Solly will have to show you
+      the way down the steps.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The woman had opened the door, and a colored servant, half dressed, with a
+      broom in her hand, came slouching down the passage. Beatrice turned and
+      fled out of the greasy, noisome atmosphere, down the wooden, uneven steps,
+      out into the ugly street. She turned toward the nearest elevated as though
+      by instinct, but when she came to the bottom of the stairs she stopped
+      short with a little groan. She knew very well that she had not a nickel to
+      pay the fare. Her pockets were empty. All day she had eaten nothing, and
+      her last coin had gone for the car which had brought her back from
+      Broadway. And here she was on the other side of New York, in the region of
+      low-class lodging houses, with the Bowery between her and Broadway. She
+      had neither the strength nor the courage to walk. With a half-stifled sob
+      she took off her one remaining ornament, a cheap enameled brooch, and
+      entered a pawnbroker's shop close to where she had been standing.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you give me something on this, please?&rdquo; she asked, desperately.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      A man who seemed to be sorting a pile of ready-made coats, paused in his
+      task for a moment, took the ornament into his hand, and threw it
+      contemptuously upon the counter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Not worth anything,&rdquo; he answered.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;But it must be worth something,&rdquo; Beatrice protested. &ldquo;I only want a very
+      little.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Something in her voice compelled the man's attention. He looked at her
+      white face.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What's the trouble?&rdquo; he inquired.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I must get up to Fifth Avenue somehow,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;I can't walk and I
+      haven't a nickel.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He pushed the brooch back to her and threw a dime upon the counter.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Well,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;you don't look fit to walk, and that's a fact, but the
+      brooch isn't worth entering up. There's a dime for you. Now git, please,
+      I'm busy.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice clutched the coin and, almost forgetting to thank him, found her
+      way up the iron stairs on to the platform of the elevated. Soon she was
+      seated in the train, rattling and shaking on its way through the slums
+      into the heart of the wonderful city. There was only one thing left for
+      her to try, a thing which she had had in her mind for days. Yet she found
+      herself, even now she was committed to it, thinking of what lay before her
+      with something like black horror. It was her last resource, indeed. Strong
+      though she was, she knew by many small signs that her strength was almost
+      at an end. The days and weeks of disappointments, the long fruitless
+      trudges from office to office, the heart-sickness of constant refusals,
+      poor food, the long fasts, had all told their tale. She was attractive
+      enough still. Her pallor seemed to have given her a wonderful delicacy.
+      The curve of her lips and the soft light in her gray eyes, were still as
+      potent as ever. When she thought, though, what a poor asset her appearance
+      had been, the color flamed in her cheeks.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      In Broadway she made her way to a very magnificent block of buildings, and
+      passing inside took the lift to the seventh floor. Here she got out and
+      knocked timidly at a glass-paneled door, on which was inscribed the name
+      of Mr. Anthony Cruxhall. A very superior young man bade her enter and
+      inquired her business.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I wish to see Mr. Cruxhall for a moment, privately,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;I shall
+      not detain him for more than a minute. My name is Franklin&mdash;Miss
+      Beatrice Franklin.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      The young man's lips seemed about to shape themselves into a whistle, but
+      something in the girl's face made him change his mind.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I guess the boss is in,&rdquo; he admitted. &ldquo;He's just got back from a big
+      meeting, but I am not sure about his seeing any one to-day. However, I'll
+      tell him that you're here.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He disappeared into an inner room. Presently he came out again and held
+      the door open.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Will you walk right in, Miss Franklin?&rdquo; he invited.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice went in bravely enough, but her knees began to tremble when she
+      found herself in the presence of the man she had come to visit. Mr.
+      Anthony Cruxhall was not a pleasant-looking person. His cheeks were fat
+      and puffy, he wore a diamond ring upon the finger of his too-white hand,
+      and a diamond pin in his somewhat flashily arranged necktie. He was
+      smoking a black cigar, which he omitted to remove from between his teeth
+      as he welcomed his visitor.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So you've come to see me at last, little Miss Beatrice!&rdquo; he said, with a
+      particularly unpleasant smile. &ldquo;Come and sit down here by the side of me.
+      That's right, eh? Now what can I do for you?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Beatrice was trembling all over. The man's eyes were hateful, his smile
+      was hideous.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I have not a cent in the world, Mr. Cruxhall,&rdquo; she faltered, &ldquo;I cannot
+      get an engagement, I have been turned out of my rooms, and I am hungry. My
+      father always told me that you would be a friend if at any time it
+      happened that I needed help. I am very sorry to have to come and beg, yet
+      that is what I am doing. Will you lend or give me ten or twenty dollars,
+      so that I can go on for a little longer? Or will you help me to get a
+      place among some of your theatrical people?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mr. Cruxhall puffed steadily at his cigar for a moment, and leaning back
+      in his chair thrust his hand into his trousers' pocket.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;So bad as that, is it?&rdquo; he remarked. &ldquo;So bad as that, eh?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is very bad indeed,&rdquo; she answered, looking at him quietly, &ldquo;or you
+      know that I should not have come to you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Mr. Cruxhall smiled.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I remember the last time we talked together,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;we didn't get on
+      very well. Too high and mighty in those days, weren't you, Miss Beatrice?
+      Wouldn't have anything to say to a bad lot like Anthony Cruxhall. You're
+      having to come to it, eh?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She began to tremble again, but she held herself in.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I must live,&rdquo; she murmured. &ldquo;Give me a little money and let me go away.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Oh, I'll do better than that for you,&rdquo; he answered, thrusting his hand
+      into his waistcoat pocket and drawing out a pile of dollar bills. &ldquo;Let's
+      look at you. Gee whiz! Yes, you're shabby, aren't you? Take this,&rdquo; he went
+      on, slamming some notes down before her. &ldquo;Go and get yourself a new frock
+      and a hat fit to wear, and meet me at the Madison Square roof garden at
+      eight o'clock. We'll have some dinner and I guess we can fix matters up.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then he smiled at her again, and Beatrice, whose hand was already upon the
+      bills, suddenly felt her knees shake. A great black horror was upon her.
+      She turned and fled out of the room, past the astonished clerk, into the
+      lift, and was downstairs on the main floor before she remembered where she
+      was, what she had done. The clerk, after gazing at her retreating form,
+      hurried into the inner office.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Young woman hasn't bolted with anything, eh?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Mr. Cruxhall smiled wickedly.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Why, no,&rdquo; he replied, &ldquo;I guess she'll come back!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Tavernake left the meeting on that same afternoon with his future
+      practically assured for life. He had been appointed surveyor to the
+      company at a salary of ten thousand dollars a year, and the mine in which
+      his savings were invested was likely to return him his small capital a
+      hundredfold. Very kind things had been said of him and to him.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      Pritchard and he had left the place together. When they had reached the
+      street, they paused for a moment.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am going to make a call near here,&rdquo; Pritchard said. &ldquo;Don't forget that
+      we are dining together, unless you find something better to do, and in the
+      meantime&rdquo;&mdash;he took a card from his pocket and handed it to Tavernake&mdash;&ldquo;I
+      don't know whether I am a fool or not to give you this,&rdquo; he added.
+      &ldquo;However, there it is. Do as you choose about it.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He walked away a little abruptly. Tavernake glanced at the address upon
+      the card: 1134, East Third Street. For a moment he was puzzled. Then the
+      light broke in upon him suddenly. His heart gave a leap. He turned back
+      into the place to ask for some directions and once more stopped short.
+      Down the stone corridor, like one who flies from some hideous fate, came a
+      slim black figure, with white face and set, horrified stare. Tavernake
+      held out his hands and she came to him with a great wondering sob.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard!&rdquo; she cried. &ldquo;Leonard!&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;There's no doubt about me,&rdquo; he answered, quickly. &ldquo;Am I such a very
+      terrifying object?&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      She stood quite still and struggled hard. By and by the giddiness passed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard,&rdquo; she murmured, &ldquo;I am ill.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      Then she began to smile.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;It is too absurd,&rdquo; she faltered, &ldquo;but you've got to do it all over
+      again.&rdquo;'
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;What do you mean?&rdquo; he asked.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Get me something to eat at once,&rdquo; she begged. &ldquo;I am starving. Somewhere
+      where it's cool. Leonard, how wonderful! I never even knew that you were
+      in New York.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He called a carriage and took her off to a roof garden. There, as it was
+      early, they got a seat near the parapet. Tavernake talked clumsily about
+      himself most of the time. There was a lump in his throat. He felt all the
+      while that tragedy was very near. By degrees, though, as she ate and
+      drank, the color came back to her cheeks, the fear of a breakdown seemed
+      to pass away. She became even cheerful.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;We are really the most amazing people, Leonard,&rdquo; she declared. &ldquo;You
+      stumbled into my life once before when I was on the point of being turned
+      out of my rooms. You've come into it again and you find me once more
+      homeless. Don't spend too much money upon our dinner, for I warn you that
+      I am going to borrow from you.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He laughed.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;That's good news,&rdquo; he remarked, &ldquo;but I'm not sure that I'm going to lend
+      anything.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He leaned across the table. Their dinner had taken long in preparing and
+      the dusk was falling now. Over them were the stars, the band was playing
+      soft music, the hubbub of the streets lay far below. Almost they were in a
+      little world by themselves.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Dear Beatrice,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;three times I asked you to marry me and you
+      would not, and I asked you because I was a selfish brute, and because I
+      knew that it was good for me and that it would save me from things of
+      which I was afraid. And now I am asking you the same thing again, but I
+      have a bigger reason, Beatrice. I have been alone most of the last two
+      years, I have lived the sort of life which brings a man face to face with
+      the truth, helps him to know himself and others, and I have found out
+      something.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Yes?&rdquo; she faltered. &ldquo;Tell me, Leonard.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I found out that it was you I cared for always,&rdquo; he continued, &ldquo;and that
+      is why I am asking you to marry me now, Beatrice, only this time I ask you
+      because I love you, and because no one else in the world could ever take
+      your place or be anything at all to me.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;Leonard!&rdquo; she murmured.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;You are not sorry that I have said this?&rdquo; he begged.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      She opened her eyes again.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I always prayed that I might hear you say it,&rdquo; she answered, &ldquo;but it
+      seems&mdash;oh, it seems so one-sided! Here am I starving and penniless,
+      and you&mdash;you, I suppose, are well on the way towards the success you
+      worshiped.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      &ldquo;I am well on the way,&rdquo; he said, earnestly, &ldquo;towards something greater,
+      Beatrice. I am well on the way towards understanding what success really
+      is, what things count and what don't. I have even found out,&rdquo; he
+      whispered, &ldquo;the thing which counts for more than anything else in the
+      world, and now that I have found it out, I shall never let it go again.&rdquo;
+     </p>
+    <p>
+      He pressed her hand and she looked across the table at him with swimming
+      eyes. The waiter, who had been approaching, turned discreetly away. The
+      band started to play a fresh tune. From down in the streets came the
+      clanging of the cars. A curious, cosmopolitan murmur of sounds, but
+      between those two there was the wonderful silence.
+    </p>
+    <p>
+      <br /><br /><br /><br />
+    </p>
+<pre xml:space="preserve">
+
+
+
+
+
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+</html>
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+Project Gutenberg's The Tempting of Tavernake, by E. Phillips Oppenheim
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Tempting of Tavernake
+
+Author: E. Phillips Oppenheim
+
+Release Date: February, 2004  [EBook #5091]
+Posting Date: June 12, 2009
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TEMPTING OF TAVERNAKE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Polly Stratton
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE TEMPTING OF TAVERNAKE
+
+
+By E. Phillips Oppenheim
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK ONE
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I. DESPAIR AND INTEREST
+
+They stood upon the roof of a London boarding-house in the neighborhood
+of Russell Square--one of those grim shelters, the refuge of
+Transatlantic curiosity and British penury. The girl--she represented
+the former race was leaning against the frail palisading, with gloomy
+expression and eyes set as though in fixed contemplation of the
+uninspiring panorama. The young man--unmistakably, uncompromisingly
+English--stood with his back to the chimney a few feet away, watching
+his companion. The silence between them was as yet unbroken, had lasted,
+indeed, since she had stolen away from the shabby drawing-room below,
+where a florid lady with a raucous voice had been shouting a music-hall
+ditty. Close upon her heels, but without speech of any sort, he had
+followed. They were almost strangers, except for the occasional word or
+two of greeting which the etiquette of the establishment demanded. Yet
+she had accepted his espionage without any protest of word or look. He
+had followed her with a very definite object. Had she surmised it,
+he wondered? She had not turned her head or vouchsafed even a single
+question or remark to him since he had pushed his way through the
+trap-door almost at her heels and stepped out on to the leads. Yet it
+seemed to him that she must guess.
+
+Below them, what seemed to be the phantasm of a painted city, a
+wilderness of housetops, of smoke-wreathed spires and chimneys,
+stretched away to a murky, blood-red horizon. Even as they stood there,
+a deeper color stained the sky, an angry sun began to sink into the
+piled up masses of thick, vaporous clouds. The girl watched with an air
+of sullen yet absorbed interest. Her companion's eyes were still fixed
+wholly and critically upon her. Who was she, he wondered? Why had she
+left her own country to come to a city where she seemed to have no
+friends, no manner of interest? In that caravansary of the world's
+stricken ones she had been an almost unnoticed figure, silent,
+indisposed for conversation, not in any obvious manner attractive. Her
+clothes, notwithstanding their air of having come from a first-class
+dressmaker, were shabby and out of fashion, their extreme neatness
+in itself pathetic. She was thin, yet not without a certain buoyant
+lightness of movement always at variance with her tired eyes, her
+ceaseless air of dejection. And withal she was a rebel. It was written
+in her attitude, it was evident in her lowering, militant expression,
+the smouldering fire in her eyes proclaimed it. Her long, rather narrow
+face was gripped between her hands; her elbows rested upon the brick
+parapet. She gazed at that world of blood-red mists, of unshapely,
+grotesque buildings, of strange, tawdry colors; she listened to the
+medley of sounds--crude, shrill, insistent, something like the groaning
+of a world stripped naked--and she had all the time the air of one who
+hates the thing she looks upon.
+
+Tavernake, whose curiosity concerning his companion remained unappeased,
+decided that the moment for speech had arrived. He took a step forward
+upon the soft, pulpy leads. Even then he hesitated before he finally
+committed himself. About his appearance little was remarkable save the
+general air of determination which gave character to his undistinguished
+features. He was something above the medium height, broad-set, and with
+rather more thick black hair than he knew how to arrange advantageously.
+He wore a shirt which was somewhat frayed, and an indifferent tie; his
+boots were heavy and clumsy; he wore also a suit of ready-made clothes
+with the air of one who knew that they were ready-made and was satisfied
+with them. People of a nervous or sensitive disposition would, without
+doubt, have found him irritating but for a certain nameless gift--an
+almost Napoleonic concentration upon the things of the passing moment,
+which was in itself impressive and which somehow disarmed criticism.
+
+"About that bracelet!" he said at last.
+
+She moved her head and looked at him. A young man of less assurance
+would have turned and fled. Not so Tavernake. Once sure of his ground
+he was immovable. There was murder in her eyes but he was not even
+disturbed.
+
+"I saw you take it from the little table by the piano, you know,"
+he continued. "It was rather a rash thing to do. Mrs. Fitzgerald was
+looking for it before I reached the stairs. I expect she has called the
+police in by now."
+
+Slowly her hand stole into the depths of her pocket and emerged.
+Something flashed for a moment high over her head. The young man caught
+her wrist just in time, caught it in a veritable grip of iron. Then,
+indeed, the evil fires flashed from her eyes, her teeth gleamed white,
+her bosom rose and fell in a storm of angry, unuttered sobs. She was
+dry-eyed and still speechless, but for all that she was a tigress. A
+strangely-cut silhouette they formed there upon the housetops, with a
+background of empty sky, their feet sinking in the warm leads.
+
+"I think I had better take it," he said. "Let go."
+
+Her fingers yielded the bracelet--a tawdry, ill-designed affair of
+rubies and diamonds. He looked at it disapprovingly.
+
+"That's an ugly thing to go to prison for," he remarked, slipping it
+into his pocket. "It was a stupid thing to do, anyhow, you know. You
+couldn't have got away with it--unless," he added, looking over
+the parapet as though struck with a sudden idea, "unless you had a
+confederate below."
+
+He heard the rush of her skirts and he was only just in time. Nothing,
+in fact, but a considerable amount of presence of mind and the full
+exercise of a strength which was continually providing surprises for his
+acquaintances, was sufficient to save her. Their struggles upon the
+very edge of the roof dislodged a brick from the palisading, which went
+hurtling down into the street. They both paused to watch it, his arms
+still gripping her and one foot pressed against an iron rod. It was
+immediately after they had seen it pitch harmlessly into the road that
+a new sensation came to this phlegmatic young man. For the first time in
+his life, he realized that it was possible to feel a certain pleasurable
+emotion in the close grasp of a being of the opposite sex. Consequently,
+although she had now ceased to struggle, he kept his arms locked around
+her, looking into her face with an interest intense enough, but more
+analytical than emotional, as though seeking to discover the meaning of
+this curious throbbing of his pulses. She herself, as though exhausted,
+remained quite passive, shivering a little in his grasp and breathing
+like a hunted animal whose last hour has come. Their eyes met; then she
+tore herself away.
+
+"You are a hateful person," she said deliberately, "a hateful,
+interfering person. I detest you."
+
+"I think that we will go down now," he replied.
+
+He raised the trap-door and glanced at her significantly. She held her
+skirts closely together and passed through it without looking at him.
+She stepped lightly down the ladder and without hesitation descended
+also a flight of uncarpeted attic stairs. Here, however, upon the
+landing, she awaited him with obvious reluctance.
+
+"Are you going to send for the police?" she asked without looking at
+him.
+
+"No," he answered.
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"If I had meant to give you away I should have told Mrs. Fitzgerald at
+once that I had seen you take her bracelet, instead of following you out
+on to the roof."
+
+"Do you mind telling me what you do propose to do, then?" she continued
+still without looking at him, still without the slightest note of appeal
+in her tone.
+
+He withdrew the bracelet from his pocket and balanced it upon his
+finger.
+
+"I am going to say that I took it for a joke," he declared.
+
+She hesitated.
+
+"Mrs. Fitzgerald's sense of humor is not elastic," she warned him.
+
+"She will be very angry, of course," he assented, "but she will not
+believe that I meant to steal it."
+
+The girl moved slowly a few steps away.
+
+"I suppose that I ought to thank you," she said, still with averted
+face and sullen manner. "You have really been very decent. I am much
+obliged."
+
+"Are you not coming down?" he asked.
+
+"Not at present," she answered. "I am going to my room."
+
+He looked around the landing on which they stood, at the miserable,
+uncarpeted floor, the ill-painted doors on which the long-forgotten
+varnish stood out in blisters, the jumble of dilapidated hot-water cans,
+a mop, and a medley of brooms and rags all thrown down together in a
+corner.
+
+"But these are the servants' quarters, surely," he remarked.
+
+"They are good enough for me; my room is here," she told him, turning
+the handle of one of the doors and disappearing. The prompt turning of
+the key sounded, he thought, a little ungracious.
+
+With the bracelet in his hand, Tavernake descended three more flights
+of stairs and entered the drawing-room of the private hotel conducted
+by Mrs. Raithby Lawrence, whose husband, one learned from her frequent
+reiteration of the fact, had once occupied a distinguished post in the
+Merchant Service of his country. The disturbance following upon the
+disappearance of the bracelet was evidently at its height. There were
+at least a dozen people in the room, most of whom were standing up. The
+central figure of them all was Mrs. Fitzgerald, large and florid, whose
+yellow hair with its varied shades frankly admitted its indebtedness to
+peroxide; a lady of the dashing type, who had once made her mark in the
+music-halls, but was now happily married to a commercial traveler who
+was seldom visible. Mrs. Fitzgerald was talking.
+
+"In respectable boarding-houses, Mrs. Lawrence," she declared with
+great emphasis, "thefts may sometimes take place, I will admit, in the
+servants' quarters, and with all their temptations, poor things, it's
+not so much to be wondered at. But no such thing as this has ever
+happened to me before--to have jewelry taken almost from my person in
+the drawing-room of what should be a well-conducted establishment. Not a
+servant in the room, remember, from the moment I took it off until I got
+up from the piano and found it missing. It's your guests you've got to
+look after, Mrs. Lawrence, sorry to say it though I am."
+
+Mrs. Lawrence managed here, through sheer loss of breath on the part of
+her assailant, to interpose a tearful protest.
+
+"I am quite sure," she protested feebly, "that there is not a person
+in this house who would dream of stealing anything, however valuable it
+was. I am most particular always about references."
+
+"Valuable, indeed!" Mrs. Fitzgerald continued with increased volubility.
+"I'd have you understand that I am not one of those who wear trumpery
+jewelry. Thirty-five guineas that bracelet cost me if it cost a penny,
+and if my husband were only at home I could show you the receipt."
+
+Then there came an interruption of almost tragical interest. Mrs.
+Fitzgerald, her mouth still open, her stream of eloquence suddenly
+arrested, stood with her artificially darkened eyes riveted upon the
+stolid, self-composed figure in the doorway. Every one else was gazing
+in the same direction. Tavernake was holding the bracelet in the palm of
+his hand.
+
+"Thirty-five guineas!" he repeated. "If I had known that it was worth as
+much as that, I do not think that I should have dared to touch it."
+
+"You--you took it!" Mrs. Fitzgerald gasped.
+
+"I am afraid," he admitted, "that it was rather a clumsy joke. I
+apologize, Mrs. Fitzgerald. I hope you did not really imagine that it
+had been stolen."
+
+One was conscious of the little thrill of emotion which marked the
+termination of the episode. Most of the people not directly concerned
+were disappointed; they were being robbed of their excitement, their
+hopes of a tragical denouement were frustrated. Mrs. Lawrence's worn
+face plainly showed her relief. The lady with the yellow hair, on the
+other hand, who had now succeeded in working herself up into a towering
+rage, snatched the bracelet from the young man's fingers and with a
+purple flush in her cheeks was obviously struggling with an intense
+desire to box his ears.
+
+"That's not good enough for a tale!" she exclaimed harshly. "I tell you
+I don't believe a word of it. Took it for a joke, indeed! I only wish my
+husband were here; he'd know what to do."
+
+"Your husband couldn't do much more than get your bracelet back, ma'am,"
+Mrs. Lawrence replied with acerbity. "Such a fuss and calling every one
+thieves, too! I'd be ashamed to be so suspicious."
+
+Mrs. Fitzgerald glared haughtily at her hostess.
+
+"It's all very well for those that don't possess any jewelry and don't
+know the value of it, to talk," she declared, with her eyes fixed upon
+a black jet ornament which hung from the other woman's neck. "What I say
+is this, and you may just as well hear it from me now as later. I don't
+believe this cock-and-bull story of Mr. Tavernake's. Them as took my
+bracelet from that table meant keeping it, only they hadn't the courage.
+And I'm not referring to you, Mr. Tavernake," the lady continued
+vigorously, "because I don't believe you took it, for all your talk
+about a joke. And whom you may be shielding it wouldn't take me two
+guesses to name, and your motive must be clear to every one. The common
+hussy!"
+
+"You are exciting yourself unnecessarily, Mrs. Fitzgerald," Tavernake
+remarked. "Let me assure you that it was I who took your bracelet from
+that table."
+
+Mrs. Fitzgerald regarded him scornfully.
+
+"Do you expect me to believe a tale like that?" she demanded.
+
+"Why not?" Tavernake replied. "It is the truth. I am sorry that you have
+been so upset--"
+
+"It is not the truth!"
+
+More sensation! Another unexpected entrance! Once more interest in the
+affair was revived. After all, the lookers-on felt that they were not to
+be robbed of their tragedy. An old lady with yellow cheeks and jet black
+eyes leaned forward with her hand to her ear, anxious not to miss a
+syllable of what was coming. Tavernake bit his lip; it was the girl from
+the roof who had entered the room.
+
+"I have no doubt," she continued in a cool, clear tone, "that Mrs.
+Fitzgerald's first guess would have been correct. I took the bracelet.
+I did not take it for a joke, I did not take it because I admire it--I
+think it is hideously ugly. I took it because I had no money."
+
+She paused and looked around at them all, quietly, yet with something in
+her face from which they all shrank. She stood where the light fell full
+upon her shabby black gown and dejected-looking hat. The hollows in her
+pale cheeks, and the faint rims under her eyes, were clearly manifest;
+but notwithstanding her fragile appearance, she held herself with
+composure and even dignity. Twenty--thirty seconds must have passed
+whilst she stood there, slowly finishing the buttoning of her gloves.
+No one attempted to break the silence. She dominated them all--they felt
+that she had something more to say. Even Mrs. Fitzgerald felt a weight
+upon her tongue.
+
+"It was a clumsy attempt," she went on. "I should have had no idea where
+to raise money upon the thing, but I apologize to you, nevertheless,
+Mrs. Fitzgerald, for the anxiety which my removal of your valuable
+property must have caused you," she added, turning to the owner of the
+bracelet, whose cheeks were once more hot with anger at the contempt in
+the girl's tone. "I suppose I ought to thank you, Mr. Tavernake, also,
+for your well-meant effort to preserve my character. In future, that
+shall be my sole charge. Has any one anything more to say to me before I
+go?"
+
+Somehow or other, no one had. Mrs. Fitzgerald was irritated and fuming,
+but she contented herself with a snort. Her speech was ready enough as
+a rule, but there was a look in this girl's eyes from which she was glad
+enough to turn away. Mrs. Lawrence made a weak attempt at a farewell.
+
+"I am sure," she began, "we are all sorry for what's occurred and that
+you must go--not that perhaps it isn't better, under the circumstances,"
+she added hastily. "As regards--"
+
+"There is nothing owing to you," the girl interrupted calmly. "You may
+congratulate yourself upon that, for if there were you would not get it.
+Nor have I stolen anything else."
+
+"About your luggage?" Mrs. Lawrence asked.
+
+"When I need it, I will send for it," the girl replied.
+
+She turned her back upon them and before they realized it she was gone.
+She had, indeed, something of the grand manner. She had come to plead
+guilty to a theft and she had left them all feeling a little like
+snubbed children. Mrs. Fitzgerald, as soon as the spell of the girl's
+presence was removed, was one of the first to recover herself. She felt
+herself beginning to grow hot with renewed indignation.
+
+"A thief!" she exclaimed looking around the room. "Just an ordinary
+self-convicted thief! That's what I call her, and nothing else. And here
+we all stood like a lot of ninnies. Why, if I'd done my duty I'd have
+locked the door and sent for a policeman."
+
+"Too late now, anyway," Mrs. Lawrence declared. "She's gone for good,
+and no mistake. Walked right out of the house. I heard her slam the
+front door."
+
+"And a good job, too," Mrs. Fitzgerald armed. "We don't want any of her
+sort here--not those who've got things of value about them. I bet she
+didn't leave America for nothing."
+
+A little gray-haired lady, who had not as yet spoken, and who very
+seldom took part in any discussion at all, looked up from her knitting.
+She was desperately poor but she had charitable instincts.
+
+"I wonder what made her want to steal," she remarked quietly.
+
+"A born thief," Mrs. Fitzgerald declared with conviction,--"a real bad
+lot. One of your sly-looking ones, I call her."
+
+The little lady sighed.
+
+"When I was better off," she continued, "I used to help at a soup
+kitchen in Poplar. I have never forgotten a certain look we used to see
+occasionally in the faces of some of the men and women. I found out what
+it meant--it was hunger. Once or twice lately I have passed the girl who
+has just gone out, upon the stairs, and she almost frightened me. She
+had just the same look in her eyes. I noticed it yesterday--it was just
+before dinner, too--but she never came down."
+
+"She paid so much for her room and extra for meals," Mrs. Lawrence said
+thoughtfully. "She never would have a meal unless she paid for it at the
+time. To tell you the truth, I was feeling a bit uneasy about her. She
+hasn't been in the dining-room for two days, and from what they tell
+me there's no signs of her having eaten anything in her room. As for
+getting anything out, why should she? It would be cheaper for her here
+than anywhere, if she'd got any money at all."
+
+There was an uncomfortable silence. The little old lady with the
+knitting looked down the street into the sultry darkness which had
+swallowed up the girl.
+
+"I wonder whether Mr. Tavernake knows anything about her," some one
+suggested.
+
+But Tavernake was not in the room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II. A TETE-A-TETE SUPPER
+
+Tavernake caught her up in New Oxford Street and fell at once into step
+with her. He wasted no time whatever upon preliminaries.
+
+"I should be glad," he said, "if you would tell me your name."
+
+Her first glance at him was fierce enough to have terrified a different
+sort of man. Upon Tavernake it had absolutely no effect.
+
+"You need not unless you like, of course," he went on, "but I wish
+to talk to you for a few moments and I thought that it would be more
+convenient if I addressed you by name. I do not remember to have heard
+it mentioned at Blenheim House, and Mrs. Lawrence, as you know, does not
+introduce her guests."
+
+By this time they had walked a score or so of paces together. The girl,
+after her first furious glance, had taken absolutely no notice of him
+except to quicken her pace a little. Tavernake remained by her side,
+however, showing not the slightest sense of embarrassment or annoyance.
+He seemed perfectly content to wait and he had not in the least the
+appearance of a man who could be easily shaken off. From a fit of
+furious anger she passed suddenly and without warning to a state of half
+hysterical amusement.
+
+"You are a foolish, absurd person," she declared. "Please go away. I do
+not wish you to walk with me."
+
+Tavernake remained imperturbable. She remembered suddenly his
+intervention on her behalf.
+
+"If you insist upon knowing," she said, "my name at Blenheim House was
+Beatrice Burnay. I am much obliged to you for what you did for me there,
+but that is finished. I do not wish to have any conversation with you,
+and I absolutely object to your company. Please leave me at once."
+
+"I am sorry," he answered, "but that is not possible."
+
+"Not possible?" she repeated, wonderingly.
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"You have no money, you have eaten no dinner, and I do not believe that
+you have any idea where you are going," he declared, deliberately.
+
+Her face was once more dark with anger.
+
+"Even if that were the truth," she insisted, "tell me what concern it is
+of yours? Your reminding me of these facts is simply an impertinence."
+
+"I am sorry that you look upon it in that light," he remarked, still
+without the least sign of discomposure. "We will, if you do not mind,
+waive the discussion for the moment. Do you prefer a small restaurant or
+a corner in a big one? There is music at Frascati's but there are not so
+many people in the smaller ones."
+
+She turned half around upon the pavement and looked at him steadfastly.
+His personality was at last beginning to interest her. His square jaw
+and measured speech were indices of a character at least unusual. She
+recognized certain invincible qualities under an exterior absolutely
+commonplace.
+
+"Are you as persistent about everything in life?" she asked him.
+
+"Why not?" he replied. "I try always to be consistent."
+
+"What is your name?"
+
+"Leonard Tavernake," he answered, promptly.
+
+"Are you well off--I mean moderately well off?"
+
+"I have a quite sufficient income."
+
+"Have you any one dependent upon you?"
+
+"Not a soul," he declared. "I am my own master in every sense of the
+word."
+
+She laughed in an odd sort of way.
+
+"Then you shall pay for your persistence," she said,--"I mean that I may
+as well rob you of a sovereign as the restaurant people."
+
+"You must tell me now where you would like to go to," he insisted. "It
+is getting late."
+
+"I do not like these foreign places," she replied. "I should prefer to
+go to the grill-room of a good restaurant."
+
+"We will take a taxicab," he announced. "You have no objection?"
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"If you have the money and don't mind spending it," she said, "I will
+admit that I have had all the walking I want. Besides, the toe of my
+boot is worn through and I find it painful. Yesterday I tramped ten
+miles trying to find a man who was getting up a concert party for the
+provinces."
+
+"And did you find him?" he asked, hailing a cab.
+
+"Yes, I found him," she answered, indifferently. "We went through the
+usual programme. He heard me sing, tried to kiss me and promised to let
+me know. Nobody ever refuses anything in my profession, you see. They
+promise to let you know."
+
+"Are you a singer, then, or an actress?"
+
+"I am neither," she told him. "I said 'my profession' because it is the
+only one to which I have ever tried to belong. I have never succeeded in
+obtaining an engagement in this country. I do not suppose that even if I
+had persevered I should ever have had one."
+
+"You have given up the idea, then," he remarked.
+
+"I have given it up," she admitted, a little curtly. "Please do not
+think, because I am allowing you to be my companion for a short time,
+that you may ask me questions. How fast these taxies go!"
+
+They drew up at their destination--a well-known restaurant in Regent
+Street. He paid the cabman and they descended a flight of stairs into
+the grill-room.
+
+"I hope that this place will suit you," he said. "I have not much
+experience of restaurants."
+
+She looked around and nodded.
+
+"Yes," she replied, "I think that it will do."
+
+She was very shabbily dressed, and he, although his appearance was by no
+means ordinary, was certainly not of the type which inspires
+immediate respect in even the grill-room of a fashionable restaurant.
+Nevertheless, they received prompt and almost officious service.
+Tavernake, as he watched his companion's air, her manner of seating
+herself and accepting the attentions of the head waiter, felt that
+nameless impulse which was responsible for his having followed her
+from Blenheim House and which he could only call curiosity, becoming
+stronger. An exceedingly matter-of-fact person, he was also by instinct
+and habit observant. He never doubted but that she belonged to a class
+of society from which the guests at the boarding-house where they had
+both lived were seldom recruited, and of which he himself knew little.
+He was not in the least a snob, this young man, but he found the fact
+interesting. Life with him was already very much the same as a ledger
+account--a matter of debits and credits, and he had never failed to
+include among the latter that curious gift of breeding for which he
+himself, denied it by heritage, had somehow substituted a complete and
+exceedingly rare naturalness.
+
+"I should like," she announced, laying down the carte, "a fried sole,
+some cutlets, an ice, and black coffee."
+
+The waiter bowed.
+
+"And for Monsieur?"
+
+Tavernake glanced at his watch; it was already ten o'clock.
+
+"I will take the same," he declared.
+
+"And to drink?"
+
+She seemed indifferent.
+
+"Any light wine," she answered, carelessly, "white or red."
+
+Tavernake took up the wine list and ordered sauterne. They were left
+alone in their corner for a few minutes, almost the only occupants of
+the place.
+
+"You are sure that you can afford this?" she asked, looking at him
+critically. "It may cost you a sovereign or thirty shillings."
+
+He studied the prices on the menu.
+
+"I can afford it quite well and I have plenty of money with me," he
+assured her, "but I do not think that it will cost more than eighteen
+shillings. While we are waiting for the sole, shall we talk? I can tell
+you, if you choose to hear, why I followed you from the boardinghouse."
+
+"I don't mind listening to you," she told him, "or I will talk with
+you about anything you like. There is only one subject which I cannot
+discuss; that subject is myself and my own doings."
+
+Tavernake was silent for a moment.
+
+"That makes conversation a bit difficult," he remarked. She leaned back
+in her chair.
+
+"After this evening," she said, "I go out of your life as completely and
+finally as though I had never existed. I have a fancy to take my poor
+secrets with me. If you wish to talk, tell me about yourself. You have
+gone out of your way to be kind to me. I wonder why. It doesn't seem to
+be your role."
+
+He smiled slowly. His face was fashioned upon broad lines and the
+relaxing of his lips lightened it wonderfully. He had good teeth,
+clear gray eyes, and coarse black hair which he wore a trifle long; his
+forehead was too massive for good looks.
+
+"No," he admitted, "I do not think that benevolence is one of my
+characteristics."
+
+Her dark eyes were turned full upon him; her red lips, redder than ever
+they seemed against the pallor of her cheeks and her deep brown hair,
+curled slightly. There was something almost insolent in her tone.
+
+"You understand, I hope," she continued, "that you have nothing whatever
+to look for from me in return for this sum which you propose to expend
+for my entertainment?"
+
+"I understand that," he replied.
+
+"Not even gratitude," she persisted. "I really do not feel grateful to
+you. You are probably doing this to gratify some selfish interest or
+curiosity. I warn you that I am quite incapable of any of the proper
+sentiments of life."
+
+"Your gratitude would be of no value to me whatever," he assured her.
+
+She was still not wholly satisfied. His complete stolidity frustrated
+every effort she made to penetrate beneath the surface.
+
+"If I believed," she went on, "that you were one of those men--the
+world is full of them, you know--who will help a woman with a reasonable
+appearance so long as it does not seriously interfere with their own
+comfort--"
+
+"Your sex has nothing whatever to do with it," he interrupted. "As to
+your appearance, I have not even considered it. I could not tell you
+whether you are beautiful or ugly--I am no judge of these matters. What
+I have done, I have done because it pleased me to do it."
+
+"Do you always do what pleases you?" she asked.
+
+"Nearly always."
+
+She looked him over again attentively, with an interest obviously
+impersonal, a trifle supercilious.
+
+"I suppose," she remarked, "you consider yourself one of the strong
+people of the world?"
+
+"I do not know about that," he answered. "I do not often think about
+myself."
+
+"I mean," she explained, "that you are one of those people who struggle
+hard to get just what they want in life."
+
+His jaw suddenly tightened and she saw the likeness to Napoleon.
+
+"I do more than struggle," he affirmed, "I succeed. If I make up my mind
+to do a thing, I do it; if I make up my mind to get a thing, I get it.
+It means hard work sometimes, but that is all."
+
+For the first time, a really natural interest shone out of her eyes.
+The half sulky contempt with which she had received his advances passed
+away. She became at that moment a human being, self-forgetting, the
+heritage of her charms--for she really had a curious but very poignant
+attractiveness--suddenly evident. It was only a momentary lapse and it
+was entirely wasted. Not even one of the waiters happened to be looking
+that way, and Tavernake was thinking wholly of himself.
+
+"It is a good deal to say--that," she remarked, reflectively.
+
+"It is a good deal but it is not too much," he declared. "Every man who
+takes life seriously should say it."
+
+Then she laughed--actually laughed--and he had a vision of flashing
+white teeth, of a mouth breaking into pleasant curves, of dark mirth-lit
+eyes, lustreless no longer, provocative, inspiring. A vague impression
+as of something pleasant warmed his blood. It was a rare thing for him
+to be so stirred, but even then it was not sufficient to disturb the
+focus of his thoughts.
+
+"Tell me," she demanded, "what do you do? What is your profession or
+work?"
+
+"I am with a firm of auctioneers and estate agents," he answered
+readily,--"Messrs. Dowling, Spence & Company the name is. Our offices
+are in Waterloo Place."
+
+"You find it interesting?"
+
+"Of course," he answered. "Interesting? Why not? I work at it."
+
+"Are you a partner?"
+
+"No," he admitted. "Six years ago I was a carpenter; then I became an
+errand boy in Mr. Dowling's office I had to learn the business, you see.
+To-day I am a sort of manager. In eighteen months' time--perhaps before
+that if they do not offer me a partnership--I shall start for myself."
+
+Once more the subtlest of smiles flickered at the corners of her lips.
+
+"Do they know yet?" she asked, with faint irony.
+
+"Not yet," he replied, with absolute seriousness. "They might tell me
+to go, and I have a few things to learn yet. I would rather make
+experiments for some one else than for myself. I can use the results
+later; they will help me to make money."
+
+She laughed softly and wiped the tears out of her eyes. They were really
+very beautiful eyes notwithstanding the dark rims encircling them.
+
+"If only I had met you before!" she murmured.
+
+"Why?" he asked.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"Don't ask me," she begged. "It would not be good for your conceit, if
+you have any, to tell you."
+
+"I have no conceit and I am not inquisitive," he said, "but I do not see
+why you laughed."
+
+Their period of waiting came to an end at this point. The fish was
+brought and their conversation became disjointed. In the silence which
+followed, the old shadow crept over her face. Once only it lifted. It
+was while they were waiting for the cutlets. She leaned towards him, her
+elbows upon the tablecloth, her face supported by her fingers.
+
+"I think that it is time we left these generalities," she insisted, "and
+you told me something rather more personal, something which I am very
+anxious to know. Tell me exactly why so self-centered a person as
+yourself should interest himself in a fellow-creature at all. It seems
+odd to me."
+
+"It is odd," he admitted, frankly. "I will try to explain it to you but
+it will sound very bald, and I do not think that you will understand. I
+watched you a few nights ago out on the roof at Blenheim House. You were
+looking across the house-tops and you didn't seem to be seeing anything
+at all really, and yet all the time I knew that you were seeing things I
+couldn't, you were understanding and appreciating something which I knew
+nothing of, and it worried me. I tried to talk to you that evening, but
+you were rude."
+
+"You really are a curious person," she remarked. "Are you always
+worried, then, if you find that some one else is seeing things or
+understanding things which are outside your comprehension?"
+
+"Always," he replied promptly.
+
+"You are too far-reaching," she affirmed. "You want to gather everything
+into your life. You cannot. You will only be unhappy if you try. No man
+can do it. You must learn your limitations or suffer all your days."
+
+"Limitations!" He repeated the words with measureless scorn. "If I learn
+them at all," he declared, with unexpected force, "it will be with scars
+and bruises, for nothing else will content me."
+
+"We are, I should say, almost the same age," she remarked slowly.
+
+"I am twenty-five," he told her.
+
+"I am twenty-two," she said. "It seems strange that two people whose
+ideas of life are as far apart as the Poles should have come together
+like this even for a moment. I do not understand it at all. Did you
+expect that I should tell you just what I saw in the clouds that night?"
+
+"No," he answered, "not exactly. I have spoken of my first interest in
+you only. There are other things. I told a lie about the bracelet and I
+followed you out of the boarding-house and I brought you here, for some
+other for quite a different reason."
+
+"Tell me what it was," she demanded.
+
+"I do not know it myself," he declared solemnly. "I really and honestly
+do not know it. It is because I hoped that it might come to me while
+we were together, that I am here with you at this moment. I do not like
+impulses which I do not understand."
+
+She laughed at him a little scornfully.
+
+"After all," she said, "although it may not have dawned upon you yet,
+it is probably the same wretched reason. You are a man and you have the
+poison somewhere in your blood. I am really not bad-looking, you know."
+
+He looked at her critically. She was a little over-slim, perhaps, but
+she was certainly wonderfully graceful. Even the poise of her head, the
+manner in which she leaned back in her chair, had its individuality. Her
+features, too, were good, though her mouth had grown a trifle hard. For
+the first time the dead pallor of her cheeks was relieved by a touch of
+color. Even Tavernake realized that there were great possibilities about
+her. Nevertheless, he shook his head.
+
+"I do not agree with you in the least," he asserted firmly. "Your looks
+have nothing to do with it. I am sure that it is not that."
+
+"Let me cross-examine you," she suggested. "Think carefully now. Does it
+give you no pleasure at all to be sitting here alone with me?"
+
+He answered her deliberately; it was obvious that he was speaking the
+truth.
+
+"I am not conscious that it does," he declared. "The only feeling I am
+aware of at the present moment in connection with you, is the curiosity
+of which I have already spoken."
+
+She leaned a little towards him, extending her very shapely fingers.
+Once more the smile at her lips transformed her face.
+
+"Look at my hand," she said. "Tell me--wouldn't you like to hold it just
+for a minute, if I gave it you?"
+
+Her eyes challenged his, softly and yet imperiously. His whole
+attention, however, seemed to be absorbed by her finger-nails. It seemed
+strange to him that a girl in her straits should have devoted so much
+care to her hands.
+
+"No," he answered deliberately, "I have no wish to hold your hand. Why
+should I?"
+
+"Look at me," she insisted.
+
+He did so without embarrassment or hesitation,--it was more than ever
+apparent that he was entirely truthful. She leaned back in her chair,
+laughing softly to herself.
+
+"Oh, my friend Mr. Leonard Tavernake," she exclaimed, "if you were not
+so crudely, so adorably, so miraculously truthful, what a prig,
+prig, prig, you would be! The cutlets at last, thank goodness! Your
+cross-examination is over. I pronounce you 'Not Guilty!"'
+
+During the progress of the rest of the meal, they talked very little. At
+its conclusion, Tavernake discharged the bill, having carefully checked
+each item and tipped the waiter the exact amount which the man had the
+right to expect. They ascended the stairs together to the street, the
+girl lingering a few steps behind. On the pavement her fingers touched
+his arm.
+
+"I wonder, would you mind driving me down to the Embankment?" she asked
+almost humbly. "It was so close down there and I want some air."
+
+This was an extravagance which he had scarcely contemplated, but he did
+not hesitate. He called a taxicab and seated himself by her side. Her
+manner seemed to have grown quieter and more subdued, her tone was no
+longer semi-belligerent.
+
+"I will not keep you much longer," she promised. "I suppose I am not so
+strong as I used to be. I have had scarcely anything to eat for two
+days and conversation has become an unknown luxury. I think--it seems
+absurd--but I think that I am feeling a little faint."
+
+"The air will soon revive you," he said. "As to our conversation, I
+am disappointed. I think that you are very foolish not to tell me more
+about yourself."
+
+She closed her eyes, ignoring his remark. They turned presently into a
+narrower thoroughfare. She leaned towards him.
+
+"You have been very good to me," she admitted almost timidly, "and I am
+afraid that I have not been very gracious. We shall not see one another
+again after this evening. I wonder--would you care to kiss me?"
+
+He opened his lips and closed them again. He sat quite still, his eyes
+fixed upon the road ahead, until he had strangled something absolutely
+absurd, something unrecognizable.
+
+"I would rather not," he decided quietly. "I know you mean to be kind
+but that sort of thing--well, I don't think I understand it. Besides,"
+he added with a sudden naive relief, as he clutched at a fugitive but
+plausible thought, "if I did you would not believe the things which I
+have been telling you."
+
+He had a curious idea that she was disappointed as she turned her head
+away, but she said nothing. Arrived at the Embankment, the cab came
+slowly to a standstill. The girl descended. There was something new in
+her manner; she looked away from him when she spoke.
+
+"You had better leave me here," she said. "I am going to sit upon that
+seat."
+
+Then came those few seconds' hesitation which were to count for a
+great deal in his life. The impulse which bade him stay with her was
+unaccountable but it conquered.
+
+"If you do not object," he remarked with some stiffness, "I should like
+to sit here with you for a little time. There is certainly a breeze."
+
+She made no comment but walked on. He paid the man and followed her to
+the empty seat. Opposite, some illuminated advertisements blazed their
+unsightly message across the murky sky. Between the two curving rows
+of yellow lights the river flowed--black, turgid, hopeless. Even here,
+though they had escaped from its absolute thrall, the far-away roar of
+the city beat upon their ears. She listened to it for a moment and then
+pressed her hands to the side of her head.
+
+"Oh, how I hate it!" she moaned. "The voices, always the voices,
+calling, threatening, beating you away! Take my hands, Leonard
+Tavernake,--hold me."
+
+He did as she bade him, clumsily, as yet without comprehension.
+
+"You are not well," he muttered.
+
+Her eyes opened and a flash of her old manner returned. She smiled at
+him, feebly but derisively.
+
+"You foolish boy!" she cried. "Can't you see that I am dying? Hold my
+hands tightly and watch--watch! Here is one more thing you can see--that
+you cannot understand."
+
+He saw the empty phial slip from her sleeve and fall on to the pavement.
+With a cry he sprang up and, carrying her in his arms, rushed out into
+the road.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III. AN UNPLEASANT MEETING
+
+It was a quarter past eleven and the theatres were disgorging their
+usual nightly crowds. The most human thoroughfare in any of the world's
+great cities was at its best and brightest. Everywhere commissionaires
+were blowing their whistles, the streets were thronged with
+slowly-moving vehicles, the pavements were stirring with life. The
+little crowd which had gathered in front of the chemist's shop was swept
+away. After all, none of them knew exactly what they had been waiting
+for. There was a rumor that a woman had fainted or had met with an
+accident. Certainly she had been carried into the shop and into the
+inner room, the door of which was still closed. A few passers-by had
+gathered together and stared and waited for a few minutes, but had
+finally lost interest and melted away. A human thoroughfare, this,
+indeed, one of the pulses of the great city beating time night and
+day to the tragedies of life. The chemist's assistant, with impassive
+features, was serving a couple of casual customers from behind the
+counter. Only a few yards away, beyond the closed door, the chemist
+himself and a hastily summoned doctor fought with Death for the body of
+the girl who lay upon the floor, faint moans coming every now and then
+from her blue lips.
+
+Tavernake, whose forced inaction during that terrible struggle had
+become a burden to him, slipped softly from the room as soon as the
+doctor had whispered that the acute crisis was over, and passed
+through the shop out into the street, a solemn, dazed figure among the
+light-hearted crowd. Even in those grim moments, the man's individualism
+spoke up to him. He was puzzled at his own action, He asked himself
+a question--not, indeed, with regret, but with something more than
+curiosity and actual selfprobing--as though, by concentrating his mind
+upon his recent course of action, he would be able to understand the
+motives which had influenced him. Why had he chosen to burden himself
+with the care of this desperate young woman? Supposing she lived, what
+was to become of her? He had acquired a certain definite responsibility
+with regard to her future, for whatever the doctor and his assistant
+might do, it was his own promptitude and presence of mind which had
+given her the first chance of life. Without a doubt, he had behaved
+foolishly. Why not vanish into the crowd and have done with it? What was
+it to him, after all, whether this girl lived or died? He had done his
+duty--more than his duty. Why not disappear now and let her take her
+chance? His common sense spoke to him loudly; such thoughts as these
+beat upon his brain.
+
+Just for once in his life, however, his common sense exercised an
+altogether subordinate position. He knew very well, even while he
+listened to these voices, that he was only counting the minutes until he
+could return. Having absolutely decided that the only reasonable course
+left for him to pursue was to return home and leave the girl to her
+fate, he found himself back inside the shop within a quarter of an hour.
+The chemist had just come out from the inner room, and looked up at his
+entrance.
+
+"She'll do now," he announced.
+
+Tavernake nodded. He was amazed at his own sense of relief.
+
+"I am glad," he declared.
+
+The doctor joined them, his black bag in his hand, prepared for
+departure. He addressed himself to Tavernake as the responsible person.
+
+"The young lady will be all right now," he said, "but she may be rather
+queer for a day or two. Fortunately, she made the usual mistake of
+people who are ignorant of medicine and its effects--she took enough
+poison to kill a whole household. You had better take care of her, young
+man," he added dryly. "She'll be getting into trouble if she tries this
+sort of thing again."
+
+"Will she need any special attention during the next few days?"
+Tavernake asked. "The circumstances under which I brought her here are a
+little unusual, and I am not quite sure--"
+
+"Take her home to bed," the doctor interrupted, "and you'll find she'll
+sleep it off. She seems to have a splendid constitution, although she
+has let herself run down. If you need any further advice and your own
+medical man is not available, I will come and see her if you send for
+me. Camden, my name is; telephone number 734 Gerrard."
+
+"I should be glad to know the amount of your fee, if you please,"
+Tavernake said.
+
+"My fee is two guineas," the doctor answered.
+
+Tavernake paid him and he went away. Already the shadow of the
+tragedy was passing. The chemist had joined his assistant and was busy
+dispensing drugs behind his counter.
+
+"You can go in to the young lady, if you like," he remarked to
+Tavernake. "I dare say she'll feel better to have some one with her."
+
+Tavernake passed slowly into the inner room, closing the door behind
+him. He was scarcely prepared for so piteous a sight. The girl's face
+was white and drawn as she lay upon the couch to which they had lifted
+her. The fighting spirit was dead; she was in a state of absolute and
+complete collapse. She opened her eyes at his coning, but closed them
+again almost immediately--less, it seemed, from any consciousness of his
+presence than from sheer exhaustion.
+
+"I am glad that you are better," he whispered crossing the room to her
+side.
+
+"Thank you," she murmured almost inaudibly.
+
+Tavernake stood looking down upon her, and his sense of perplexity
+increased. Stretched on the hard horsehair couch she seemed, indeed,
+pitifully thin and younger than her years. The scowl, which had passed
+from her face, had served in some measure as a disguise.
+
+"We shall have to leave here in a few minutes," he said, softly. "They
+will want to close the shop."
+
+"I am so sorry," she faltered, "to have given you all this trouble. You
+must send me to a hospital or the workhouse--anywhere."
+
+"You are sure that there are no friends to whom I can send?" he asked.
+
+"There is no one!"
+
+She closed her eyes and Tavernake sat quite still on the end of
+her couch, his elbow upon his knee, his head resting upon his hand.
+Presently, the rush of customers having ceased, the chemist came in.
+
+"I think, if I were you, I should take her home now," he remarked.
+"She'll probably drop off to sleep very soon and wake up much stronger.
+I have made up a prescription here in case of exhaustion."
+
+Tavernake stared at the man. Take her home! His sense of humor was faint
+enough but he found himself trying to imagine the faces of Mrs. Lawrence
+or Mrs. Fitzgerald if he should return with her to the boardinghouse at
+such an hour.
+
+"I suppose you know where she lives?" the chemist inquired curiously.
+
+"Of course," Tavernake assented. "You are quite right. I dare say she is
+strong enough now to walk as far as the pavement."
+
+He paid the bill for the medicines, and they lifted her from the couch.
+Between them she walked slowly into the outer shop. Then she began to
+drag on their arms and she looked up at the chemist a little piteously.
+
+"May I sit down for a moment?" she begged. "I feel faint."
+
+They placed her in one of the cane chairs facing the door. The chemist
+mixed her some sal volatile.
+
+"I am sorry," she murmured, "so sorry. In a few minutes--I shall be
+better."
+
+Outside, the throng of pedestrians had grown less, but from the great
+restaurant opposite a constant stream of motor-cars and carriages was
+slowly bringing away the supper guests. Tavernake stood at the door,
+watching them idly. The traffic was momentarily blocked and almost
+opposite to him a motor-car, the simple magnificence of which filled him
+with wonder, had come to a standstill. The chauffeur and footman both
+wore livery which was almost white. Inside a swinging vase of flowers
+was suspended from the roof. A man and a woman leaned back in luxurious
+easy-chairs. The man was dark and had the look of a foreigner. The woman
+was very fair. She wore a long ermine cloak and a tiara of pearls.
+
+Tavernake, whose interest in the passing throngs was entirely
+superficial, found himself for some reason curiously attracted by this
+glimpse into a world of luxury of which he knew nothing; attracted, too,
+by the woman's delicate face with its uncommon type of beauty. Their
+eyes met as he stood there, stolid and motionless, framed in the
+doorway. Tavernake continued to stare, unmindful, perhaps unconscious,
+of the rudeness of his action. The woman, after a moment, glanced away
+at the shopwindow. A sudden thought seemed to strike her. She spoke
+through the tube at her side and turned to her companion. Meanwhile, the
+footman, leaning from his place, held out his arm in warning and the
+car was slowly backed to the side of the pavement. The lady felt for a
+moment in a bag of white satin which lay upon the round table in front
+of her, and handed a slip of paper through the open window to the
+servant who had already descended and was standing waiting. He came at
+once towards the shop, passing Tavernake, who remained in the door-way.
+
+"Will you make this up at once, please?" he directed, handing the paper
+across to the chemist.
+
+The chemist took it in his hand and turned away mechanically toward the
+dispensing room. Suddenly he paused, and, looking back, shook his head.
+
+"For whom is this prescription required?" he asked.
+
+"For my mistress," the man answered. "Her name is there."
+
+"Where is she?"
+
+"Outside; she is waiting for it."
+
+"If she really wants this made up to-night," the chemist declared, "she
+must come in and sign the book."
+
+The footman looked across the counter, for a moment, a little blankly.
+
+"Am I to tell her that?" he inquired. "It's only a sleeping draught. Her
+regular chemist makes it up all right."
+
+"That may be," the man behind the counter replied, "but, you see, I am
+not her regular chemist. You had better go and tell her so."
+
+The footman departed upon his errand without a glance at the girl who
+was sitting within a few feet of him.
+
+"I am very sorry, madam," he announced to his mistress, "that the
+chemist declines to make up the prescription unless you sign the book."
+
+"Very well, then, I will come," she declared.
+
+The woman, handed from the automobile by her servant, lifted her white
+satin skirts in both hands and stepped lightly across the pavement.
+Tavernake stood on one side to let her pass. She seemed to him to be,
+indeed, a creature of that other world of which he knew nothing. Her
+slow, graceful movements, the shimmer of her skirt, her silk stockings,
+the flashing of the diamond buckles upon her shoes, the faint perfume
+from her clothes, the soft touch of her ermine as she swept by--all
+these things were indeed strange to him. His eyes followed her with rapt
+interest as she approached the counter.
+
+"You wish me to sign for my prescription?" she asked the chemist. "I
+will do so, with pleasure, if it is necessary, only you must not keep me
+waiting long."
+
+Her voice was very low and very musical; the slight smile which had
+parted her tired lips, was almost pathetic. Even the chemist felt
+himself to be a human being. He turned at once to his shelves and began
+to prepare the drug.
+
+"I am sorry, madam, that it should have been necessary to fetch you in,"
+he said, apologetically. "My assistant will give you the book if you
+will kindly sign it."
+
+The assistant dived beneath the counter, reappearing almost immediately
+with a black volume and a pen and ink. The chemist was engrossed upon
+his task; Tavernake's eyes were still riveted upon this woman, who
+seemed to him the most beautiful thing he had ever seen in life. No one
+was watching the girl. The chemist was the first to see her face, and
+that only in a looking glass. He stopped in the act of mixing his drug
+and turned slowly round. His expression was such that they all followed
+his eyes. The girl was sitting up in her chair, with a sudden spot of
+color burning in her cheeks, her fingers gripping the counter as though
+for support, her eyes dilated, unnatural, burning in their white setting
+with an unholy fire. The lady was the last to turn her head, and the
+bottle of eau-de-cologne which she had taken up from the counter,
+slipped with a crash to the floor. All expression seemed to pass from
+her face; the very life seemed drawn from it. Those who were watching
+her saw suddenly an old woman looking at something of which she was
+afraid.
+
+The girl seemed to find an unnatural strength. She dragged herself up
+and turned wildly to Tavernake.
+
+"Take me away," she cried, in a low voice. "Take me away at once."
+
+The woman at the counter did not speak. Tavernake stepped quickly
+forward and then hesitated. The girl was on her feet now and she
+clutched at his arms. Her eyes besought him.
+
+"You must take me away, please," she begged, hoarsely. "I am well
+now--quite well. I can walk."
+
+Tavernake's lack of imagination stood him in good stead then. He simply
+did what he was told, did it in perfectly mechanical fashion, without
+asking any questions. With the girl leaning heavily upon his arm, he
+stepped into the street and almost immediately into a passing taxicab
+which he had hailed from the threshold of the shop. As he closed the
+door, he glanced behind him. The woman was standing there, half turned
+towards him, still with that strange, stony look upon her lifeless
+face. The chemist was bending across the counter towards her, wondering,
+perhaps, if another incident were to be drawn into his night's work. The
+eau-de-cologne was running in a little stream across the floor.
+
+"Where to, sir?" the taxicab driver asked Tavernake.
+
+"Where to?" Tavernake repeated.
+
+The girl was clinging to his arm.
+
+"Tell him to drive away from here," she whispered, "to drive anywhere,
+but away from here."
+
+"Drive straight on," Tavernake directed, "along Fleet Street and up
+Holborn. I will give you the address later on."
+
+The man changed his speed and their pace increased. Tavernake sat quite
+still, dumfounded by these amazing happenings. The girl by his side was
+clutching his arm, sobbing a little hysterically, holding him all the
+time as though in terror.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV. BREAKFAST WITH BEATRICE
+
+
+The girl, awakened, perhaps, by the passing of some heavy cart along
+the street below, or by the touch of the sunbeam which lay across
+her pillow, first opened her eyes and then, after a preliminary stare
+around, sat up in bed. The events of the previous night slowly shaped
+themselves in her mind. She remembered everything up to the commencement
+of that drive in the taxicab. Sometime after that she must have fainted.
+And now--what had become of her? Where was she?
+
+She looked around her in ever-increasing surprise. Certainly it was the
+strangest room she had ever been in. The floor was dusty and innocent
+of any carpet; the window was bare and uncurtained. The walls were
+unpapered but covered here and there with strange-looking plans, one of
+them taking up nearly the whole side of the room--a very rough piece
+of work with little dabs of blue paint here and there, and shadings and
+diagrams which were absolutely unintelligible. She herself was lying
+upon a battered iron bedstead, and she was wearing a very coarse
+nightdress. Her own clothes were folded up and lay upon a piece of brown
+paper on the floor by the side of the bed. To all appearance, the room
+was entirely unfurnished, except that in the middle of it was a hideous
+papier mache screen.
+
+After her first bewildered inspection of her surroundings, it was upon
+this screen that her attention was naturally directed. Obviously it
+must be there to conceal something. Very carefully she leaned out of bed
+until she was able to see around the corner of it. Then her heart gave a
+little jump and she was only just able to stifle an exclamation of fear.
+Some one was sitting there--a man--sitting on a battered cane chair,
+bending over a roll of papers which were stretched upon a rude deal
+table. She felt her cheeks grow hot. It must be Tavernake! Where had he
+brought her? What did his presence in the room mean?
+
+The bed creaked heavily as she regained her former position. A voice
+came to her from behind the screen. She knew it at once. It was
+Tavernake's.
+
+"Are you awake?" he asked.
+
+"Yes," she answered,--"yes, I am awake. Is that Mr. Tavernake? Where am
+I, please?"
+
+"First of all, are you better?" he inquired.
+
+"I am better," she assured him, sitting up in bed and pulling the
+clothes to her chin. "I am quite well now. Tell me at once where I am
+and what you are doing over there."
+
+"There is nothing to be terrified about," Tavernake answered. "To all
+effects and purposes, I am in another room. When I move to the door,
+as I shall do directly, I shall drag the screen with me. I can promise
+you--"
+
+"Please explain everything," she begged, "quickly. I am
+most--uncomfortable."
+
+"At half-past twelve this morning," Tavernake said, "I found myself
+alone in a taxicab with you, without any luggage or any idea where to
+go to. To make matters worse, you fainted. I tried two hotels but they
+refused to take you in; they were probably afraid that you were going
+to be ill. Then I thought of this room. I am employed, as you know, by
+a firm of estate agents. I do a great deal of work on my own account,
+however, which I prefer to do in secret, and unknown to any one. For
+that reason, I hired this room a year ago and I come here most evenings
+to work. Sometimes I stay late, so last month I bought a small bedstead
+and had it fixed up here. There is a woman who comes in to clean the
+room. I went to her house last night and persuaded her to come here.
+She undressed you and put you to bed. I am sorry that my presence
+here distresses you, but it is a large building and quite empty at
+night-time. I thought you might wake up and be frightened, so I borrowed
+this screen from the woman and have been sitting here."
+
+"What, all night?" she gasped.
+
+"Certainly," he answered. "The woman could not stop herself and this
+is not a residential building at all. All the lower floors are let for
+offices and warehouses, and there is no one else in the place until
+eight o'clock."
+
+She put her hands to her head and sat quite still for a moment or two.
+It was really hard to take everything in.
+
+"Aren't you very sleepy?" she asked, irrelevantly.
+
+"Not very," he replied. "I dozed for an hour, a little time ago. Since
+then I have been looking through some plans which interest me very
+much."
+
+"Can I get up?" she inquired, timidly.
+
+"If you feel strong enough, please do," he answered, with manifest
+relief. "I shall move towards the door, dragging the screen in front of
+me. You will find a brush and comb and some hairpins on your clothes. I
+could not think of anything else to get for you, but, if you will dress,
+we will walk to London Bridge Station, which is just across the way,
+and while I order some breakfast you can go into the ladies' room and do
+your hair properly. I did my best to get hold of a looking-glass, but it
+was quite impossible."
+
+The girl's sense of humor was suddenly awake. She had hard work not to
+scream. He had evidently thought out all these details in painstaking
+fashion, one by one.
+
+"Thank you," she said. "I will get up immediately, if you will do as you
+say."
+
+He clutched the screen from the inside and dragged it towards the door.
+On the threshold, he spoke to her once more.
+
+"I shall sit upon the stairs just outside," he announced.
+
+"I sha'n't be more than five minutes," she assured him.
+
+She sprang out of bed and dressed quickly. There was nothing beyond
+where the screen had been except a table covered with plans, and a
+particularly hard cane chair which she dragged over for her own use.
+As she dressed, she began to realize how much this matter-of-fact,
+unimpressionable young man had done for her during the last few hours.
+The reflection affected her in a curious manner. She became afflicted
+with a shyness which she had not felt when he was in the room. When at
+last she had finished her toilette and opened the door, she was almost
+tongue-tied. He was sitting on the top step, with his back against the
+landing, and his eyes were closed. He opened them with a little start,
+however, as soon as he heard her approach.
+
+"I am glad you have not been long," he remarked. "I want to be at my
+office at nine o'clock and I must go and have a bath somewhere. These
+stairs are rather steep. Please walk carefully."
+
+She followed him in silence down three flights of stone steps. On each
+landing there were names upon the doors--two firms of hop merchants,
+a solicitor, and a commission agent. The ground floor was some sort of
+warehouse, from which came a strong smell of leather.
+
+Tavernake opened the outside door with a small key and they passed into
+the street.
+
+"London Bridge Station is just across the way," he said. "The
+refreshment room will be open and we can get some breakfast at once."
+
+"What time is it?" she asked.
+
+"About half-past seven."
+
+She walked by his side quite meekly, and although there were many things
+which she was longing to say, she remained absolutely without the power
+of speech. Except that he was looking a little crumpled, there was
+nothing whatever in his appearance to indicate that he had been up all
+night. He looked exactly as he had done on the previous day, he
+seemed even quite unconscious that there was anything unusual in their
+relations. As soon as they arrived at the station, he pointed to the
+ladies' waiting-room.
+
+"If you will go in and arrange your hair there," he said, "I will go and
+order breakfast and have a shave. I will be back here in about twenty
+minutes. You had better take this."
+
+He offered her a shilling and she accepted it without hesitation. As
+soon as he had gone, however, she looked at the coin in her hand in
+blank wonder. She had accepted it from him with perfect naturalness and
+without even saying "Thank you!" With a queer little laugh, she pushed
+open the swinging doors and made her way into the waiting-room.
+
+In hardly more than a quarter of an hour she emerged, to find Tavernake
+waiting for her. He had retied his tie, bought a fresh collar, had been
+shaved. She, too, had improved her appearance.
+
+"Breakfast is waiting this way," he announced.
+
+She followed him obediently and they sat down at a small table in the
+station refreshment-room.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she asked, suddenly, "I must ask you something. Has
+anything like this ever happened to you before?"
+
+"Nothing," he assured her, with some emphasis.
+
+"You seem to take everything so much as a matter of course," she
+protested.
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know," she replied, a little feebly. "Only--"
+
+She found relief in a sudden and perfectly natural laugh.
+
+"Come," he said, "that is better. I am glad that you feel like
+laughing."
+
+"As a matter of fact," she declared, "I feel much more like crying.
+Don't you know that you were very foolish last night? You ought to have
+left me alone. Why didn't you? You would have saved yourself a great
+deal of trouble."
+
+He nodded, as though that point of view did, in some degree, commend
+itself to him.
+
+"Yes," he admitted, "I suppose I should. I do not, even now, understand
+why I interfered. I can only remember that it didn't seem possible not
+to at the time. I suppose one must have impulses," he added, with a
+little frown.
+
+"The reflection," she remarked, helping herself to another roll, "seems
+to annoy you."
+
+"It does," he confessed. "I do not like to feel impelled to do anything
+the reason for which is not apparent. I like to do just the things which
+seem likely to work out best for myself."
+
+"How you must hate me!" she murmured.
+
+"No, I do not hate you," he replied, "but, on the other hand, you have
+certainly been a trouble to me. First of all, I told a falsehood at the
+boarding-house, and I prefer always to tell the truth when I can. Then
+I followed you out of the house, which I disliked doing very much, and
+I seem to have spent a considerable portion of the time since, in your
+company, under somewhat extraordinary circumstances. I do not understand
+why I have done this."
+
+"I suppose it is because you are a very good-hearted person," she
+remarked.
+
+"But I am not," he assured her, calmly. "I am nothing of the sort. I
+have very little sympathy with good-hearted people. I think the world
+goes very much better when every one looks after himself, and the people
+who are not competent to do so go to the wall."
+
+"It sounds a trifle selfish," she murmured.
+
+"Perhaps it is. I have an idea that if I could phrase it differently it
+would become philosophy."
+
+"Perhaps," she suggested, smiling across the table at him, "you have
+really done all this because you like me."
+
+"I am quite sure that it is not that," he declared. "I feel an interest
+in you for which I cannot account, but it does not seem to me to be
+a personal one. Last night," he continued, "when I was sitting there
+waiting, I tried to puzzle it all out. I came to the conclusion that it
+was because you represent something which I do not understand. I am very
+curious and it always interests me to learn. I believe that must be the
+secret of my interest in you."
+
+"You are very complimentary," she told him, mockingly. "I wonder what
+there is in the world which I could teach so superior a person as Mr.
+Tavernake?"
+
+He took her question quite seriously.
+
+"I wonder what there is myself," he answered. "And yet, in a way, I
+think I know."
+
+"Your imagination should come to the rescue," she remarked.
+
+"I have no imagination," he declared, gloomily.
+
+They were silent for several minutes; she was still studying him.
+
+"I wonder you don't ask me any questions about myself," she said,
+abruptly.
+
+"There is only one thing," he answered, "concerning which I am in the
+least curious. Last night in the chemist's shop--"
+
+"Don't!" she begged him, with suddenly whitening face. "Don't speak of
+that!"
+
+"Very well," he replied, indifferently. "I thought that you were rather
+inviting my questions. You need not be afraid of any more. I really am
+not curious about personal matters; I find that my own life absorbs all
+my interests."
+
+They had finished breakfast and he paid the bill. She began to put on
+her gloves.
+
+"Whatever happens to me," she said, "I shall never forget that you have
+been very kind."
+
+She hesitated for a moment and then she seemed to realize more
+completely how really kind he had been. There had been a certain crude
+delicacy about his actions which she had under-appreciated. She leaned
+towards him. There was nothing left this morning of that disfiguring
+sullenness. Her mouth was soft; her eyes were bright, almost appealing.
+If Tavernake had been a judge of woman's looks, he must certainly have
+found her attractive.
+
+"I am very, very grateful to you," she continued, holding out her hand.
+"I shall always remember how kind you were. Good-bye!"
+
+"You are not going?" he asked.
+
+She laughed.
+
+"Why, you didn't imagine that you had taken the care of me upon your
+shoulders for the rest of your life?" she demanded.
+
+"No, I didn't imagine that," he answered. "At the same time, what plans
+have you made? Where are you going?"
+
+"Oh! I shall think of something," she declared, indifferently.
+
+He caught the gleam in her eyes, the sudden hopelessness which fell like
+a cloud upon her face. He spoke promptly and with decision.
+
+"As a matter of fact," he remarked, "you do not know yourself. You are
+just going to drift out of this place and very likely find your way to a
+seat on the Embankment again."
+
+Her lips quivered. She had tried to be brave but it was hard.
+
+"Not necessarily," she replied. "Something may turn up."
+
+He leaned a little across the table towards her.
+
+"Listen," he said, deliberately, "I will make a proposition to you.
+It has come to me during the last few minutes. I am tired of the
+boarding-house and I wish to leave it. The work which I do at night
+is becoming more and more important. I should like to take two rooms
+somewhere. If I take a third, would you care to call yourself what I
+called you to the charwoman last night--my sister? I should expect you
+to look after the meals and my clothes, and help me in certain other
+ways. I cannot give you much of a salary," he continued, "but you would
+have an opportunity during the daytime of looking out for some work, if
+that is what you want, and you would at least have a roof and plenty to
+eat and drink."
+
+She looked at him in blank amazement. It was obvious that his
+proposition was entirely honest.
+
+"But, Mr. Tavernake," she protested, "you forget that I am not really
+your sister."
+
+"Does that matter?" he asked, without flinching. "I think you understand
+the sort of person I am. You would have nothing to fear from any
+admiration on my part--or anything of that sort," he added, with some
+show of clumsiness. "Those things do not come in my life. I am ambitious
+to get on, to succeed and become wealthy. Other things I do not even
+think about."
+
+She was speechless. After a short pause, he went on.
+
+"I am proposing this arrangement as much for my own sake as for yours.
+I am very well read and I know most of what there is to be known in my
+profession. But there are other things concerning which I am ignorant.
+Some of these things I believe you could teach me."
+
+Still speechless, she sat and looked at him for several moments.
+Outside, the station now was filled with a hurrying throng on their way
+to the day's work. Engines were shrieking, bells ringing, the press of
+footsteps was unceasing. In the dark, ill-ventilated room itself there
+was the rattle of crockery, the yawning of discontented-looking young
+women behind the bar, young women with their hair still in curl-papers,
+as yet unprepared for their weak little assaults upon the good-nature or
+susceptibility of their customers. A queer corner of life it seemed. She
+looked at her companion and realized how fragmentary was her knowledge
+of him. There was nothing to be gathered from his face. He seemed
+to have no expression. He was simply waiting for her reply, with his
+thoughts already half engrossed upon the business of the day.
+
+"Really," she began, "I--"
+
+He came back from his momentary wandering and looked at her. She
+suddenly altered the manner of her speech. It was a strange proposition,
+perhaps, but this was one of the strangest of men.
+
+"I am quite willing to try it," she decided. "Will you tell me where I
+can meet you later on?"
+
+"I have an hour and a half for luncheon at one o'clock," he said. "Meet
+me exactly at the southeast corner of Trafalgar Square. Would you like a
+little money?" he added, rising.
+
+"I have plenty, thank you," she answered.
+
+He laid half-a-crown upon the table and made an entry in a small
+memorandum book which he drew from his pocket.
+
+"You had better keep this," he said, "in case you want it. I am going to
+leave you alone here. You can find your way anywhere, I am sure, and
+I am in a hurry. At one o'clock, remember. I hope you will still be
+feeling better."
+
+He put on his hat and went away without a backward glance. Beatrice sat
+in her chair and watched him out of sight.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V. INTRODUCING Mrs. WENHAM GARDNER
+
+
+A very distinguished client was engaging the attention of Mr. Dowling,
+Senior, of Messrs. Dowling, Spence & Company, auctioneers and estate
+agents, whose offices were situated in Waterloo Place, Pall Mall. Mr.
+Dowling was a fussy little man of between fifty and sixty years, who
+spent most of his time playing golf, and who, although he studiously
+contrived to ignore the fact, had long since lost touch with the details
+of his business. Consequently, in the absence of Mr. Dowling, Junior,
+who had developed a marked partiality for a certain bar in the locality,
+Tavernake was hastily summoned to the rescue from another part of the
+building, by a small boy violently out of breath.
+
+"Never see the governor in such a fuss," the latter declared,
+confidentially, "She's asking no end of questions and he don't know a
+thing."
+
+"Who is the lady?" Tavernake asked, on the way downstairs.
+
+"Didn't hear her name," the boy replied. "She's all right, though, I can
+tell you--a regular slap-up beauty. Such a motor-car, too! Flowers and
+tables and all sorts of things inside. By Jove, won't the governor tear
+his hair if she goes before you get there!"
+
+Tavernake quickened his steps and in a few moments knocked at the door
+of the private office and entered.
+
+His chief welcomed him with a gesture of relief. The distinguished
+client of the firm, whose attention he was endeavoring to engage, had
+glanced toward the newcomer, at his first appearance, with an air of
+somewhat bored unconcern. Her eyes, however, did not immediately leave
+his face. On the contrary, from the moment of his entrance she watched
+him steadfastly. Tavernake, stolid, unruffled, at that time without
+comprehension, approached the desk.
+
+"This is--er--Mr. Tavernake, our manager," Mr. Dowling announced,
+obsequiously. "In the absence of my son, he is in charge of the letting
+department. I have no doubt that he will be able to suggest something
+suitable. Tavernake," he continued, "this lady,"--he glanced at a card
+in front of him--"Mrs. Wenham Gardner of New York, is looking for a town
+house, and has been kind enough to favor us with an inquiry."
+
+Tavernake made no immediate reply. Mr. Dowling was shortsighted, and in
+any case it would never have occurred to him to associate nervousness,
+or any form of emotion, with his responsible manager. The beautiful
+lady leaned back in her chair. Her lips were parted in a slight but
+very curious smile, her fingers supported her cheek, her eyelids were
+contracted as she looked into his face. Tavernake felt that their
+recognition was mutual. Once more he was back again in the tragic
+atmosphere of that chemist's shop, with Beatrice, half fainting, in his
+arms, the beautiful lady turned to stone. It was an odd tableau, that,
+so vividly imprinted upon his memory that it was there before him at
+this very moment. There was mystery in this woman's eyes, mystery and
+something else.
+
+"I don't seem to have come across anything down here
+which--er--particularly attracts Mrs.--Mrs. Wenham Gardner," Mr. Dowling
+went on, taking up a little sheaf of papers from the desk. "I thought,
+perhaps, that the Bryanston Square house might have suited, but it
+seems that it is too small, far too small. Mrs. Gardner is used to
+entertaining, and has explained to me that she has a great many friends
+always coming and going from the other side of the water. She requires,
+apparently, twelve bedrooms, besides servants' quarters."
+
+"Your list is scarcely up to date, sir," Tavernake reminded him. "If the
+rent is of no particular object, there is Grantham House."
+
+Mr. Dowling's face was suddenly illuminated.
+
+"Grantham House!" he exclaimed. "Precisely! Now I declare that it
+had absolutely slipped my memory for the moment--only for the moment,
+mind--that we have just had placed upon our books one of the most
+desirable mansions in the west end of London. A most valued client,
+too, one whom we are most anxious to oblige. Dear, dear me! It is
+very fortunate--very fortunate indeed that I happened to think of it,
+especially as it seems that no one had had the sense to place it upon
+my list. Tavernake, get the plans at once and show them to--er--to Mrs.
+Gardner."
+
+Tavernake crossed the room in silence, opened a drawer, and returned
+with a stiff roll of papers, which he spread carefully out in front of
+this unexpected client. She spoke then for the first time since he had
+entered the room. Her voice was low and marvelously sweet. There was
+very little of the American accent about it, but something in the
+intonation, especially toward the end of her sentences, was just a
+trifle un-English.
+
+"Where is this Grantham House?" she inquired.
+
+"Within a stone's throw of Grosvenor Square," Tavernake answered,
+briskly. "It is really one of the most central spots in the west end. If
+you will allow me!"
+
+For the next few minutes he was very fluent indeed. With pencil in hand,
+he explained the plans, dwelt on the advantages of the location, and
+from the very reserve of his praise created an impression that the house
+he was describing was the one absolutely perfect domicile in the whole
+of London.
+
+"Can I look over the place?" she asked, when he had finished.
+
+"By all means," Mr. Dowling declared, "by all means. I was on the point
+of suggesting it. It will be by far the most satisfactory proceeding.
+You will not be disappointed, my dear madam, I can assure you."
+
+"I should like to do so, if I may, without delay," she said.
+
+"There is no opportunity like the present," Mr. Dowling replied. "If
+you will permit me," he added, rising, "it will give me the greatest
+pleasure to escort you personally. My engagements for the rest of the
+day happen to be unimportant. Tavernake, let me have the keys of
+the rooms that are locked up. The caretaker, of course, is there in
+possession."
+
+The beautiful visitor rose to her feet, and even that slight movement
+was accomplished with a grace unlike anything which Tavernake had ever
+seen before.
+
+"I could not think of troubling you so far, Mr. Dowling," she protested.
+"It is not in the least necessary for you to come yourself. Your manager
+can, perhaps, spare me a few minutes. He seems to be so thoroughly
+posted in all the details," she added, apologetically, as she noticed
+the cloud on Mr. Dowling's brow.
+
+"Just as you like, of course," he declared. "Mr. Tavernake can go, by
+all means. Now I come to think of it, it certainly would be inconvenient
+for me to be away from the office for more than a few minutes. Mr.
+Tavernake has all the details at his fingers' ends, and I only hope,
+Mrs. Gardner, that he will be able to persuade you to take the house.
+Our client," he added, with a bow, "would, I am sure, be delighted to
+hear that we had secured for him so distinguished a tenant."
+
+She smiled at him, a delightful mixture of graciousness and
+condescension.
+
+"You are very good," she answered. "The house sounds rather large for me
+but it depends so much upon circumstances. If you are ready, Mr.--"
+
+"Tavernake," he told her.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she continued, "my car is waiting outside and we might
+go on at once."
+
+He bowed and held open the door for her, an office which he performed
+a little awkwardly. Mr. Dowling himself escorted her out on to the
+pavement. Tavernake stopped behind to get his hat, and passing out
+a moment afterwards, would have seated himself in front beside the
+chauffeur but that she held the door of the car open and beckoned to
+him.
+
+"Will you come inside, please?" she insisted. "There are one or two
+questions which I might ask you as we go along. Please direct the
+chauffeur."
+
+He obeyed without a word; the car glided off. As they swung round the
+first corner, she leaned forward from among the cushions of her seat and
+looked at him. Then Tavernake was conscious of new things. As though by
+inspiration, he knew that her visit to the office of Messrs. Dowling,
+Spence & Company had been no chance one.
+
+She remembered him, remembered him as the companion of Beatrice during
+that strange, brief meeting. It was an incomprehensible world, this,
+into which he had wandered. The woman's face had lost her languid,
+gracious expression. There was something there almost akin to tragedy.
+Her fingers fell upon his arm and her touch was no light one. She was
+gripping him almost fiercely.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she said, "I have a memory for faces which seldom fails
+me. I have seen you before quite lately. You remember where, of course.
+Tell me the truth quickly, please."
+
+The words seemed to leap from her lips. Beautiful and young though she
+undoubtedly was, her intense seriousness had suddenly aged her face.
+Tavernake was bewildered. He, too, was conscious of a curious emotional
+disturbance.
+
+"The truth? What truth do you mean?" he demanded.
+
+"It was you whom I saw with Beatrice!"
+
+"You saw me one night about three weeks ago," he admitted slowly. "I
+was in a chemist's shop in the Strand. You were signing his book for a
+sleeping draught, I think."
+
+She shivered all over.
+
+"Yes, yes!" she cried. "Of course, I remember all about it. The young
+lady who was with you--what was she doing there? Where is she now?"
+
+"The young lady was my sister," Tavernake answered stiffly.
+
+Mrs. Wenham Gardner looked, for a moment, as though she would have
+struck him.
+
+"You need not lie to me!" she exclaimed. "It is not worth while. Tell
+me where you met her, why you were with her at all in that intimate
+fashion, and where she is now!"
+
+Tavernake realized at once that so far as this woman was concerned, the
+fable of his relationship with Beatrice was hopeless. She knew!
+
+"Madam," he replied, "I made the acquaintance of the young lady with
+whom I was that evening, at the boarding-house where we both lived."
+
+"What were you doing in the chemist's shop?" she demanded.
+
+"The young lady had been ill," he proceeded deliberately, wondering
+how much to tell. "She had been taken very ill indeed. She was just
+recovering when you entered."
+
+"Where is she now?" the woman asked eagerly. "Is she still at that
+boarding-house of which you spoke?"
+
+"No," he answered.
+
+Her fingers gripped his arm once more.
+
+"Why do you answer me always in monosyllables? Don't you understand that
+you must tell me everything that you know about her. You must tell me
+where I can find her, at once."
+
+Tavernake remained silent. The woman's voice had still that note of
+wonderful sweetness, but she had altogether lost her air of complete and
+aristocratic indifference. She was a very altered person now from the
+distinguished client who had first enlisted his services. For some
+reason or other, he knew that she was suffering from a terrible anxiety.
+
+"I am not sure," he said at last, "whether I can do as you ask."
+
+"What do you mean?" she exclaimed sharply.
+
+"The young lady," he continued, "seemed, on the occasion to which you
+have referred, to be particularly anxious to avoid recognition. She
+hurried out of the place without speaking to you, and she has avoided
+the subject ever since. I do not know what her motives may have been,
+but I think that I should like to ask her first before I tell you where
+she is to be found."
+
+Mrs. Wenham Gardner leaned towards him. It was certainly the first time
+that a woman in her apparent rank of life had looked upon Tavernake in
+such a manner. Her forehead was a little wrinkled, her lips were parted,
+her eyes were pathetically, delightfully eloquent.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake, you must not--you must not refuse me," she pleaded. "If
+you only knew the importance of it, you would not hesitate for a moment.
+This is no idle curiosity on my part. I have reasons, very serious
+reasons indeed, for wishing to discover that poor girl's whereabouts at
+once. There is a possible danger of which she must be warned. No one can
+do it except myself."
+
+"Are you her friend or her enemy?" Tavernake asked.
+
+"Why do you ask such a question?" she demanded.
+
+"I am only going by her expression when she saw you come into the
+chemist's shop," Tavernake persisted doggedly.
+
+"It is a cruel suggestion, that," the woman cried. "I wish to be her
+friend, I am her friend. If I could only tell you everything, you would
+understand at once what a terrible situation, what a hideous quandary I
+am in."
+
+Once more Tavernake paused for a few moments. He was never a quick
+thinker and the situation was certainly an embarrassing one for him.
+
+"Madam," he replied at length, "I beg that you will tell me nothing. The
+young lady of whom you have spoken permits me to call myself her friend,
+and what she has not told me herself I do not wish to learn from others.
+I will tell her of this meeting with you, and if it is her desire, I
+will bring you her address myself within a few hours. I cannot do more
+than that."
+
+Her face was suddenly cold and hard.
+
+"You mean that you will not!" she exclaimed angrily. "You are obstinate.
+I do not know how you dare to refuse what I ask."
+
+The car had come to a standstill. He stepped out on to the pavement.
+
+"This is Grantham House, madam," he announced. "Will you descend?"
+
+He heard her draw a quick breath between her teeth and he caught a
+gleam in her eyes which made him feel vaguely uneasy. She was very angry
+indeed.
+
+"I do not think that it is necessary for me to do so," she said
+frigidly. "I do not like the look of the house at all. I do not believe
+that it will suit me."
+
+"At least, now that you are here," he protested, "you will, if
+you please, go over it. I should like you to see the ballroom. The
+decorations are supposed to be quite exceptional."
+
+She hesitated for a moment and then, with a slight shrug of the
+shoulders, she yielded. There was a note in his tone not exactly
+insistent, and yet dominant, a note which she obeyed although secretly
+she wondered at herself for doing so. They passed inside the house and
+she followed him from room to room, leaving him to do all the talking.
+She seemed very little interested but every now and then she asked a
+languid question.
+
+"I do not think that it is in the least likely to suit me," she decided
+at last. "It is all very magnificent, of course, but I consider that the
+rent is exorbitant."
+
+Tavernake regarded her thoughtfully.
+
+"I believe," he said, "that our client might be disposed to consider
+some reduction, in the event of your seriously entertaining taking the
+house. If you like, I will see him on the subject. I feel sure that the
+amount I have mentioned could be reduced, if the other conditions were
+satisfactory."
+
+"There would be no harm in your doing so," she assented. "How soon can
+you come and let me know?"
+
+"I might be able to ring you up this evening; certainly to-morrow
+morning," he answered.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"I will not speak upon the telephone," she declared. "I only allow it in
+my rooms under protest. You must come and tell me what your client says.
+When can you see him?"
+
+"It is doubtful whether I shall be able to find him this evening," he
+replied. "It would probably be to-morrow morning."
+
+"You might go and try at once," she suggested.
+
+He was a little surprised.
+
+"You are really interested in the matter, then?" he inquired.
+
+"Yes, yes," she told him, "of course I am interested. I want you to come
+and see me directly you have heard. It is important. Supposing you are
+able to find your client to-night, shall you have seen the young lady
+before then?"
+
+"I am afraid not," he answered.
+
+"You must try," she begged, laying her fingers upon his shoulder. "Mr.
+Tavernake, do please try. You can't realize what all this anxiety means
+to me. I am not at all well and I am seriously worried about--about that
+young lady. I tell you that I must have an interview with her. It is not
+for my sake so much as hers. She must be warned."
+
+"Warned?" Tavernake repeated. "I really don't understand."
+
+"Of course you don't!" she exclaimed impatiently. "Why should you
+understand? I don't want to offend you, Mr. Tavernake," she went on
+hurriedly. "I would like to treat you quite frankly. It really isn't
+your place to make difficulties like this. What is this young lady to
+you that you should presume to consider yourself her guardian?"
+
+"She is a boarding-house acquaintance," Tavernake confessed, "nothing
+more."
+
+"Then why did you tell me, only a moment ago, that she was your sister?"
+Mrs. Gardner demanded.
+
+Tavernake threw open the door before which they had been standing.
+
+"This," he said, "is the famous dancing gallery. Lord Clumber is quite
+willing to allow the pictures to remain, and I may tell you that they
+are insured for over sixty thousand pounds. There is no finer dancing
+room than this in all London."
+
+Her eyes swept around it carelessly.
+
+"I have no doubt," she admitted coldly, "that it is very beautiful. I
+prefer to continue our discussion."
+
+"The dining-room," he went on, "is almost as large. Lord Clumber tells
+us that he has frequently entertained eighty guests for dinner. The
+system of ventilation in this room is, as you see, entirely modern."
+
+She took him by the arm and led him to a seat at the further end of the
+apartment.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she said, making an obvious attempt to control her
+temper, "you seem like a very sensible young man, if you will allow me
+to say so, and I want to convince you that it is your duty to answer
+my questions. In the first place--don't be offended, will you?--but I
+cannot possibly see what interest you and that young lady can have
+in one another. You belong, to put it baldly, to altogether different
+social stations, and it is not easy to imagine what you could have in
+common."
+
+She paused, but Tavernake had nothing to say. His gift of silence
+amounted sometimes almost to genius. She leaned so close to him while
+she waited in vain for his reply, that the ermine about her neck brushed
+his cheek. The perfume of her clothes and hair, the pleading of her deep
+violet-blue eyes, all helped to keep him tongue-tied. Nothing of this
+sort had ever happened to him before. He did not in the least understand
+what it could possibly mean.
+
+"I am speaking to you now, Mr. Tavernake," she continued earnestly, "for
+your own good. When you tell the young lady, as you have promised to
+this evening, that you have seen me, and that I am very, very anxious to
+find out where she is, she will very likely go down on her knees and beg
+you to give me no information whatever about her. She will do her best
+to make you promise to keep us apart. And yet that is all because she
+does not understand. Believe me, it is better that you should tell me
+the truth. You cannot know her very well, Mr. Tavernake, but she is
+not very wise, that young lady. She is very obstinate, and she has some
+strange ideas. It is not well for her that she should be left in the
+world alone. You must see that for yourself, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+"She seems a very sensible young lady," he declared slowly. "I should
+have thought that she would have been old enough to know for herself
+what she wanted and what was best for her."
+
+The woman at his side wrung her hands with a little gesture of despair.
+
+"Oh, why can't I make you understand!" she exclaimed, the emotion once
+more quivering in her tone. "How can I--how can I possibly make you
+believe me? Listen. Something has happened of which she does not
+know--something terrible. It is absolutely necessary, in her own
+interests as well as mine, that I see her, and that very shortly."
+
+"I shall tell her exactly what you say," Tavernake answered apparently
+unmoved. "Perhaps it would be as well now if we went on to view the
+sleeping apartments."
+
+"Never mind about the sleeping apartments!" she cried quickly. "You must
+do more than tell her. You can't believe that I want to bring harm upon
+any one. Do I look like it? Have I the appearance of a person of evil
+disposition? You can be that young lady's best friend, Mr. Tavernake, if
+you will. Take me to her now, this minute. Believe me, if you do that,
+you will never regret it as long as you live."
+
+Tavernake studied the pattern of the parquet floor for several moments.
+It was a difficult problem, this. Putting his own extraordinary
+sensations into the background, he was face to face with something which
+he did not comprehend, and he disliked the position intensely. After
+all, delay seemed safest.
+
+"Madam," he protested, "a few hours more or less can make but little
+difference."
+
+"That is for me to judge!" she exclaimed. "You say that because you do
+not understand. A few hours may make all the difference in the world."
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"I will tell you exactly what is in my mind," he said, deliberately.
+"The young lady was terrified when she saw you that night accidentally
+in the chemist's shop. She almost dragged me away, and although she
+was almost fainting when we reached the taxicab, her greatest and chief
+anxiety was that we should get away before you could follow us. I
+cannot forget this. Until I have received her permission, therefore,
+to disclose her whereabouts, we will, if you please, speak of something
+else."
+
+He rose to his feet and glancing around was just in time to see the
+change in the face of his companion. That eloquently pleading smile
+had died away from her lips, her teeth were clenched. She looked like a
+woman struggling hard to control some overwhelming passion. Without the
+smile her lips seemed hard, even cruel. There were evil things shining
+out of her eyes. Tavernake felt chilled, almost afraid.
+
+"We will see the rest of the house," she declared coldly.
+
+They went on from room to room. Tavernake, recovering himself rapidly,
+master of his subject, was fluent and practical. The woman listened,
+with only a terse remark here and there. Once more they stood in the
+hall.
+
+"Is there anything else you would like to see?" he asked.
+
+"Nothing," she replied, "but there is one thing more I have to say."
+
+He waited in stolid silence.
+
+"Only a week ago," she went on, looking him in the face, "I told a man
+who is what you call, I think, an inquiry agent, that I would give
+a hundred pounds if he could discover that young woman for me within
+twenty-four hours."
+
+Tavernake started, and the smile came back to the lips of Mrs. Wenham
+Gardner. After all, perhaps she had found the way!
+
+"A hundred pounds is a great deal of money," he said thoughtfully.
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"Not so very much," she replied. "About a fortnight's rent of this
+house, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+"Is the offer still open?" he asked.
+
+She looked into his eyes, and her face had once more the beautiful
+ingenuousness of a child.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she said, "the offer is still open. Get into the car
+with me and drive back to my rooms at the Milan Court, and I will give
+you a cheque for a hundred pounds at once. It will be very easily earned
+and you may just as well take it, for now I know where you are employed,
+I could have you followed day by day until I discover for myself what
+you are so foolishly concealing. Be reasonable, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+Tavernake stood quite still. His arms were folded, he was looking out of
+the hall window at the smoky vista of roofs and chimneys. From the soles
+of his ready-made boots to his ill-brushed hair, he was a commonplace
+young man. A hundred pounds was to him a vast sum of money. It
+represented a year's strenuous savings, perhaps more. The woman who
+watched him imagined that he was hesitating. Tavernake, however, had no
+such thought in his mind. He stood there instead, wondering what strange
+thing had come to him that the mention of a hundred pounds, delightful
+sum though it was, never tempted him for a single second. What this
+woman had said might be true. She would probably be able to discover the
+address easily enough without his help. Yet no such reflection seemed to
+make the least difference. From the days of his earliest boyhood, from
+the time when he had flung himself into the struggle, money had always
+meant much to him, money not for its own sake but as the key to those
+things which he coveted in life. Yet at that moment something stronger
+seemed to have asserted itself.
+
+"You will come?" she whispered, passing her arm through his. "We will be
+there in less than five minutes, and I will write you the cheque before
+you tell me anything."
+
+He moved towards the door indeed, but he drew a little away from her.
+
+"Madam," he said, "I am sorry to seem so obstinate, but I thought I had
+made you understand some time ago. I do not feel at liberty to tell you
+anything without that young lady's permission."
+
+"You refuse?" she cried, incredulously. "You refuse a hundred pounds?"
+
+He opened the door of the car. He seemed scarcely to have heard her.
+
+"At about eleven o'clock to-morrow morning," he announced, "I shall have
+the pleasure of calling upon you. I trust that you will have decided to
+take the house."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
+
+
+Tavernake sat a few hours later at his evening meal in the tiny
+sitting-room of an apartment house in Chelsea. He wore a black tie, and
+although he had not yet aspired to a dinner coat, the details of his
+person and toilet showed signs of a new attention. Opposite to him was
+Beatrice.
+
+"Tell me," she asked, as soon as the small maid-servant who brought in
+their first dish had disappeared, "what have you been doing all day?
+Have you been letting houses or surveying land or book-keeping, or have
+you been out to Marston Rise?"
+
+It was her customary question, this. She really took an interest in his
+work.
+
+"I have been attending a rich American client," he announced, "a
+compatriot of your own. I went with her to Grantham House in her own
+motor-car. I believe she thinks of taking it."
+
+"American!" Beatrice remarked. "What was her name?"
+
+Tavernake looked up from his plate across the little table, across the
+bowl of simple flowers which was its sole decoration.
+
+"She called herself Mrs. Wenham Garner!"
+
+Away like a flash went the new-found peace in the girl's face. She
+caught at her breath, her fingers gripped the table in front of her.
+Once more she was as he had known her first--pale, with great terrified
+eyes shining out of a haggard face.
+
+"She has been to you," Beatrice gasped, "for a house? You are sure?"
+
+"I am quite sure," Tavernake declared, calmly.
+
+"You recognized her?"
+
+He assented gravely.
+
+"It was the woman who stood in the chemist's shop that night, signing
+her name in a book," he said.
+
+He did not apologize in any way for the shock he had given her. He
+had done it deliberately. From that very first morning, when they had
+breakfasted together at London Bridge, he had felt that he deserved
+her confidence, and in a sense it was a grievance with him that she had
+withheld it.
+
+"Did she recognize you?"
+
+"Yes," he admitted. "I was sent for into the office and found her there
+with the chief. I felt sure that she recognized me from the first, and
+when she agreed to look at Grantham House, she insisted upon it that I
+should accompany her. While we were in the motor-car, she asked me about
+you. She wished for your address."
+
+"Did you give it to her?" the girl cried, breathlessly.
+
+"No; I said that I must consult you first."
+
+She drew a little sigh of relief. Nevertheless, she was looking white
+and shaken.
+
+"Did she say what she wanted me for?"
+
+"She was very mysterious," Tavernake answered. "She spoke of some danger
+of which you knew nothing. Before I came away, she offered me a hundred
+pounds to let her know where you were."
+
+Beatrice laughed softly.
+
+"That is just like Elizabeth," she declared. "You must have made her
+very angry. When she wants anything, she wants it very badly indeed, and
+she will never believe that every person has not his price. Money means
+everything to her. If she had it, she would buy, buy, buy all the time."
+
+"On the face of it," Tavernake remarked, soberly, "her offer seemed
+rather an absurd one. If she is in earnest, if she is really so anxious
+to discover your whereabouts, she will certainly be able to do so
+without my help."
+
+"I am not so sure," Beatrice replied. "London is a great hiding place."
+
+"A private detective," he began,--
+
+Beatrice shook her head.
+
+"I do not think," she said, "that Elizabeth will care to employ a
+private detective. Tell me, have you to see her upon this business
+again?"
+
+"I am going to her flat at the Milan Court to-morrow morning at eleven
+o'clock."
+
+Beatrice leaned back in her chair. Presently she recommenced her dinner.
+She had the air of one to whom a respite has been granted. Tavernake, in
+a way, began to resent this continued silence of hers. He had certainly
+hoped that she would at least have gone so far as to explain her anxiety
+to keep her whereabouts secret.
+
+"You must remember," he went on, after a short pause, "that I am in
+a somewhat peculiar position with regard to you, Beatrice. I know so
+little that I do not even know how to answer in your interests such
+questions as Mrs. Wenham Gardner asked me. I am not complaining, but is
+this state of absolute ignorance necessary?"
+
+A new thought seemed to come to Beatrice. She looked at her companion
+curiously.
+
+"Tell me," she asked, "what did you think of Mrs. Wenham Gardner?"
+
+Tavernake answered deliberately, and after a moment's reflection.
+
+"I thought her," he said, "one of the most beautiful women I have ever
+seen in my life. That is not saying very much, perhaps, but to me it
+meant a good deal. She was exceedingly gracious and her interest in you
+seemed quite real and even affectionate. I do not understand why you
+should wish to hide from such a woman."
+
+"You found her attractive?" Beatrice persisted.
+
+"I found her very attractive indeed," Tavernake admitted, without
+hesitation. "She had an air with her. She was quite different from all
+the women I have ever met at the boarding-house or anywhere else. She
+has a face which reminded me somehow of the Madonnas you took me to see
+in the National Gallery the other day."
+
+Beatrice shivered slightly. For some reason, his remark seemed to have
+distressed her.
+
+"I am very, very sorry," she declared, "that Elizabeth ever came to
+your office. I want you to promise me, Leonard, that you will be careful
+whenever you are with her."
+
+Tavernake laughed.
+
+"Careful!" he repeated. "She isn't likely to be even civil to me
+tomorrow when I tell her that I have seen you and I refuse to give her
+your address. Careful, indeed! What has a poor clerk in a house-agent's
+office to fear from such a personage?"
+
+The servant had reappeared with their second and last course. For a few
+moments they spoke of casual subjects. Afterwards, however, Tavernake
+asked a question.
+
+"By the way," he said, "we are hoping to let Grantham House to Mrs.
+Wenham Gardner. I suppose she must be very wealthy?"
+
+Beatrice looked at him curiously.
+
+"Why do you come to me for information?" she demanded. "I suppose that
+she brought you references?"
+
+"We haven't quite got to that stage yet," he answered. "Somehow or
+other, from her manner of talking and general appearance, I do not think
+that either Mr. Dowling or I doubted her financial position."
+
+"I should never have thought you so credulous a person," remarked
+Beatrice, with a smile.
+
+Tavernake was genuinely disturbed. His business instincts were aroused.
+
+"Do you really mean that this Mrs. Wenham Gardner is not a person of
+substance?" he inquired.
+
+Beatrice shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"She is the wife of a man who had the reputation of being very wealthy,"
+she replied. "She has no money of her own, I am sure."
+
+"She still lives with her husband, I suppose?" Tavernake asked.
+
+Beatrice closed her eyes.
+
+"I know very little about her," she declared. "Last time I heard, he had
+disappeared, gone away, or something of the sort."
+
+"And she has no money," Tavernake persisted, "except what she gets from
+him? No settlement, even, or anything of that sort?"
+
+"Nothing at all," Beatrice answered.
+
+"This is very bad news," Tavernake remarked, thinking gloomily of his
+wasted day. "It will be a great disappointment to Mr. Dowling. Why, her
+motor-car was magnificent, and she talked as though money were no object
+at all. I suppose you are quite sure of what you are saying?"
+
+Beatrice shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"I ought to know," she answered, grimly, "for she is my sister."
+
+Tavernake remained quite motionless for a minute, without speech; it was
+his way of showing surprise. When he was sure that he had grasped the
+import of her words, he spoke again.
+
+"Your sister!" he repeated. "There is a likeness, of course. You are
+dark and she is fair, but there is a likeness. That would account," he
+continued, "for her anxiety to find you."
+
+"It also accounts," Beatrice replied, with a little break of the lips,
+"for my anxiety that she should not find me. Leonard," she added,
+touching his hand for a moment with hers, "I wish that I could tell you
+everything, but there are things behind, things so terrible, that even
+to you, my dear brother, I could not speak of them."
+
+Tavernake rose to his feet and lit a cigarette--a new habit with him,
+while Beatrice busied herself with a small coffee-making machine. He sat
+in an easy-chair and smoked slowly. He was still wearing his ready-made
+clothes, but his collar was of the fashionable shape, his tie well
+chosen and neatly adjusted. He seemed somehow to have developed.
+
+"Beatrice," he asked, "what am I to tell your sister to-morrow?"
+
+She shivered as she set his coffee-cup down by his side.
+
+"Tell her, if you will, that I am well and not in want," she answered.
+"Tell her, too, that I refuse to send my address. Tell her that the one
+aim of my life is to keep the knowledge of my whereabouts a secret from
+her."
+
+Tavernake relapsed into silence. He was thinking. Mysteries had no
+attraction for him--he loathed them. Against this one especially he felt
+a distinct grudge. Nevertheless, some instinct forbade his questioning
+the girl.
+
+"Apart from more personal matters, then," he asked after some time, "you
+would not advise me to enter into any business negotiations with this
+lady?"
+
+"You must not think of it," Beatrice replied, firmly. "So far as money
+is concerned, Elizabeth has no conscience whatever. The things she wants
+in life she will have somehow, but it is all the time at other people's
+expense. Some day she will have to pay for it."
+
+Tavernake sighed.
+
+"It is very unfortunate," he declared. "The commission on the letting of
+Grantham House would have been worth having."
+
+"After all, it is only your firm's loss," she reminded him.
+
+"It does not appeal to me like that," he continued. "So long as I am
+manager for Dowling & Spence, I feel these things personally. However,
+that does not matter. I am afraid it is a disagreeable subject for you,
+and we will not talk about it any longer."
+
+She lit a cigarette with a little gesture of relief. She came once more
+to his side.
+
+"Leonard," she said, "I know that I am treating you badly in telling
+you nothing, but it is simply because I do not want to descend to half
+truths. I should like to tell you all or nothing. At present I cannot
+tell you all."
+
+"Very well," he replied, "I am quite content to leave it with you to do
+as you think best."
+
+"Leonard," she continued, "of course you think me unreasonable. I can't
+help it. There are things between my sister and myself the knowledge of
+which is a constant nightmare to me. During the last few months of my
+life it has grown to be a perfect terror. It sent me into hiding at
+Blenheim House, it reconciled me even to the decision I came to that
+night on the Embankment. I had decided that sooner than go back, sooner
+than ask help from her or any one connected with her, I would do what I
+tried to do the time when you saved my life."
+
+Tavernake looked at her wonderingly. She was, indeed, under the spell
+of some deep emotion. Her memory seemed to have carried her back into
+another world, somewhere far away from this dingy little sitting-room
+which they two were sharing together, back into a world where life
+and death were matters of small moment, where the great passions were
+unchained, and men and women moved among the naked things of life.
+Almost he felt the thrill of it. It was something new to him, the touch
+of a magic finger upon his eyelids. Then the moment passed and he was
+himself again, matter-of-fact, prosaic.
+
+"Let us dismiss the subject finally," he said. "I must see your sister
+on business to-morrow, but it shall be for the last time."
+
+"I think," she murmured, "that you will be wise."
+
+He crossed the room and returned with a newspaper.
+
+"I saw your music in the hall as I came in," he remarked. "Are you
+singing to-night?"
+
+The question was entirely in his ordinary tone. It brought her back to
+the world of every-day things as nothing else could have done.
+
+"Yes; isn't it luck?" she told him. "Three in one week. I only heard an
+hour ago."
+
+"A city dinner?" he inquired.
+
+"Something of the sort," she replied. "I am to be at the Whitehall Rooms
+at ten o'clock. If you are tired, Leonard, please let me go alone. I
+really do not mind. I can get a 'bus to the door, there and back again."
+
+"I am not tired," he declared. "To tell you the truth, I scarcely know
+what it is to be tired. I shall go with you, of course."
+
+She looked at him with a momentary admiration of his powerful frame, his
+strong, forceful face.
+
+"It seems too bad," she remarked, "after a long day's work to drag you
+out again."
+
+He smiled.
+
+"I really like to come," he assured her. "Besides," he added, after a
+moment's pause, "I like to hear you sing."
+
+"I wonder if you mean that?" she asked, looking at him curiously. "I
+have watched you once or twice when I have been singing to you. Do you
+really care for it?"
+
+"Certainly I do. How can you doubt it? I do not," he continued, slowly,
+"understand music, or anything of that sort, of course, any more than
+I do the pictures you take me to see, and some of the books you talk
+about. There are lots of things I can't get the hang of entirely, but
+they all leave a sort of pleasure behind. One feels it even if one only
+half appreciates."
+
+She came over to his chair.
+
+"I am glad," she said, a little wistfully, "that there is one thing I do
+which you like."
+
+He looked at her reprovingly.
+
+"My dear Beatrice," he said, "I often wish I could make you understand
+how extraordinarily helpful and useful to me you have been."
+
+"Tell me in what way?" she begged.
+
+"You have given me," he assured her, "an insight into many things in
+life which I had found most perplexing. You see, you have traveled and
+I haven't. You have mixed with all classes of people, and I have gone
+steadily on in one groove. You have told me many things which I shall
+find very useful indeed later on."
+
+"Dear me," she laughed, "you are making me quite conceited!"
+
+"Anyhow," he replied, "I don't want you to look upon me, Beatrice, in
+any way as a benefactor. I am much more comfortable here than at the
+boarding-house and it is costing no more money, especially since you
+began to get those singing engagements. By the way, hadn't you better go
+and get ready?"
+
+She smothered a sigh as she turned away and went slowly upstairs. To
+all appearance, no person who ever breathed was more ordinary than this
+strong-featured, self-centered young man who had put out his arm and
+snatched her from the Maelstrom. Yet it seemed to her that there
+was something almost unnatural about his unapproachability. She was
+convinced that he was entirely honest, not only with regard to his
+actual relations toward her, but with regard to all his purposes.
+Her sex did not even seem to exist for him. The fact that she was
+good-looking, and with her renewed health daily becoming more so,
+seemed to be of no account to him whatever. He showed interest in her
+appearance sometimes, but it was interest of an entirely impersonal
+sort. He simply expressed himself as satisfied or dissatisfied, as a
+matter of taste. It came to her at that moment that she had never seen
+him really relax. Only when he sat opposite to that great map which hung
+now in the further room, and wandered about from section to section
+with a pencil in one hand and a piece of rubber in another, did he show
+anything which in any way approached enthusiasm, and even then it was
+always the unmistakable enthusiasm born of dead things. Suddenly she
+laughed at herself in the little mirror, laughed softly but heartily.
+This was the guardian whom Fate had sent for her! If Elizabeth had only
+understood!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII. Mr. PRITCHARD OF NEW YORK
+
+
+Later in the evening, Beatrice and Tavernake traveled together in a
+motor omnibus from their rooms at Chelsea to Northumberland Avenue.
+Tavernake was getting quite used to the programme by now. They sat in a
+dimly-lit waiting-room until the time came for Beatrice to sing. Every
+now and then an excitable little person who was the secretary to some
+institution or other would run in and offer them refreshments, and tell
+them in what order they were to appear. To-night there was no departure
+from the ordinary course of things, except that there was slightly more
+stir. The dinner was a larger one than usual. It came to Beatrice's turn
+very soon after their arrival, and Tavernake, squeezing his way a few
+steps into the dining-room, stood with the waiters against the wall.
+He looked with curious eyes upon a scene with which he had no manner of
+sympathy.
+
+A hundred or so of men had dined together in the cause of some charity.
+The odor of their dinner, mingled with the more aromatic perfume of the
+tobacco smoke which was already ascending in little blue clouds from the
+various tables, hung about the over-heated room, seeming, indeed, the
+fitting atmosphere for the long rows of guests. The majority of them
+were in a state of expansiveness. Their faces were redder than when they
+had sat down; a certain stiffness had departed from their shirt-fronts
+and their manners; their faces were flushed, their eyes watery. There
+were a few exceptions--paler-faced men who sat there with the air of
+endeavoring to bring themselves into accord with surroundings in which
+they had no real concern. Two of these looked up with interest at the
+first note of Beatrice's song. The one was sitting within a few places
+of the chairman, and he was too far away for his little start to be
+noticed by either Tavernake or Beatrice. The nearer one, however,
+Tavernake happened to be watching, and he saw the change in his
+expression. The man was, in his way, ugly. His face was certainly not a
+good one, although he did not appear to share the immediate weaknesses
+of his neighbors. To every note of the song he listened intently. When
+it was over, he rose and came toward Tavernake.
+
+"I beg your pardon," he said, "but did I not see you come in with the
+young lady who has just been singing?"
+
+"You may have," Tavernake answered. "I certainly did come with her."
+
+"May I ask if you are related to her?"
+
+Tavernake had got over his hesitation in replying to such questions, by
+now. He answered promptly.
+
+"I am her brother," he declared.
+
+The man produced a card.
+
+"Please introduce me to her," he begged, laconically.
+
+"Why should I?" Tavernake asked. "I have no reason to suppose that she
+desires to know you."
+
+The man stared at him for a moment, and then laughed.
+
+"Well," he said, "you had better show your sister my card. She is, I
+presume, a professional, as she is singing here. My desire to make her
+acquaintance is purely actuated by business motives."
+
+Tavernake moved away toward the waiting-room.
+
+The man, who according to his card was Mr. Sidney Grier, would have
+followed him in, but Tavernake stopped him.
+
+"If you will wait here," he suggested, "I will see whether my sister
+desires to meet you."
+
+Once more Mr. Sidney Grier looked surprised, but after a second glance
+at Tavernake he accepted his suggestion and remained outside. Tavernake
+took the card to Beatrice.
+
+"Beatrice," he announced, "there is a man outside who has heard you sing
+and who wants to be introduced."
+
+She took the card and her eyes opened wide.
+
+"Do you know who he is?" Tavernake asked.
+
+"Of course," she answered. "He is a great producer of musical comedies.
+Let me think."
+
+She stood with the card in her hand. Some one else was singing now--an
+ordinary modern ballad of love and roses, rapture and despair. They
+heard the rising and falling of the woman's voice; the clatter of the
+dinner had ceased. Beatrice stood still thinking, her fingers clinching
+the card of Mr. Sidney Grier.
+
+"You must bring him in," she said to Tavernake finally.
+
+Tavernake went outside.
+
+"My sister will see you," he remarked, with the air of one who brings
+good news.
+
+Mr. Sidney Grier grunted. He was not used to being kept waiting, even
+for a second. Tavernake ushered him into the retiring room, and the
+other two musicians who were there stared at him as at a god.
+
+"This is the gentleman whose card you have, Beatrice," Tavernake
+announced. "Mr. Sidney Grier--Miss Tavernake!"
+
+The man smiled.
+
+"Your brother seems to be suspicious of me," he declared. "I found it
+quite difficult to persuade him that you might find it interesting to
+talk to me for a few minutes."
+
+"He does not quite understand," Beatrice answered. "He has not much
+experience of musical affairs or the stage, and your name would not have
+any significance for him."
+
+Tavernake went outside and listened idly to the song which was
+proceeding. It was a class of music which secretly he preferred to the
+stranger and more haunting notes of Beatrice's melodies. Apparently
+the audience was of his opinion, for they received it with a vociferous
+encore, to which the young lady generously replied with a music-hall
+song about "A French lady from over the water." Towards the close of
+the applause which marked the conclusion of this effort, Tavernake felt
+himself touched lightly upon the arm. He turned round. By his side was
+standing the other dinner guest who had shown some interest in
+Beatrice. He was a man apparently of about forty years of age, tall and
+broad-shouldered, with black moustache, and dark, piercing eyes. Unlike
+most of the guests, he wore a short dinner-coat and black tie, from
+which, and his slight accent, Tavernake concluded that he was probably
+an American.
+
+"Say, you'll forgive my speaking to you," he said, touching Tavernake
+on the arm. "My name is Pritchard. I saw you come in with the young
+lady who was singing a few minutes ago, and if you won't consider it a
+liberty, I'll be very glad indeed if you'll answer me one question."
+
+Tavernake stiffened insensibly.
+
+"It depends upon the question," he replied, shortly.
+
+"Well, it's about the young lady, and that's a fact," Mr. Pritchard
+admitted. "I see that her name upon the programme is given as Miss
+Tavernake. I was seated at the other end of the room but she seemed to
+me remarkably like a young lady from the other side of the Atlantic,
+whom I am very anxious to meet."
+
+"Perhaps you will kindly put your question in plain words," Tavernake
+said.
+
+"Why, that's easy," Mr. Pritchard declared. "Is Miss Tavernake really
+her name, or an assumed one? I expect it's the same over here as in my
+country--a singer very often sings under another name than her own, you
+know," he added, noting Tavernake's gathering frown.
+
+"The young lady in question is my sister, and I do not care to discuss
+her with strangers," Tavernake announced.
+
+Mr. Pritchard nodded pleasantly.
+
+"Why, of course, that ends the matter," he remarked. "Sorry to have
+troubled you, anyway."
+
+He strolled off back to his seat and Tavernake returned thoughtfully to
+the dressing-room. He found Beatrice alone and waiting for him.
+
+"You've got rid of that fellow, then?" he inquired.
+
+Beatrice assented.
+
+"Yes; he didn't stay very long," she replied.
+
+"Who was he?" Tavernake asked, curiously.
+
+"From a musical comedy point of view," she said, "he was the most
+important person in London. He is the emperor of stage-land. He can make
+the fortune of any girl in London who is reasonably good-looking and who
+can sing and dance ever so little."
+
+"What did he want with you?" Tavernake demanded, suspiciously.
+
+"He asked me whether I would like to go upon the stage. What do you
+think about it, Leonard?"
+
+Tavernake, for some reason or other, was displeased.
+
+"Would you earn much more money than by singing at these dinners?" he
+asked.
+
+"Very, very much more," she assured him.
+
+"And you would like the life?"
+
+She laughed softly.
+
+"Why not? It isn't so bad. I was on the stage in New York for some time
+under much worse conditions."
+
+He remained silent for a few minutes. They had made their way into the
+street now and were waiting for an omnibus.
+
+"What did you tell him?" he asked, abruptly.
+
+She was looking down toward the Embankment, her eyes filled once more
+with the things which he could not understand.
+
+"I have told him nothing yet," she murmured.
+
+"You would like to accept?"
+
+She nodded.
+
+"I am not sure," she replied. "If only--I dared!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII. WOMAN'S WILES
+
+
+At eleven o'clock the next morning, Tavernake presented himself at the
+Milan Court and inquired for Mrs. Wenham Gardner. He was sent at once to
+her apartments in charge of a page. She was lying upon a sofa piled up
+with cushions, wrapped in a wonderful blue garment which seemed somehow
+to deepen the color of her eyes. By her side was a small table on which
+was some chocolate, a bowl of roses, and a roll of newspapers. She held
+out her hand toward Tavernake, but did not rise. There was something
+almost spiritual about her pallor, the delicate outline of her figure,
+so imperfectly concealed by the thin silk dressing-gown, the faint,
+tired smile with which she welcomed him.
+
+"You will forgive my receiving you like this, Mr. Tavernake?" she
+begged. "To-day I have a headache. I have been anxious for your coming.
+You must sit by my side, please, and tell me at once whether you have
+seen Beatrice."
+
+Tavernake did exactly as he was bidden. The chair toward which she had
+pointed was quite close to the sofa, but there was no other unoccupied
+in the room. She raised herself a little on the couch and turned towards
+him. Her eyes were fixed anxiously upon his, her forehead slightly
+wrinkled, her voice tremulous with eagerness.
+
+"You have seen her?"
+
+"I have," he admitted, looking steadily into the lining of his hat.
+
+"She has been cruel," Elizabeth declared. "I can tell it from your face.
+You have bad news for me."
+
+"I do not know," Tavernake replied, "whether she has been cruel or not.
+She refuses to allow me to tell you her address. She begged me, indeed,
+to keep away from you altogether."
+
+"Why? Did she tell you why?"
+
+"She says that you are her sister, that you have no money of your own
+and that your husband has left you," Tavernake answered, deliberately.
+
+"Is that all?"
+
+"No, it is not all," he continued. "As to the rest, she told me nothing
+definite. It is quite clear, however, that she is very anxious to keep
+away from you."
+
+"But her reason?" Elizabeth persisted. "Did she give you no reason?"
+
+Tavernake looked her in the face.
+
+"She gave me no reason," he said.
+
+"Do you believe that she is justified in treating me like this?"
+Elizabeth asked, playing nervously with a pendant which hung from her
+smooth, bare neck.
+
+"Of course I do," he replied. "I am quite sure that she would not
+feel as she does unless you had been guilty of something very terrible
+indeed."
+
+The woman on the couch winced as though some one had struck her. A more
+susceptible man than Tavernake must have felt a little remorseful at the
+tears which dimmed for a moment her beautiful eyes. Tavernake, however,
+although he felt a moment's uneasiness, although he felt himself
+assailed all the time by a curious new emotion which he utterly failed
+to understand, was nevertheless still immune. The things which were to
+happen to him had not yet, arrived.
+
+"Of course," he continued, "I was very much disappointed to hear this,
+because I had hoped that we might have been able to let Grantham House
+to you. We cannot consider the matter at all now unless you pay for
+everything in advance."
+
+She uncovered her eyes and looked at him. People so direct of speech as
+this had come very seldom into her life. She was conscious of a thrill
+of interest. The study of men was a passion with her. Here was indeed a
+new type!
+
+"So you think that I am an adventuress," she murmured.
+
+He reflected for a moment.
+
+"I suppose," he admitted, "that it comes to that. I should not have
+returned at all if I had not promised. If there is any message which you
+wish me to give your sister, I will take it, but I cannot tell you her
+address."
+
+She laid her hand suddenly upon his, and raising herself a little on the
+couch, leaned towards him. Her eyes and her lips both pleaded with him.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she said slowly, "Beatrice is such a dear, obstinate
+creature, but she does not quite appreciate my position. Do me a favor,
+please. If you have promised not to give me her address let me at least
+know some way or some place in which I could come across her. I am sure
+she will be glad afterwards, and I--I shall be very grateful."
+
+Tavernake felt that he was enveloped by something which he did not
+understand, but his lack of experience was so great that he did not even
+wonder at his insensibility.
+
+"I shall keep my word to your sister," he announced, "in the spirit as
+well as the letter. It is quite useless to ask me to do otherwise."
+
+Elizabeth was at first amazed, then angry, how angry she scarcely knew
+even herself. She had been a spoilt child, she had grown into a spoilt
+woman. Men, at least, had been ready enough to do her bidding all
+her life. Her beauty was of that peculiar kind, half seductive, half
+pathetic, wholly irresistible. And now there had come this strange,
+almost impossible person, against the armor of whose indifference she
+had spent herself in vain. Her eyes filled with tears once more as she
+looked at him, and Tavernake became uneasy. He glanced at the clock and
+again toward the door.
+
+"I think, if you will excuse me," he began,--
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she interrupted, "you are very unkind to me, very
+unkind indeed."
+
+"I cannot help it," he answered.
+
+"If you knew everything," she continued, "you would not be so obstinate.
+If Beatrice herself were here, if I could whisper something in her ear,
+she would be only too thankful that I had found her out. Beatrice has
+always misunderstood me, Mr. Tavernake. It is a little hard upon me, for
+we are both so far away from home, from our friends."
+
+"You can send her any message you like by me," Tavernake declared.
+"If you like, I will wait while you write a letter. If you really have
+anything to say to her which might change her opinion, you can write it,
+can't you?"
+
+She looked down at her hands--very beautiful and well-kept hands--and
+sighed. This young man, with his unusual imperturbability and hateful
+common sense, was getting on her nerves.
+
+"It is so hard to write things, Mr. Tavernake," she said, "but, of
+course, it is something to know that if the worst happens I can send her
+a letter. I shall think about that for a short time. Meanwhile, there
+is so much about her I would love to have you tell me. She has no money,
+has she? How does she support herself?"
+
+"She sings occasionally at concerts," Tavernake replied after a moment's
+pause. "I suppose there is no harm in telling you that."
+
+Elizabeth leaned towards him. She was very loth indeed to acknowledge
+defeat. Once more her voice was deliciously soft, her forehead
+delicately wrinkled, her blue eyes filled with alluring light.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she murmured, "do you know that you are not in the
+least kind to me? Beatrice and I are sisters, after all. Even she has
+admitted that. She left me most unkindly at a critical time in my
+life; she misunderstood things; if I were to see her, I could explain
+everything. I feel it very much that she is living apart from me in this
+city where we are both strangers. I am anxious about her, Mr. Tavernake.
+Does she want money? If so, will you take her some from me? Can't you
+suggest any way in which I could help her? Do be my friend, please, and
+advise me."
+
+Life was certainly opening out for Tavernake. The atmosphere by which he
+was surrounded, which she was deliberately creating around him, was the
+atmosphere of an unknown world. It was a position, this, entirely novel
+to him. Nevertheless, he did his best to cope with it intelligently. He
+reflected carefully before he made any reply, he refused absolutely to
+listen to the strange voices singing in his ears, and he delivered his
+decision with his usual air of finality.
+
+"I am afraid," he said, "that since Beatrice refuses even to let you
+know her whereabouts, she would not wish to accept anything from you.
+It seems a pity," he went on, the instincts of the money-saver stirring
+within him; "she is certainly none too well off."
+
+The lady on the couch sighed.
+
+"Beatrice has at least a friend," she murmured. "It is a great deal
+to have a friend. It is more than I have. We are both so far from home
+here. Often I am sorry that we ever left America. England is not a
+hospitable country, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+Again this painfully literal young man spoke out what was in his mind.
+
+"There was a gentleman in the motor-car with you the other night," he
+reminded her.
+
+She bit her lip.
+
+"He was just an acquaintance," she answered, "a man whom I used to know
+in New York, passing through London. He called on me and asked me to go
+to the theatre and supper. Why not? I have had a terrible time during
+the last few months, Mr. Tavernake, and I am very lonely--lonelier than
+ever since my sister deserted me."
+
+Tavernake began to feel, ridiculous though it seemed, that in some
+subtle and inexplicable fashion he was in danger. At any rate, he was
+hopelessly bewildered. He did not understand why this very beautiful
+lady should look at him as though they were old friends, why her eyes
+should appeal to him so often for sympathy, why her fingers, which a
+moment ago were resting lightly upon his hand, and which she had drawn
+away with reluctance, should have burned him like pin-pricks of fire.
+The woman who wishes to allure may be as subtle as possible in her
+methods, but a sense of her purpose, however vague it may be, is
+generally communicated to her would be victim. Tavernake was becoming
+distinctly uneasy. He had no vanity. He knew from the first that this
+beautiful creature belonged to a world far removed from any of which he
+had any knowledge. The only solution of the situation which presented
+itself to him was that she might be thinking of borrowing money from
+him!
+
+"There was never a time in my life," she continued softly, "when I felt
+that I needed a friend more. I am afraid that my sister has prejudiced
+you against me, Mr. Tavernake. Beatrice is very young, and the young are
+not always sympathetic, you know. They do not make allowances, they do
+not understand."
+
+"Why did you tell Mr. Dowling things which were not true?" he asked
+bluntly.
+
+She sighed, and looked down at the handkerchief with which she had been
+toying.
+
+"It was a very silly piece of conceit," she admitted, "but, you see, I
+had to tell him something."
+
+"Why did you come to the office at all?" he continued.
+
+"Do you really want to know that?" she whispered softly.
+
+"Well,--"
+
+"I will tell you," she went on suddenly. "It sounds foolish, in a way,
+and yet it wasn't really, because, you see,"--she smiled at him--"I was
+anxious about Beatrice. I saw you come out of the office that morning,
+and I recognized you at once. I knew that it was you who had been with
+Beatrice. I made an excuse about the house to come and see whether I
+could find you out."
+
+Tavernake, in whom the vanity was not yet born, missed wholly the
+significance of her smile, her trifling hesitation.
+
+"All that," he declared, "is no reason why you should have told Mr.
+Dowling that your husband was a millionaire and had given you carte
+blanche about taking a house."
+
+"Did I mention--my husband?"
+
+"Distinctly," he assured her.
+
+For the first time she had faltered in her speech. Tavernake felt that
+she herself was shaken by some emotion. Her eyes for a moment were
+strangely-lit; something had come into her face which he did not
+understand. Then it passed. The delightful smile, half deprecating,
+half appealing, once more parted her lips; the gleam of horror no longer
+shone in her blue eyes.
+
+"I am always so foolish about money," she declared, "so ignorant that
+I never know how I stand, but really I think that I have plenty, and a
+hundred or two more or less for rent didn't seem to matter much."
+
+It was a point of view, this, which Tavernake utterly failed to
+comprehend. He looked at her in surprise.
+
+"I suppose," he protested, "you know how much a year you have to live
+on?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"It seems to vary all the time," she sighed. "There are so many
+complications."
+
+He looked at her in amazement.
+
+"After all," he admitted, "you don't look as though you had much of a
+head for figures."
+
+"If only I had some one to help me!" she murmured.
+
+Tavernake moved uneasily in his chair. His sense of danger was growing.
+
+"If you will excuse me now," he said, "I think that I must be getting
+back. I am an employee at Dowling, Spence & Company's, you know, and my
+time is not quite my own. I only came because I promised to."
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she begged, looking at him full out of those wonderful
+blue eyes, "please do me a great favor."
+
+"What is it?" he asked with clumsy ungraciousness.
+
+"Come and see me, every now and then, and let me know how my sister is.
+Perhaps you may be able to suggest some way in which I can help her."
+
+Tavernake considered the question for a moment. He was angry with
+himself for the unaccountable sense of pleasure which her suggestion had
+given him.
+
+"I am not quite sure," he said, "whether I had better come. Beatrice
+seemed quite anxious that I should not talk about her to you at all. She
+did not like my coming to-day."
+
+"You seem to know a great deal about my sister," Elizabeth declared
+reflectively. "You call her by her Christian name and you appear to see
+her frequently. Perhaps, even, you are fond of her."
+
+Tavernake met his questioner's inquiring gaze blankly. He was almost
+indignant.
+
+"Fond of her!" he exclaimed. "I have never been fond of any one in my
+life, or anything--except my work," he added.
+
+She looked at him a little bewildered at first.
+
+"Oh, you strange person!" she cried, her lips breaking into a delightful
+smile. "Don't you know that you haven't begun to live at all yet? You
+don't even know anything about life, and at the back of it all you have
+capacity. Yes," she went on, "I think that you have the capacity for
+living."
+
+Her hand fell upon his with a little gesture which was half a caress. He
+looked around him as though seeking for escape. He was on his feet now
+and he clutched at his hat.
+
+"I must go," he insisted almost roughly.
+
+"Am I keeping you?" she asked innocently. "Well, you shall go as soon as
+you please, only you must promise me one thing. You must come back, say
+within a week, and let me know how my sister is. I am not half so brutal
+as you think. I really am anxious about her. Please!"
+
+"I will promise that," he answered.
+
+"Wait one moment, then," she begged, turning to the letters by her side.
+"There is just something I want to ask you. Don't be impatient--it is
+entirely a matter of business."
+
+All the time he was acutely conscious of that restless desire to get out
+of the room. The woman's white arms, from which the sleeves of her blue
+gown had fallen back, were stretched towards him as she lazily turned
+over her pile of correspondence. They were very beautiful arms and
+Tavernake, although he had had no experience, was dimly aware of the
+fact. Her eyes, too, seemed always to be trying to reach some part of
+him which was dead, or as yet unborn. He could feel her striving to get
+there, beating against the walls of his indifference. Why should a woman
+wear blue stockings because she had a blue gown, he wondered idly. She
+was not like Beatrice, this alluring, beautiful woman, who lay there
+talking to him in a manner whose meaning came to him only in strange,
+bewildering flashes. He could be with Beatrice and feel the truth of
+what he had once told her--that her sex was a thing which need not even
+be taken into account between them. With this woman it was different; he
+felt that she wished it to be different.
+
+"Perhaps you had better tell me about that matter of business next time
+I am here," he suggested, with an abruptness which was almost brusque.
+"I must go now. I do not know why I have stayed so long."
+
+She held out her fingers.
+
+"You are a very sudden person," she declared, smiling at his
+discomfiture. "If you must go!"
+
+He scarcely touched her hand, anxious only to get away. And then the
+door opened and a man of somewhat remarkable appearance entered the room
+with the air of a privileged person. He was oddly dressed, with little
+regard to the fashion of the moment. His black coat was cut after
+the mode of a past generation, his collar was of the type affected by
+Gladstone and his fellow-statesmen, his black bow was arranged with
+studied negligence and he showed more frilled white shirt-front than
+is usual in the daytime. His silk hat was glossy but broad-brimmed; his
+masses of gray hair, brushed back from a high, broad forehead, gave
+him almost a patriarchal aspect. His features were large and fairly
+well-shaped, but his mouth was weak and his cheeks lacked the color of
+a healthy life. Tavernake stared at him open-mouthed. He, for his part,
+looked at Tavernake as he might have looked at some strange wild animal.
+
+"A thousand apologies, dear Elizabeth!" he exclaimed. "I knocked, but I
+imagine that you did not hear me. Knowing your habits, it did not occur
+to me that you might be engaged at this hour of the morning."
+
+"It is a young man from the house agent's," she announced indifferently,
+"come to see me about a flat."
+
+"In that case," he suggested amiably, "I am, perhaps, not in the way."
+
+Elizabeth turned her head slightly and looked at him; he backed
+precipitately toward the door.
+
+"In a few minutes," he said. "I will return in a few minutes."
+
+Tavernake attempted to follow his example.
+
+"There is no occasion for your friend to leave," he protested. "If you
+have any instructions for us, a note to the office will always bring
+some one here to see you."
+
+She sat up on the couch and smiled at him. His obvious embarrassment
+amused her. It was a new sort of game, this, altogether.
+
+"Come, Mr. Tavernake," she said, "three minutes more won't matter, will
+it? I will not keep you longer than that, I promise."
+
+He came reluctantly a few steps back.
+
+"I am sorry," he explained, "but we really are busy this morning."
+
+"This is business," she declared, still smiling at him pleasantly. "My
+sister has filled you with suspicions about me. Some of them may be
+justifiable, some are not. I am not so rich as I should like some people
+to believe. It is so much easier to live well, you know, when people
+believe that you are rolling in money. Still, I am by no means a pauper.
+I cannot afford to take Grantham House, but neither can I afford to go
+on living here. I have decided to make a change, to try and economize,
+to try and live within my means. Now will you bring me a list of small
+houses or flats, something at not more than say two or three hundred
+a year? It shall be strictly a business proceeding. I will pay you for
+your time, if that is necessary, and your commission in advance. There,
+you can't refuse my offer on those terms, can you?"
+
+Tavernake remained silent. He was conscious that his lack of response
+seemed both sullen and awkward, but he was for the moment tongue-tied.
+His habit of inopportune self-analysis had once more asserted itself. He
+could not understand the curious nature of his mistrust of this woman,
+nor could he understand the pleasure which her suggestion gave him. He
+wanted to refuse, and yet he was glad to be able to tell himself that
+he was, after all, but an employee of his firm and not in a position to
+decline business on their behalf.
+
+She leaned a little towards him; her tone was almost beseeching.
+
+"You are not going to be unkind? You will not refuse me?" she pleaded.
+
+"I will bring you a list," he answered heavily, "on the terms you
+suggest."
+
+"To-morrow morning?" she begged.
+
+"As soon as I am able," he promised.
+
+Then he escaped. Outside in the corridor, the man who had interrupted
+his interview was walking backwards and forwards. Tavernake passed him
+without responding to his bland greeting. He forgot all about the lift
+and descended five flights of stairs....
+
+A few minutes later, he presented himself at the office and reported
+that Mrs. Wenham Gardner had decided unfavorably about Grantham House,
+and that she was not disposed, indeed, to take premises of anything like
+such a rental. Mr. Dowling was disappointed, and inclined to think that
+his employee had mismanaged the affair.
+
+"I wish that I had gone myself," he declared. "She obviously wished me
+to, but it happened to be inconvenient. By-the-bye, Tavernake, close the
+door, will you? There is another matter concerning which I should like
+to speak to you."
+
+Tavernake did as he was bidden at once, without any disquietude. His
+own services to the firm were of such a nature that he had no misgiving
+whatever as to his employer's desire for a private interview.
+
+"It is about the Marston Rise estate," Mr. Dowling explained, arranging
+his pince nez. "I believe that the time is coming when some sort of
+overtures should be made. You know what has been in my mind for a very
+considerable time."
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+"Yes," he admitted, "I know quite well."
+
+"I did hear a rumor," Mr. Dowling continued, "that some one had bought
+one small plot on the outskirts of the estate. I dare say it is not
+true, and in any case it is not worth while troubling about, but it
+shows that the public is beginning to nibble. I am of opinion that the
+time is almost--yes, almost ripe for a move."
+
+"Do you wish me to do anything in the matter, sir?" Tavernake asked.
+
+"In the first place," Mr. Dowling declared, "I should like you to try to
+find out whether any of the plots have really been sold, and, if so, to
+whom, and what would be their price. Can you do this during the week?"
+
+"I think so," Tavernake answered.
+
+"Say Monday morning," Mr. Dowling suggested, taking down his hat. "I
+shall be playing golf to-morrow and Friday, and of course Saturday.
+Monday morning you might let me have a report."
+
+Tavernake went back to his office. After all, then, things were to come
+to a crisis a little earlier than he had thought. He knew quite well
+that that report, if he made it honestly, and no other idea was likely
+to occur to him, would effectually sever his connection with Messrs.
+Dowling, Spence & Company.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX. THE PLOT THICKENS
+
+
+The man whom Tavernake had left walking up and down the corridor lost
+no time in presenting himself once more at the apartments of Mrs. Wenham
+Gardner. He entered the suite without ceremony, carefully closing both
+doors behind him. It became obvious then that his deportment on the
+occasion of his previous appearance had been in the nature of a bluff.
+The air with which he looked across the room at the woman who watched
+him was furtive; the hand which laid his hat upon the table was shaking;
+there was a gleam almost of terror in his eyes. The woman remained
+impassive, inscrutable, simply watching him. After a moment or two,
+however, she spoke--a single monosyllable.
+
+"Well?"
+
+The man broke down.
+
+"Elizabeth," he exclaimed, "you are too--too ghastly! I can't stand it.
+You are unnatural."
+
+She stretched herself upon the couch and turned towards him.
+
+"Unnatural, am I?" she remarked. "And what are you?"
+
+He sank into a chair. He had become very flabby indeed.
+
+"What you are always calling me, I suppose," he muttered,--"a coward.
+You have so little consideration, Elizabeth. My health isn't what it
+was."
+
+His eyes had wandered longingly toward the cupboard at the further end
+of the apartment. The woman upon the couch smiled.
+
+"You may help yourself," she directed carelessly. "Perhaps then you will
+be able to tell me why you have come in such a state."
+
+He crossed the room in a few hasty steps, his head and shoulders
+disappeared inside the cupboard. There was the sound of the withdrawal
+of a cork, the fizz of a sodawater syphon. He returned to his place a
+different man.
+
+"You must remember my age, Elizabeth dear," he said, apologetically.
+"I haven't your nerve--it isn't likely that I should have. When I was
+twenty-five, there was nothing in the world of which I was afraid."
+
+She looked him over critically.
+
+"Perhaps I am not so absolutely courageous as you think," she remarked.
+"To tell you the truth, there are a good many things of which I am
+afraid when you come to me in such a state. I am afraid of you, of what
+you will do or say."
+
+"You need not be," he assured her hastily. "When I am away from you, I
+am dumb. What I suffer no one knows. I keep it to myself."
+
+She nodded, a little contemptuously.
+
+"I suppose you do your best," she declared. "Tell me, now, what is this
+fresh thing which has disturbed you?"
+
+Her visitor stared at her.
+
+"Does there need to be any fresh thing?" he muttered.
+
+"I suppose it is something about Wenham?" she asked.
+
+The man shivered. He opened his lips and closed them again. The woman's
+tone, if possible, grew colder.
+
+"I hope you are not going to tell me that you have disobeyed my orders,"
+she said.
+
+"No," he protested, "no! I was there yesterday. I came back by the mail
+from Penzance. I had to motor thirty miles to catch it."
+
+"Something has happened, of course," she went on, "something which you
+are afraid to tell 'me. Sit up like a man, my dear father, and let me
+have the truth."
+
+"Nothing fresh has happened at all," he assured her. "It is simply that
+the memory of the day I spent at that place and that the sight of him
+has got on my nerves till I can't sleep or think of anything else."
+
+"What rubbish!" she exclaimed.
+
+"You have only seen the place in fine weather," he continued, dropping
+his voice a little. "Elizabeth, you have no idea what it is really like.
+Yesterday morning I got out of the train at Bodmin and I motored through
+to the village of Clawes. After that there were five miles to walk.
+There's no road, only a sort of broken track, and for the whole of that
+five miles there isn't even a farm building to be seen and I didn't meet
+a human soul. There was a sort of pall of white-gray mists everywhere
+over the moor, sometimes so dense that I couldn't see my way, and you
+could stop and listen and there wasn't a thing to be heard, not even a
+sheep bell."
+
+She laughed softly..
+
+"My dear, foolish father," she murmured, "you don't understand what
+a rest cure is. This is quite all right, quite as it should be. Poor
+Wenham has been seeing too many people all his life--that is why we have
+to keep him quiet for a time. You can skip the scenery. I suppose you
+got to the house at last?"
+
+"Yes, I got there," continued her father. "You know what a bleak-looking
+place it is, right on the side of a bare hill--a square, gray stone
+place just the color of the hillside. Well, I got there and walked in.
+There was Ted Mathers, half dressed, no collar, with a bottle of whiskey
+on the table, playing some wretched game of cards by himself. Elizabeth,
+what a brute that man is!"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"Go on," she said. "What about Wenham?"
+
+"He was there in a corner, gazing out of the window. When I came he
+sprang up, but when he saw who it was, he--he tried to hide. He was
+afraid of me."
+
+"Why?" she asked.
+
+"He said that I--I reminded him of you."
+
+"Absurd!" she murmured. "Tell me, how did he look?"
+
+"Ill, wretched, paler and thinner than ever, and wilder looking."
+
+"What did Mathers say about him?" she demanded.
+
+"What could he? He told me that he cried all day and begged to be taken
+back to America."
+
+"No one goes near the place, I suppose?" she asked.
+
+"Not a soul. A man comes from the village to sell things once a week.
+Mathers knows when to expect him and takes care that Wenham is not
+around. They are out of the world there--no road, no paths, nothing
+to bring even a tourist. I could have imagined such a spot in Arizona,
+Elizabeth, but in England--no!"
+
+"Has he any amusements at all?" she inquired.
+
+The man's hands were shaking; once more his eyes went longingly toward
+the cupboard.
+
+"He has made--a doll," he said, "carved it out of a piece of wood and
+dressed it in oddments from his ties. Mathers showed it to me as a joke.
+Elizabeth, it was wonderful--horrible!"
+
+"Why?" she asked him.
+
+"It is you," he continued, moistening his lips with his tongue, "you,
+in a blue gown--your favorite shade. He has even made blue stockings and
+strange little shoes. He has got some hair from somewhere and parted it
+just like yours."
+
+"It sounds very touching," she remarked.
+
+The man was shivering again.
+
+"Elizabeth," he said, "I do not think that he means it kindly. Mathers
+took me up into his room. He has made something there which looks like
+a scaffold. The doll was hanging by a piece of string from the gallows.
+Elizabeth!--my God, but it was like you!" he cried, suddenly dropping
+his head upon his arms.
+
+For a moment, a reflection of the terror which had seized him flashed in
+her own face. It passed quickly away. She laughed mockingly.
+
+"My dear father," she protested, "you are certainly not yourself this
+morning."
+
+"I saw you swinging," he muttered, "swinging by that piece of cord!
+There was a great black pin through your heart. Elizabeth, if he
+should get away sometime! If some one should come over from America
+and discover where he was! If he should find us out! Oh, my God, if he
+should find us out!"
+
+Elizabeth had risen to her feet. She was standing now before the fire,
+her left elbow resting upon the mantelpiece, a trifle of silver gleaming
+in her right hand.
+
+"Father," she said, "there is no danger in life for those who know no
+fear. Look at me."
+
+His eyes sought hers, fascinated.
+
+"If he should find me out," she continued, "it would be no such terrible
+thing, after all. It would be the end."
+
+Her fingers disclosed the little ornament she was carrying--a tiny
+pistol. She slipped it back into her pocket. The man was wondering how
+such a thing as this came to be his daughter.
+
+"You have courage, Elizabeth," he whispered.
+
+"I have courage," she assented, "because I have brains. I never allow
+myself to be in a position where I should be likely to get the worst
+of it. Ever since the day when he turned so suddenly against me, I have
+been careful."
+
+Her father leaned towards her.
+
+"Elizabeth," he said, "I never really understood. What was it that came
+over him so suddenly? One day he was your slave, the next I think he
+would have murdered you if he could."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"Honestly," she replied, "I felt it impossible to keep up the sham any
+longer. I married Wenham Gardner in New York because he was supposed to
+be a millionaire and because it seemed to be the best thing to do, but
+as to living with him, I never meant that. You know how ridiculous his
+behavior was on the boat. He never let me out of his sight, but swore
+that he was going to give up smoking and drinking and lead a new life
+for my sake. I really believe he meant it, too."
+
+"Wouldn't it have been better, dear," her father suggested, timidly, "to
+have encouraged him?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"He was absolutely hopeless," she declared. "You say that I have no
+nerves; that is because I do not allow myself to suffer. If I had gone
+on living with Wenham, it would have driven me mad. His habits, his
+manner of life, everything disgusted me. Until I came to see so much of
+him, I never understood what the term 'decadent' really can mean. The
+very touch of him grew to be hateful. No woman could live with such a
+man. By the way, he signed the draft, I suppose?"
+
+Her father handed her a slip of paper, which she looked at and locked in
+her drawer.
+
+"Did he make any trouble about it?" she asked.
+
+The professor shivered.
+
+"He refused to sign it," he said, in a low tone, "swore he would never
+sign it. Mathers sent me out for a few minutes, made me go into another
+room. When I came back, he gave me the draft. I heard him calling out."
+
+"Mathers certainly earns his money," she remarked, drily.
+
+He gazed at her with grudging admiration. This was his daughter, his own
+flesh and blood. Back through the years, for a moment, he seemed to see
+her, a child with hair down her back, sitting on his knee, listening
+to his stories, wondering at the little arts and tricks by which he
+had wrested their pennies and sixpennies from a credulous public.
+Phrenologist, hypnotist, conjurer--all these things the great Professor
+Franklin had called himself. Often, from the rude stage where he had
+given his performance, he had terrified to death the women and children
+of his audience. It flashed upon him at that moment that never, even in
+the days of her childhood, had he seen fear in Elizabeth's face.
+
+"You should have been a man, Elizabeth," he muttered.
+
+She shook her head, smiling as though not ill-pleased at the compliment.
+
+"The power of a man is so limited," she declared. "A woman has more
+weapons."
+
+"More weapons indeed," the professor agreed, as his eyes traveled over
+the slim yet wonderful perfection of her form, lingered for a moment
+at the little knot of lace at her throat, wrestled with the delicate
+sweetness of her features, struggling hard to think from whom among his
+ancestors could have come a creature so physically attractive.
+
+"More weapons, indeed," he repeated. "Elizabeth, what a gift--what a
+gift!"
+
+"You speak," she replied, "as though it were an evil one."
+
+"I was only thinking," he said, "that it seems a pity. You are so
+wonderful, we might have found an easier and a less dangerous way to
+fortune."
+
+She smiled.
+
+"The Bohemian blood in me, I suppose," she remarked. "The crooked ways
+attract, you know, when one has been brought up as I was."
+
+"Your poor mother had no love for them," he reminded her.
+
+"Beatrice has inherited everything that belonged to my mother. I am your
+own daughter, father. You ought to be proud of me. But there, I gave you
+another commission. Is it true that Jerry is really here?"
+
+"He arrived in England on Wednesday on the Lusitania. He has been in
+town all the time since."
+
+A distinct frown darkened her face.
+
+"He must have had my letter, then," she murmured, half to herself.
+
+"Without a doubt," her father admitted. "Elizabeth, why do you take
+chances about seeing this man? He was fond of you in New York, I know,
+but then he was fond of his brother, too. He may not believe your story.
+It may be dangerous."
+
+She smiled.
+
+"I think I can convince Jerry Gardner of anything I choose to tell
+him," she said. "Besides, it is absolutely necessary that I have some
+information about Wenham's affairs. He must have a great deal more money
+somewhere and I must find out how we are to get at it."
+
+The professor shook his head.
+
+"I don't like it," he muttered. "Supposing he finds Beatrice!"
+
+Elizabeth shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"Beatrice is made of silent stuff," she declared. "I should never be
+afraid of her. All the same, I wish I could find out just where she is.
+It would look better if we were living together."
+
+The professor shook his head sadly.
+
+"She left us of her own free will," he said, "and I don't believe,
+Elizabeth, that she would ever come back again. She knew very well what
+she was doing. She knew that our views of life were not hers. She didn't
+know half but she knew enough. You were quite right in what you said
+just now; Beatrice was more like her mother, and her mother was a good
+woman."
+
+"Really!" Elizabeth remarked, insolently.
+
+"Don't answer like that," he blustered, striking the table. "She was
+your mother, too."
+
+The woman's face was inscrutable, hard, and flawless behind the little
+cloud of tobacco smoke. The man began to tremble once more. Every time
+he ventured to assert himself, a single look from her was sufficient to
+quell him.
+
+"Elizabeth," he muttered, "you haven't a heart, you haven't a soul, you
+haven't a conscience. I wonder--what sort of a woman you are!"
+
+"I am your daughter," she reminded him, pleasantly.
+
+"I was never quite so bad as that," he went on, taking a large silk
+handkerchief from his pocket and dabbing his forehead. "I had to live
+and times were hard. I have cheated the public, perhaps. I haven't been
+above playing at cards a little cleverly, or making something where I
+could out of the weaker men. But, Elizabeth, I am afraid of you."
+
+"Men are generally afraid of the big stakes," she remarked, flicking the
+ash from her cigarette. "They will cheat and lie for halfpennies, but
+they are bad gamblers when life or death--the big things are in the
+balance. Bah!" she went on. "Father, I want Jerry Gardner to come and
+see me."
+
+"If you can't make him come, my dear," the professor said, "I am sure it
+will be of no use my trying."
+
+"He has had my letter," she continued, half to herself; "he has had my
+letter and he does not come."
+
+"There is nothing to be done but wait," her father decided.
+
+"And meanwhile," she went on, "supposing he were to discover Beatrice,
+supposing they two were to come together; supposing he were to tell her
+what he knows and she were to tell him what she guessed!"
+
+The professor buried his face in his hands. Elizabeth threw her
+cigarette away with an impatient gesture.
+
+"What an idiot I am!" she declared. "What is the use of wasting time
+like this?"
+
+There was a knock at the door. A trim-looking French maid presented
+herself. She addressed her mistress in voluble French. A coiffeur and a
+manicurist were waiting in the next apartment; it was time that Madame
+habited herself. The professor listened to these announcements with an
+air of half-admiring wonder.
+
+"I suppose I must be going," he said, rising to his feet. "There is just
+one thing I should like to ask you, Elizabeth, if I may, before I go."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Who was the young man whom I met here just now?"
+
+"Why do you ask that?" she demanded.
+
+"I really do not know," her father replied, thoughtfully, "except that
+his appearance seemed a little singular. In some respects he appeared so
+commonplace. His clothes and bearing, in fact, were so ordinary that
+I was surprised to find him here with you. And, on the other hand, his
+face--you must remember, my dear, that this is entirely a professional
+instinct; I am still interested in faces--"
+
+"Quite so," she admitted. "Go on. The young man rather puzzles me
+myself. I should like to hear what you make of him. What did you think
+of his face?"
+
+"There was something powerful about it," he declared, "something dogged,
+splendid, narrow, impossible,--the sort of face which belongs to a man
+who achieves great things because he is too stupid to recognize failure,
+even when it has him in its arms and its fingers are upon his throat.
+That young man has qualities, my dear, I am sure. Mind you, at present
+they are dormant, but he has qualities."
+
+She led him to the door.
+
+"My dear father," she said, "sometimes I really respect you. If you
+should come across that young man again, keep your eye upon him. He
+knows one thing at least which I wish he would tell us--he knows where
+Beatrice is."
+
+Her father looked at her in amazement.
+
+"He knows where Beatrice is and he has not told you?"
+
+She nodded.
+
+"You tried to have him tell you and he refused?" the professor
+persisted.
+
+"Exactly," she admitted.
+
+Her father put on his hat.
+
+"I knew that young man was something out of the common."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X. THE JOY OF BATTLE
+
+
+They sat on the trunk of a fallen tree, in the topmost corner of the
+field. In the hedge, close at hand, was a commotion of birds. In the elm
+tree, a little further away, a thrush was singing. A soft west wind
+blew in their faces; the air immediately around them was filled with
+sunlight. Yet almost to their feet stretched one of those great arms of
+the city--a suburb, with its miles of villas, its clanging of electric
+cars, its waste plots, its rows of struggling shops. And only a little
+further away still, the body itself--the huge city, throbbing beneath
+its pall of smoke and cloud. The girl, who had been gazing steadily
+downwards for several moments, turned at last to her companion.
+
+"Do you know," she said, "that this makes me think of the first night
+you spoke to me? You remember it--up on the roof at Blenheim House?"
+
+Tavernake did not answer for a moment. He was looking through a
+queerly-shaped instrument that he had brought with him at half-a-dozen
+stakes that he had laboriously driven into the ground some distance
+away. He was absolutely absorbed in his task.
+
+"The main avenue," he muttered softly to himself. "Yes, it must be a
+trifle more to the left. Then we get all the offshoots parallel and the
+better houses have their southern aspect. I beg your pardon, Beatrice,
+did you say anything?" he broke off suddenly.
+
+She smiled.
+
+"Nothing worth mentioning. I was just thinking that it reminded me a
+little up here of the first time you and I ever talked together."
+
+He glanced down at the panorama below, with its odd jumble of hideous
+buildings, softened here and there with wreaths of sunstained smoke, its
+great blots of ugliness irredeemable, insistent.
+
+"It's different, of course," she went on. "I remember, even now, the
+view from the house-top that night. In a sense, it was finer than this;
+everything was more lurid and yet more chaotic; one simply felt that
+underneath all those mysterious places was some great being, toiling and
+struggling--Life itself, groaning through space with human cogwheels. Up
+here one sees too much. Oh, my dear Leonard," she continued, "to think
+that you, too, should be one of the devastators!"
+
+He fitted his instrument into its case and replaced it in his pocket.
+
+"Come," he said, "you mustn't call me hard names. I shall remind you of
+the man whose works you are making me read. You know what he says--'The
+aesthete is, after all, only a dallier. The world lives and progresses
+by reason of its utilitarians.' This hill represents to me most of the
+things that are worth having in life."
+
+She laughed shortly.
+
+"You will cut down those hedges and drive away the birds to find a fresh
+home; you will plough up the green grass, cut out a street and lay
+down granite stones. Then I see your ugly little houses coming up like
+mushrooms all over the place. You are a vandal, my dear Leonard."
+
+"I am simply obeying the law," he answered. "After all, even from your
+own point of view, I do not think that it is so bad. Look closer, and
+you will find that the hedges are blackened here and there with smuts.
+The birds will find a better dwelling place further away. See how the
+smoke from those factory chimneys is sending its smuts across these
+fields. They are no longer country; they are better gathered in."
+
+She shivered.
+
+"There is something about life," she said, sadly, "which terrifies me.
+Every force that counts seems to be destructive."
+
+Up the steep hill behind them came the puffing and groaning of a small
+motor-car. They both turned their heads to watch it come into view.
+It was an insignificant affair of an almost extinct pattern, a single
+cylinder machine with a round tonneau back. The engine was knocking
+badly as the driver brought it to a standstill a few yards away from
+them. Involuntarily Tavernake stiffened as he saw the two men who
+descended from it, and who were already passing through the gate close
+to where they were. One was Mr. Dowling, the other the manager of the
+bank where they kept their account. Mr. Dowling recognized his manager
+with surprise but much cordiality.
+
+"Dear me!" he exclaimed. "Dear me, this is most fortunate! You know Mr.
+Tavernake, of course, Belton? My manager, Mr. Tavernake--Mr. Belton,
+of the London & Westminster Bank. I have brought Mr. Belton up here,
+Tavernake, to have a look round, so that he may know what we mean to do
+with all the money we shall have to come and borrow, eh?"
+
+The bank manager smiled.
+
+"It is a very fine situation," he remarked.
+
+The eyes of the two men fell upon Beatrice, who had drawn a little to
+one side.
+
+"May we have the pleasure, Tavernake?" Mr. Dowling said, graciously.
+"You are not married, I believe?"
+
+"No, this is my sister," Tavernake answered, slowly,--"Mr. Belton and
+Mr. Dowling."
+
+The two men acknowledged the salute with some slight surprise. Beatrice,
+although her clothes were simple, had always the air of belonging to a
+different world.
+
+"Your brother, my dear Miss Tavernake," Mr. Dowling declared, "is a
+perfect genius at discovering these desirable sites. This one I honestly
+consider to be the find of our lifetime. We have now," he proceeded,
+turning to Mr. Belton, "certain information that the cars will run to
+whatever point we desire in this vicinity, and the Metropolitan Railway
+has also arranged for an extension of its system. To-morrow I propose,"
+Mr. Dowling continued, holding the sides of his coat and assuming a
+somewhat pompous manner, "to make an offer for the whole of this site.
+It will involve a very large sum of money indeed, but I am convinced
+that it will be a remunerative speculation."
+
+Tavernake remained grimly silent. This was scarcely the time or the
+place which he would have selected for an explanation with his employer.
+There were signs, however, that the thing was to be forced upon him.
+
+"I am very pleased indeed to meet you here, Tavernake," Mr. Dowling went
+on, "pleased both for personal reasons and because it shows, if I may be
+allowed to say so, the interest which you take in the firm's business,
+that you should devote your holiday to coming and--er--surveying the
+scene of our exploits, so to speak. Perhaps now that you are here you
+would be able to explain to Mr. Belton better than I should, just what
+it is that we propose."
+
+Tavernake hesitated for a moment. Finally, however, he proceeded to make
+clear a very elaborate and carefully thought out building scheme, to
+which both men listened with much attention. When he had finished,
+however, he turned round to Mr. Dowling, facing him squarely.
+
+"You will understand, sir," he concluded, "that a scheme such as I have
+pointed out could only be carried through if the whole of the property
+were in one person's hands. I may say that the information to which you
+referred a few days ago was perfectly correct. A considerable portion of
+the south side of the hill has already been purchased, besides certain
+other plots which would interfere considerably with any comprehensive
+scheme of building."
+
+Mr. Dowling's face fell at once; his tone was one of annoyance mingled
+with irritation.
+
+"Come, come," he declared, "this sounds very bad, Mr. Tavernake, very
+neglectful, very careless as to the interests of the firm. Why did we
+not keep our eye upon it? Why did we not forestall this other purchaser,
+eh? It appears to me that we have been slack, very slack indeed."
+
+Tavernake took a small book from his pocket.
+
+"You will remember, sir," he said, "that it was on the eleventh of May
+last year when I first spoke to you of this site."
+
+"Well, well," Mr. Dowling exclaimed, sharply, "what of it?"
+
+"You were starting out for a fortnight's golf somewhere," Tavernake
+continued, "and you promised to look into the affair when you returned.
+I spoke to you again but you declared that you were far too busy to go
+into the matter at all for the present, you didn't care about this side
+of London, you considered that we had enough on hand--in fact, you threw
+cold water upon the idea."
+
+"I may not have been very enthusiastic at first," Mr. Dowling admitted,
+grudgingly. "Latterly, however, I have come round to your views."
+
+"There have been several articles in various newspapers, and a good deal
+of talk," Tavernake remarked, "which have been more effectual, I think,
+in bringing you round, than my advice. However, what I wish to say to
+you is this, sir, that when I found myself unable to interest you in
+this scheme, I went into it myself to some extent."
+
+"Went into it yourself?" Mr. Dowling repeated, incredulously. "What do
+you mean, Tavernake? What do you mean, sir?"
+
+"I mean that I have invested my savings in the purchase of several plots
+of land upon this hillside," Tavernake explained.
+
+"On your own account?" Mr. Dowling demanded. "Your savings, indeed!"
+
+"Certainly," Tavernake answered. "Why not?"
+
+"But it's the firm's business, sir--the firm's, not yours!"
+
+"The firm had the opportunity," Tavernake pointed out, "and were not
+inclined to avail themselves of it. If I had not bought the land when I
+did, some one else would have bought the whole of it long ago."
+
+Mr. Dowling was obviously in a furious temper.
+
+"Do you mean to tell me, sir," he exclaimed, "that you dared to enter
+into private speculations while still an employee of the firm? It is
+a most unheard-of thing, unwarranted, ridiculous. I shall require you,
+sir, to at once make over the plots of land to us--to the firm, you
+understand. We shall give you your price, of course, although I expect
+you paid much more for it than we should have done. Still, we must give
+you what you paid, and four per cent interest for your money."
+
+"I am sorry," Tavernake replied, "but I am afraid that I should require
+better terms than that. In fact," he continued, "I do not wish to sell.
+I have given a great deal of thought and time to this matter, and I
+intend to carry it out as a personal speculation."
+
+"Then you will carry it out, sir, from some other place than from
+within the walls of my office," Mr. Dowling declared, furiously. "You
+understand that, Tavernake?"
+
+"Perfectly," Tavernake answered. "You wish me to leave you. It is very
+unwise of you to suggest it, but I am quite prepared to go."
+
+"You will either resell me those plots at cost price, or you shall not
+set foot within the office again," Mr. Dowling insisted. "It is a gross
+breach of faith, this. I never heard of such a thing in all my life.
+Most unprofessional, impossible behavior!"
+
+Tavernake showed no signs of anger--he simply turned a little away.
+
+"I shall not sell you my land, Mr. Dowling," he said, "and it will suit
+me very well to leave your employ. You appear," he continued, "to expect
+some one else to do the whole of the work for you while you reap the
+entire profits. Those days have gone by. My business in the world is to
+make a fortune for myself, and not for you!"
+
+"How dare you, sir!" Mr. Dowling cried. "I never heard such impertinence
+in my life."
+
+"You haven't done a stroke of work for five years," Tavernake went on,
+unmoved, "and my efforts have supplied you with a fairly good income. In
+future, those efforts will be directed towards my own advancement."
+
+Mr. Dowling turned back toward the car.
+
+"Young man," he said, "you can brazen it out as much as you like, but
+you have been guilty of a gross breach of faith. I shall take care that
+the exact situation is made known in all responsible quarters. You'll
+get no situation with any firm with whom I am acquainted--I can promise
+you that. If you have anything more to say to Dowling, Spence & Company,
+let it be in writing."
+
+They parted company there and then. Tavernake and Beatrice went down the
+hill in silence.
+
+"Does this bother you at all?" she inquired presently.
+
+"Nothing to speak of," Tavernake answered. "It had to come. I wasn't
+quite ready but that doesn't matter."
+
+"What shall you do now?" she asked.
+
+"Borrow enough to buy the whole of the hill," he replied.
+
+She looked back.
+
+"Won't that mean a great deal of money?"
+
+He nodded.
+
+"It will be a big thing, of course," he admitted. "Never mind, I dare
+say I shall be able to interest some one in it. In any case, I never
+meant Mr. Dowling to make a fortune out of this."
+
+They walked on in silence a little further. Then she spoke again, with
+some hesitation.
+
+"I suppose that what you have done is quite fair, Leonard?"
+
+He answered her promptly, without any sign of offence at her question.
+
+"As a matter of fact," he confessed, "it is an unusual thing for any one
+in the employ of a firm of estate agents to make speculations on their
+own account in land. In this case, however, I consider that I was
+justified. I have opened up three building speculations for the firm, on
+each one of which they have made a great deal of money, and I have not
+even had my salary increased, or any recognition whatever offered me.
+There is a debt, of course, which an employee owes to his employer.
+There is also a debt, however, which the employer owes to his employee.
+In my case I have never been treated with the slightest consideration
+of any sort. What I have done I shall stick to. After all, I am more
+interested in making money for myself than for other people."
+
+They had reached the corner of the field now, and turning into the lane
+commenced the steep descent. It was Sunday evening, and from all the
+little conventicles and tin churches below, the bells began their
+unmusical summons. From further away in the distance came the more
+melodious chiming from the Cathedral and the city churches. The shriller
+and nearer note, however, prevailed. The whole medley of sound was a
+discord. As they descended, they could see the black-coated throngs
+slowly moving towards the different places of worship. There was
+something uninspiring about it all. She shuddered.
+
+"Leonard," she said, "I wonder why you are so anxious to get on in the
+world. Why do you want to be rich?"
+
+He was glancing back toward the hill, the light of calculations in his
+eyes. Once more he was measuring out those plots of land, calculating
+rent, deducting interest.
+
+"We all seek different things," he replied tolerantly,--"some fame,
+some pleasure. Mr. Dowling, for instance, has no other ambition than to
+muddle round the golf links a few strokes better than his partner."
+
+"And you?" she asked.
+
+"It is success I seek," he answered. "Women, as a rule, do not
+understand. You, for instance, Beatrice, are too sentimental. I am very
+practical. It is money that I want. I want money because money means
+success."
+
+"And afterwards?" she whispered.
+
+He was attending to her no longer. They were turning now into the broad
+thoroughfare at the bottom of the lane, at the end of which a tram-car
+was waiting. He scribbled a few, final notes into his pocket-book.
+
+"To-morrow," he exclaimed, with the joy of battle in his tone,
+"to-morrow the fight begins in earnest!"
+
+Beatrice passed her hand through his arm.
+
+"Not only for you, dear friend, but for me," she said. "For you? What do
+you mean?" he asked quickly.
+
+"I have been trying to tell you all day," she continued, "but you have
+been too engrossed. Yesterday afternoon I went to see Mr. Grier at the
+Atlas Theatre. I had my voice tried, and to-morrow night I am going to
+take a small part in the new musical comedy."
+
+Tavernake stared at her in something like consternation. His ideas as
+to the stage and all that belonged to it were of a primitive order. Mrs.
+Fitzgerald was perhaps as near as possible to his idea of the type. He
+glanced incredulously at Beatrice--slim, quietly dressed, yet with the
+unmistakable, to him mysterious, distinction of breeding.
+
+"You an actress!" he exclaimed.
+
+She laughed softly.
+
+"Dear Leonard," she said, "this is going to be a part of your education.
+To-morrow night you shall come to the theatre and wait for me at the
+stage-door."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI. A BEWILDERING OFFER
+
+
+Elizabeth stood with her hands behind her back, leaning slightly against
+the writing-table. The professor, with his broad-brimmed hat clinched
+in his fingers, walked restlessly up and down the little room. The
+discussion had not been altogether a pleasant one. Elizabeth was
+composed but serious, her father nervous and excited.
+
+"You are mad, Elizabeth!" he declared. "Is it that you do not
+understand, or will not? I tell you that we must go."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"Where would you drag me to?" she asked. "We certainly can't go back to
+New York."
+
+He turned fiercely upon her.
+
+"Whose fault is it that we can't?" he demanded. "If it weren't for you
+and your confounded schemes, I could be walking down Broadway next week.
+God's own city it is, too!" he muttered. "I wish we'd never seen those
+two young men."
+
+"It was a pity, perhaps," she admitted, "yet we had to do something. We
+were absolutely stonybroke, as they say over here."
+
+"Anyway, we've got to get out of this," the professor declared.
+
+"My dear father," she replied, "I will agree that if a new city or a new
+world could arise from the bottom of the sea, where Professor Franklin
+was unknown, and his beautiful daughter Elizabeth had neyer been heard
+of, it might perhaps be advisable for us to go there.  As it is--"
+
+"There is Rome," he exclaimed, "or some of the smaller places! We have
+money for a time. We could get another draft, perhaps, from Wenham."
+
+She shook her head. "We are just as safe here as anywhere on the
+Continent," she remarked.
+
+Once more he struck the table. Then he threw out his hands above his
+head with the melodramatic instinct which had always been strong in his
+blood.
+
+"Do you think that I am a fool?" he cried. "Do you think I do not know
+that if there were not something moving in your brain you would think
+no more of that clerk, that bourgeois estate agent, than of the door-mat
+beneath your feet? It is what I always complain about. You make use
+of me as a tool. There are always things which I do not understand. He
+comes here, this young man, under a pretext, whether he knows it or not.
+You talk to him for an hour at a time. There should be nothing in
+your life which I do not know of, Elizabeth," he continued, his voice
+suddenly hoarse as he leaned towards her. "Can't you see that there is
+danger in friendships for you and for me, there is danger in intimacies
+of any sort? I share the danger; I have a right to share the knowledge.
+This young man has no money of his own, I take it. Of what use is he to
+us?"
+
+"You are too hasty, my dear father," she replied. "Let me assure you
+that there is nothing at all mysterious about Mr. Tavernake. The simple
+truth is that the young man rather attracts me."
+
+The professor gazed at her incredulously.
+
+"Attracts you! He!"
+
+"You have never perfectly understood me, my dear parent," she murmured.
+"You have never appreciated that trait in my character, that strange
+preference, if you like, for the absolutely original. Now in all my life
+I never met such a young man as this. He wears the clothes and he has
+the features and speech of just such a person as you have described, but
+there is a difference."
+
+"A difference, indeed!" the professor interrupted roughly. "What
+difference, I should like to know?"
+
+She shrugged her shoulders lightly.
+
+"He is stolid without being stupid," she explained. "He is entirely
+self-centered. I smile at him, and he waits patiently until I have
+finished to get on with our business. I have said quite nice things to
+him and he has stared at me without change of expression, absolutely
+without pleasure or emotion of any sort."
+
+"You are too vain, Elizabeth," her father declared. "You have been
+spoilt. There are a few people in the world whom even you might fail to
+charm. No doubt this young man is one of them."
+
+She sighed gently.
+
+"It really does seem," she admitted, "as though you were right, but we
+shall see. By-the-bye, hadn't you better go? The five minutes are nearly
+up."
+
+He came over to her side, his hat and gloves in his hand, prepared for
+departure.
+
+"Will you tell me, upon your honor, Elizabeth," he begged, "that there
+is no other reason for your interest? That you are not engaged in any
+fresh schemes of which I know nothing? Things are bad enough as they
+are. I cannot sleep, I cannot rest, for thinking of our position. If I
+thought that you had any fresh plans on hand--"
+
+She flicked the ash from her cigarette and checked him with a little
+gesture.
+
+"He knows where Beatrice is," she remarked thoughtfully, "and I can't
+get him to tell me. There is nothing beyond--absolutely nothing."...
+
+When Tavernake was announced, Elizabeth was still smoking, sitting in
+an easy-chair and looking into the fire. Something in her attitude, the
+droop of her head as it rested upon her fingers, reminded him suddenly
+of Beatrice. He showed no other emotion than a sudden pause in his
+walk across the room. Even that, however, in a person whose machinelike
+attitude towards her provoked her resentment, was noticeable.
+
+"Good morning, my friend!" she said pleasantly. "You have brought me the
+fresh list?"
+
+"Unfortunately, no, madam," Tavernake answered. "I have called simply
+to announce that I am not able to be of any further assistance to you in
+the matter."
+
+She looked at him for a moment without remark.
+
+"Are you serious, Mr. Tavernake?" she asked.
+
+"Yes," he replied. "The fact is I am not in a position to help you. I
+have left the employ of Messrs. Dowling, Spence & Company."
+
+"Of your own accord?" she inquired quietly.
+
+"No, I was dismissed," he confessed. "I should have been compelled to
+leave in a very short time, but Mr. Dowling forestalled me."
+
+"Won't you sit down and tell me about it?" she invited.
+
+He looked her in the eyes, square and unflinching. He was still able to
+do that!
+
+"It could not possibly interest you," he said.
+
+"And--my sister? You have seen her?"
+
+"I have seen your sister," Tavernake answered, without hesitation.
+
+"You have a message for me?"
+
+"None," he declared.
+
+"She refuses--to be reconciled, then?"
+
+"I am afraid she has no friendly feelings towards you."
+
+"She gave you no reason?"
+
+"No direct reason," he admitted, "but her attitude is--quite
+uncompromising."
+
+She rose and swept across the floor towards him. With firm but gentle
+fingers she took his worn bowler hat and mended gloves from his hand.
+Her gesture guided him towards a sofa.
+
+"Beatrice has prejudiced you against me," she murmured. "It is not fair.
+Please come and sit down--for five minutes," she pleaded. "I want you
+to tell me why you have quarrelled with that funny little man, Mr.
+Dowling."
+
+"But, madam,--" he protested.
+
+"If you refuse, I shall think that my sister has been telling you
+stories about me," she declared, watching him closely.
+
+Tavernake drew a little away from her but seated himself on the sofa
+which she had indicated. He took up as much room as possible, and to his
+relief she did not persist in her first intention, which was obviously
+to seat herself beside him.
+
+"Your sister has told me nothing about you whatsoever," he said
+deliberately. "At the same time, she asked me not to give you her
+address."
+
+"We will talk about that presently," she interrupted. "In the first
+place, tell me why you have left your place."
+
+"Mr. Dowling discovered," he told her, in a matter-of-fact tone, "that
+I had been doing some business on my own account. He was quite right to
+disapprove. I have not been back to the office since he found it out."
+
+"What sort of business?" she asked.
+
+"The business of the firm is to buy property in undeveloped districts
+and sell it for building estate," he explained. "I have been very
+successful hitherto in finding sites for their operations. A short time
+ago, I discovered one so good that I invested all my own savings in
+buying certain lots, and have an option upon the whole. Mr. Dowling
+found it out and dismissed me."
+
+"But it seems most unfair," she declared.
+
+"Not at all," he answered. "In Mr. Dowling's place I should have done
+the same thing. Every one with his way in life to make must look out for
+himself. Strictly speaking, what I did was wrong. I wish, however, that
+I had done it before. One must think of one's self first."
+
+"And now?" she inquired. "What are you going to do now?"
+
+"I am going to find a capitalist or float a company to buy the rest of
+the site," he announced. "After that, we must see about building. There
+is no hurry about that, though. The first thing is to secure the site."
+
+"How much money does it require?"
+
+"About twelve thousand pounds," he told her.
+
+"It seems very little," she murmured.
+
+"The need for money comes afterwards," he explained. "We want to drain
+and plan and build without mortgages. As soon as we are sure of the
+site, one can think of that. My option only extends for a week or so."
+
+"Do you really think that it is a good speculation?" she asked.
+
+"I do not think about such matters," he answered, drily. "I know."
+
+She leaned back in her chair, watching him for several seconds--admiring
+him, as a matter of fact. The profound conviction of his words was
+almost inspiring. In her presence, and she knew that she was a very
+beautiful woman, he appeared, notwithstanding his absence of any
+knowledge of her sex and his lack of social status, unmoved, wholly
+undisturbed. He sat there in perfect naturalness. It did not seem to him
+even unaccountable that she should be interested in his concerns. He
+was not conceited or aggressive in any way. His complete self-confidence
+lacked any militant impulse. He was--himself, impervious to
+surroundings, however unusual.
+
+"Why should I not be your capitalist?" she inquired slowly.
+
+"Have you as much as twelve thousand pounds that you want to invest?" he
+asked, incredulously.
+
+She rose to her feet and moved across to her desk. He sat quite still,
+watching her without any apparent curiosity. She unlocked a drawer and
+returned to him with a bankbook in her hand.
+
+"Add that up," she directed, "and tell me how much I have."
+
+He drew a lead pencil from his pocket and quickly added up the total.
+
+"If you have not given any cheques since this was made up," he said
+calmly, "you have a credit balance of thirteen thousand, one hundred and
+eighteen pounds, nine shillings and fourpence. It is very foolish of
+you to keep so much money on current account. You are absolutely losing
+about eight pounds a week."
+
+She smiled.
+
+"It is foolish of me, I suppose," she admitted, "but I have no one to
+advise me just now. My father knows no more about money than a child,
+and I have just had quite a large amount paid to me in cash. I only wish
+we could get Beatrice to share some of this, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+He made no remark. To all appearance, he had never heard of her sister.
+She came and sat down by his side again.
+
+"Will you have me for a partner, Mr. Tavernake?" she whispered.
+
+Then, indeed, for a moment, the impassivity of his features relaxed. He
+was frankly amazed.
+
+"You cannot mean this," he declared. "You know nothing about the
+value of the property, nothing about the affair at all. It is quite
+impossible."
+
+"I know what you have told me," she said. "Is not that enough? You are
+sure that it will make money and you have just told me how foolish I am
+to keep so much money in my bank. Very well, then, I give it to you to
+invest. You must pay me quite a good deal of interest."
+
+"But you know nothing about me," he protested, "nothing about the
+property."
+
+"One must trust somebody," she replied. "Why shouldn't I trust you?"
+
+He was nonplussed. This woman seemed to have an answer for everything.
+Besides, when once he had got over the unexpectedness of the thing, it
+was, of course, a wonderful stroke of fortune for him. Then came a whole
+rush of thoughts, a glow which he thrust back sternly. It would mean
+seeing her often; it would mean coming here to her rooms; it would mean,
+perhaps, that she might come to look upon him as a friend. He set his
+teeth hard. This was folly!
+
+"Have you any idea about terms?" he inquired.
+
+She laughed softly.
+
+"My dear friend," she said, "why do you ask me such a question? You know
+quite well that I am not competent to discuss terms with you. Listen.
+You are engaged in a speculation to carry out which you want the loan of
+twelve thousand pounds. Draw up a paper in which you state what my share
+will be of the profits, what interest I shall get for my money, and give
+particulars of the property. Then I will take it to my solicitor, if you
+insist upon it, although I am willing to accept what you think is fair."
+
+"You must take it to a solicitor, of course," he answered, thoughtfully.
+"I may as well tell you at once, however, that he will probably advise
+you against investing it in such a way."
+
+"That will make no difference at all," she declared. "Solicitors hate
+all investments, I know, except their horrid mortgages. There are only
+two conditions that I shall make."
+
+"What are they?" he asked.
+
+"The first is that you must not say a word of this to my sister."
+
+Tavernake frowned.
+
+"That is a little difficult," he remarked. "It happens that your sister
+knows something about the estate and my plans."
+
+"There is no need to tell her the name of your partner," Elizabeth said.
+"I want this to be our secret entirely, yours and mine."
+
+Her hand fell upon his; he gripped the sides of his chair. Again he was
+conscious of this bewildering, incomprehensible sensation.
+
+"And the other condition?" he demanded, hoarsely.
+
+"That you come sometimes and tell me how things are going on."
+
+"Come here?" he repeated.
+
+She nodded.
+
+"Please! I am very lonely. I shall look forward to your visits."
+
+Tavernake rose slowly to his feet. He held out his hand--she knew better
+than to attempt to keep him. He made a speech which was for him gallant,
+but while he made it he looked into her eyes with a directness to which
+she was indeed unaccustomed.
+
+"I shall come," he said. "I should have wanted to come, anyhow."
+
+Then he turned abruptly away and left the room. It was the first speech
+of its sort which he had ever made in his life.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII. TAVERNAKE BLUNDERS
+
+
+Tavernake felt that he had indeed wandered into an alien world as he
+took his place the following evening among the little crowd of people
+who were waiting outside the stage-door of the Atlas Theatre. These were
+surroundings to which he was totally unaccustomed. Two very handsome
+motor-cars were drawn up against the curb, and behind them a string of
+electric broughams and taxicabs, proving conclusively that the young
+ladies of the Atlas Theatre were popular in other than purely theatrical
+circles.
+
+The handful of young men by whom Tavernake was surrounded were of a
+genus unknown to him. They were all dressed exactly alike, they all
+seemed to breathe the same atmosphere, to exhibit the same indifference
+towards the other loungers. One or two more privileged passed in
+through the stage-door and disappeared. Tavernake contented himself with
+standing on the edge of the curbstone, his hands thrust into the pockets
+of his dark overcoat, his bowler hat, which was not quite the correct
+shape, slightly on the back of his head; his serious, stolid face
+illuminated by the gleam from a neighboring gas lamp.
+
+Presently, people began to emerge from the door. First of all, the
+musicians and a little stream of stage hands.
+
+Then a girl's hat appeared in the doorway, and the first of the Atlas
+young ladies came out, to be claimed at once by her escort. Very soon
+afterwards, Beatrice arrived. She recognized Tavernake at once and
+crossed over to him.
+
+"Well?" she asked.
+
+"You looked very nice," he said, slowly, as he led the way down
+the street. "Of course, I knew about your singing, but everything
+else--seemed such a surprise."
+
+"For instance?"
+
+"Why, I mean your dancing," he went on, "and somehow or other you looked
+different on the stage."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"'Different' won't do for me," she persisted. "I must have something
+more specific."
+
+"Well, then, you looked much prettier than I thought you were,"
+Tavernake declared, solemnly. "You looked exceedingly nice."
+
+"You really thought so?" she asked, a little doubtfully.
+
+"I really thought so. I thought you looked much nicer than any of the
+others."
+
+She squeezed his arm affectionately.
+
+"Dear Leonard," she said, "it's so nice to have you think so. Do you
+know, Mr. Grier actually asked me out to supper."
+
+"What impertinence!" Tavernake muttered.
+
+Beatrice threw her head back and laughed.
+
+"My dear brother," she protested, "it was a tremendous compliment. You
+must remember that it was entirely through him, too, that I got the
+engagement. Four pounds a week I am going to have. Just think of it!"
+
+"Four pounds a week is all very well," Tavernake admitted. "It seems a
+great deal of money to earn like that. But I don't think you ought to go
+out to supper with any one whom you know so slightly."
+
+"Dear prig! You know, you are a shocking prig, Leonard."
+
+"Am I?" he answered, without offence, and with the air of one seriously
+considering the subject.
+
+"Of course you are. How could you help it, living the sort of life
+you've led all your days? Never mind, I like you for it. I don't know
+whether I want to go out to supper with anybody--I really haven't
+decided yet--but if I did, it would certainly be better for me to go
+with Mr. Grier, because he can do me no end of good at the theatre, if
+he likes."
+
+Tavernake was silent for several moments. He was conscious of feeling
+something which he did not altogether understand. He only knew that
+it involved a strong and unreasonable dislike to Mr. Grier. Then he
+remembered that he was her brother, that he had the right to speak with
+authority.
+
+"I hope that you will not go out to supper with any one," he said.
+
+She began to laugh but checked herself.
+
+"Well," she remarked, "that sounds very terrible. Shall we take a 'bus?
+To tell you the truth, I am dying of hunger. We rehearsed for two hours
+before the performance, and I ate nothing but a sandwich--I was so
+excited."
+
+Tavernake hesitated a moment--he certainly was not himself this evening!
+
+"Would you like to have some supper at a restaurant," he asked, "before
+we go home?"
+
+"I should love it," she declared, taking his arm as they passed through
+a stream of people. "To tell you the truth, I was so hoping that you
+would propose it."
+
+"I think," Tavernake said, deliberately, "that there is a place a little
+way along here."
+
+They pushed their way down the Strand and entered a restaurant which
+Tavernake knew only by name. A small table was found for them and
+Beatrice looked about with delight.
+
+"Isn't this jolly!" she exclaimed, taking off her gloves. "Why, there
+are five or six of the girls from the theatre here already. There are
+two, see, at the corner table, and the fair-haired girl--she is just
+behind me in the chorus."
+
+Tavernake glanced around. The young women whom she pointed out were
+all escorted by men who were scrupulously attired in evening dress. She
+seemed to read his thoughts as she laughed at him.
+
+"You stupid boy," she said. "You don't suppose that I want to be like
+them, do you? There are lots of things it's delightful to look on at,
+and that's all. Isn't this fish good? I love this place."
+
+Tavernake looked around him with an interest which he took no pains
+to conceal. Certainly the little groups of people by whom they were
+surrounded on every side had the air of finding some zest in life which
+up to the present, at any rate, had escaped him. They came streaming in,
+finding friends everywhere, laughing and talking, insisting upon tables
+in impossible places, calling out greetings to acquaintances across the
+room, chaffing the maitre d'hotel who was hastening from table to table.
+The gathering babel of voices was mingled every now and then with the
+popping of corks, and behind it all were the soft strains of a very
+seductive little band, perched up in the balcony. Tavernake felt the
+color mounting into his cheeks. It was true: there was something here
+which was new to him!
+
+"Beatrice," he asked her suddenly, "have you ever drunk champagne?"
+
+She laughed at him.
+
+"Often, my dear brother," she answered. "Why?"
+
+"I never have," he confessed. "We are going to have some now."
+
+She would have checked him but he had summoned a waiter imperiously and
+given his order.
+
+"My dear Leonard," she protested, "this is shocking extravagance."
+
+"Is it?" he replied. "I don't care. Tell me about the theatre. Were they
+kind to you there? Will you be able to keep your place?"
+
+"The girls were all much nicer than I expected," she told him, "and the
+musical director said that my voice was much too good for the chorus.
+Oh, I do hope that they will keep me!"
+
+"They would be idiots if they didn't," he declared, vigorously. "You
+sing better and you dance more gracefully and to me you seemed much
+prettier than any one else there."
+
+She laughed into his eyes.
+
+"My dear brother," she exclaimed, "your education is progressing indeed!
+It is positively the first evening I have ever heard you attempt to make
+pretty speeches, and you are quite an adept already."
+
+"I don't know about that," he protested. "I suppose it never occurred
+to me before that you were good-looking," he added, examining her
+critically, "or I dare say I should have told you so. You see, one
+doesn't notice these things in an ordinary way. Lots of other people
+must have told you so, though."
+
+"I was never spoilt with compliments," she said. "You see, I had a
+beautiful sister."
+
+The words seemed to have escaped her unconsciously. Almost as they
+passed her lips, her expression changed. She shivered, as though
+reminded of something unpleasant. Tavernake, however, noticed nothing.
+For the greater part of the day he had been sedulously fighting against
+a new and unaccustomed state of mind. He had found his thoughts slipping
+away, time after time, until he had had to set his teeth and use all
+his will power to keep his attention concentrated upon his work. And now
+once more they had escaped, again he felt the strange stir in his blood.
+The slight flush on his cheek grew suddenly deeper. He looked past the
+girl opposite to him, out of the restaurant, across the street, into
+that little sitting-room in the Milan Court. It was Elizabeth who was
+there in front of him. Again he heard her voice, saw the turn of her
+head, the slow, delightful curve of the lips, the eyes that looked into
+his and spoke to him the first strange whispers of a new language. His
+heart gave a quick throb. He was for the moment transformed, a prisoner
+no longer, a different person, indeed, from the stolid, well-behaved
+young man who found himself for the first time in his life in these
+unaccustomed surroundings. Then Beatrice leaned towards him, her voice
+brought him back to the present--not, alas, the voice which at that
+moment he would have given so much to have heard.
+
+"To-night," she murmured, "I feel as though we were at the beginning of
+new things. We must drink a toast."
+
+Tavernake filled her glass and his own.
+
+"Luck to you in your new profession!" he said.
+
+"And here is one after your own heart, you most curious of men!" she
+exclaimed, a few seconds later. "To the undiscovered in life!"
+
+He drained his glass and set it down empty.
+
+"The undiscovered," he muttered, looking around. "It is a very good
+toast, Beatrice. There are many things of which one might remain
+ignorant all one's life if one relied wholly upon one's own
+perceptions."
+
+"I believe," she agreed, "that if I had not appeared you were in great
+danger of becoming narrow."
+
+"I am sure of it," he answered, "but you see you came."
+
+She was thoughtful for a moment.
+
+"This reminds me just a little of that first dreary feast of ours," she
+said. "You knew what it was like then to feed a genuinely starving girl.
+And I was miserable, Leonard. It didn't seem to me that there was any
+other end save one."
+
+"You've got over all that nonsense?" he asked anxiously.
+
+"Yes, I suppose so," she answered. "You see, I've started life again and
+one gets stronger. But there are times even now," she added, "when I am
+afraid."
+
+The mirth had suddenly died from her face. She looked older, tired,
+and careworn. The shadows were back under her eyes; she glanced around
+almost timorously. He filled her glass.
+
+"That is foolishness," he said. "Nothing nor anybody can harm you now."
+
+Some note in his voice attracted her attention. Strong and square, with
+hard, forceful face, he sat wholly at his ease among these unfamiliar
+surroundings, a very tower of refuge, she felt, to the weak. His
+face was not strikingly intellectual--she was not sure now about his
+mouth--but one seemed to feel that dogged nature, the tireless pains by
+which he would pursue any aim dear to him. The shadows passed away from
+her mind. What was dead was gone! It was not reasonable that she should
+be haunted all her days by the ghosts of other people's sins. The
+atmosphere of the place, the atmosphere of the last few hours, found its
+way again into her blood. After all, she was young, the music was sweet,
+her pulses were throbbing to the tune of this new life. She drank her
+wine and laughed, her head beating time to the music.
+
+"We have been sad long enough," she declared. "You and I, my dear
+serious brother, will embark in earnest now upon the paths of frivolity.
+Tell me, how did things go to-day?"
+
+It flashed into his mind that he had great news, but that it was not for
+her. About that matter there was still doubt in his mind, but he could
+not speak of it.
+
+"I have had an offer," he said guardedly. "I cannot say much about it at
+present, for nothing is certain, but I am sure that I shall be able to
+raise the money somehow."
+
+His tone was calm and confident. There was no self-assurance or bluster
+about it, and yet it was convincing. She looked at him curiously.
+
+"You are a very positive person, Leonard," she remarked. "You must have
+great faith in yourself, I think."
+
+He considered the question for a moment.
+
+"Perhaps I have," he admitted. "I do not think that there is any other
+way to succeed."
+
+The atmosphere of the place was becoming now almost languorous. The band
+had ceased to play; little parties of men and women were standing about,
+bidding one another goodnight. The lamps had been lowered, and in the
+gloom the voices and laughter seemed to have become lower and more
+insinuating; the lights in the eyes of the women, as they passed down
+the room on their way out, softer and more irresistible.
+
+"I suppose we must go," she said reluctantly.
+
+Tavernake paid his bill and they turned into the street. She took his
+arm and they turned westward. Even out here, the atmosphere of the
+restaurant appeared to have found its way. The soberness of life, its
+harder and more practical side, was for the moment obscured. It was
+not the daytime crowd, this, whose footsteps pressed the pavements. The
+careworn faces of the money-seekers had vanished. The men and women to
+whom life was something of a struggle had sought their homes--resting,
+perhaps, before they took up their labors again. Every moment taxicabs
+and motor-cars whirled by, flashing upon the night a momentary
+impression of men in evening dress, of women in soft garments with
+jewels in their hair. The spirit of pleasure seemed to have crept into
+the atmosphere. Even the poorer people whom they passed in the street,
+were laughing or singing.
+
+Tavernake stopped short.
+
+"To-night," he declared, "is not the night for omnibuses. We are going
+to have a taxicab. I know that you are tired."
+
+"I should love it," she admitted.
+
+They hailed one and drove off. Beatrice leaned back among the cushions
+and closed her eyes, her ungloved hand rested almost caressingly upon
+his. He leaned forward. There were new things in the world--he was sure
+of it now, sure though they were coming to him through the mists, coming
+to him so vaguely that even while he obeyed he did not understand.
+Her full, soft lips were slightly parted; her heavily-fringed eyelids
+closed; her deep brown hair, which had escaped bounds a little, drooping
+over her ear. His fingers suddenly clasped hers tightly.
+
+"Beatrice!" he whispered.
+
+She sat up with a start, her eyes questioning his, the breath coming
+quickly through her parted lips.
+
+"Once you asked me to kiss you, Beatrice," he said. "To-night--I am
+going to."
+
+She made no attempt to repulse him. He took her in his arms and
+kissed her. Even in that moment he knew that he had made a mistake.
+Nevertheless, he kissed her again and again, crushing her lips against
+his.
+
+"Please let me go, Leonard," she begged at last.
+
+He obeyed at once. He understood quite well that some strange thing had
+happened. It seemed to him during those next few minutes that everything
+which had passed that night was a dream, that this vivid picture of a
+life more intense, making larger demands upon the senses than anything
+he had yet experienced, was a mirage, a thing which would live only
+in his memory, a life in which he could never take any part. He had
+blundered; he had come into a new world and he had blundered. A sense of
+guilt was upon him. He had a sudden wild desire to cry out that it was
+Elizabeth whom he had kissed. Beatrice was sitting upright in her place,
+her head turned a little away from him. He felt that she was expecting
+him to speak--that there were inevitable words which he should say. His
+silence was a confession. He would have lied but the seal was upon his
+lips. So the moment passed, and Tavernake had taken another step forward
+towards his destiny! ...
+
+As he helped her out of the cab, her fingers tightened for a moment upon
+his hand. She patted it gently as she passed out before him into the
+house, leaving the door open. When he had paid the cabman and followed,
+she had disappeared. He looked into the sitting-room; it was empty.
+Overhead, he could hear her footsteps as she ascended to her room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII. AN EVENING CALL
+
+
+In the morning, when he left for the city, she was not down. When he
+came home in the evening, she was gone. Without removing his hat
+or overcoat, he took the letter which he found propped up on the
+mantelpiece and addressed to him to the window and read it.
+
+DEAR BROTHER LEONARD,--It wasn't your fault and I don't think it was
+mine. If either of us is to blame, it is certainly I, for though you are
+such a clever and ambitious young person, you really know very little
+indeed of the world,--not so much, I think, as I do. I am going to stay
+for a few nights, at any rate, with one of the girls at the theatre,
+who I know wants some one to share her tiny flat with her. Afterwards, I
+shall see.
+
+Don't throw this letter in the fire and don't think me ungrateful. I
+shall never forget what you did for me. How could I?
+
+I will send you my address as soon as I am sure of it, or you can always
+write me to the theatre.
+
+                Good-bye, dear Leonard,
+                                        YOUR SISTER BEATRICE.
+
+Tavernake looked from the sheet of notepaper out across the gray square.
+He knew that he was very angry, angry though he deliberately folded
+the letter up and placed it in his pocket, angry though he took off
+his overcoat and hung it up with his usual care; but his anger was with
+himself. He had blundered badly. This episode of his life was one which
+he had better forget. It was absolutely out of harmony with all his
+ideas. He told himself that he was glad Beatrice was gone. Housekeeping
+with an imaginary sister in this practical world was an absurdity.
+Sooner or later it must have come to an end. Better now, before it had
+gone too far--better now, much better! All the same, he knew that he was
+going to be very lonely.
+
+He rang the bell for the woman who waited upon them, and whom he seldom
+saw, for Beatrice herself had supplied their immediate wants. He found
+some dinner ready, which he ate with absolute unconsciousness. Then he
+threw himself fiercely into his work. It was all very well for the first
+hour or so, but as ten o'clock grew near he began to find a curious
+difficulty in keeping his attention fixed upon those calculations. The
+matter of average rentals, percentage upon capital--things which but
+yesterday he had found fascinating--seemed suddenly irksome. He could
+fix his attention upon nothing. At last he pushed his papers away, put
+on his hat and coat, and walked into the street.
+
+At the Milan Court, the hall-porter received his inquiry for Elizabeth
+with an air of faint but well-bred surprise. Tavernake, in those days,
+was a person exceedingly difficult to place. His clothes so obviously
+denoted the station in life which he really occupied, while the slight
+imperiousness of his manner, his absolute freedom from any sort of
+nervousness or awkwardness, seemed to bespeak a consideration which
+those who had to deal with him as a stranger found sometimes a little
+puzzling.
+
+"Mrs. Wenham Gardner is in her rooms, I believe, sir," the man said. "If
+you will wait for a moment, I will inquire."
+
+He disappeared into his office, thrusting his head out, a moment or two
+later, with the telephone receiver still in his hand.
+
+"Mrs. Gardner would like the name again, sir, please," he remarked.
+
+Tavernake repeated it firmly.
+
+"You might say," he added, "that I shall not detain her for more than a
+few minutes."
+
+The man disappeared once more. When he returned, he indicated the lift
+to Tavernake.
+
+"If you will go up to the fifth floor, sir," he said, "Mrs. Gardner
+will see you."
+
+Tavernake found his courage almost leaving him as he knocked at the door
+of her rooms. Her French maid ushered him into the little sitting-room,
+where, to his dismay, he found three men, one sitting on the table, the
+other two in easy-chairs. Elizabeth, in a dress of pale blue satin, was
+standing before the mirror. She turned round as Tavernake entered.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake shall decide!" she exclaimed, waving her hand to him.
+"Mr. Tavernake, there is a difference of opinion about my earrings. Major
+Post here,"--she indicated a distinguished-looking elderly gentleman,
+with carefully trimmed beard and moustache, and an eyeglass attached to
+a thin band of black ribbon--"Major Post wants me to wear turquoises. I
+prefer my pearls. Mr. Crease half agrees with me, but as he never agrees
+with any one, on principle, he hates to say so. Mr. Faulkes is wavering.
+You shall decide; you, I know, are one of those people who never waver."
+
+"I should wear the pearls," Tavernake said.
+
+Elizabeth made them a little courtesy.
+
+"You see, my dear friends," she declared, "you have to come to England,
+after all, to find a man who knows his own mind and speaks it without
+fear. The pearls it shall be."
+
+"It may be decision," Crease drawled, speaking with a slight American
+accent, "or it may be gallantry. Mr. Tavernake knew your own choice."
+
+"The last word, as usual," she sighed. "Now, if you good people will
+kindly go on downstairs, I will join you in a few minutes. Mr. Tavernake
+is my man of business and I am sure he has something to say to me."
+
+She dismissed them all pleasantly. As soon as the door was closed she
+turned to Tavernake. Her manner seemed to become a shade less gracious.
+
+"Well?"
+
+"I don't know why I came," Tavernake confessed bluntly. "I was restless
+and I wanted to see you."
+
+She looked at him for a moment and then she laughed. Tavernake felt a
+sense of relief; at least she was not angry.
+
+"Oh, you strangest of mortals!" she exclaimed, holding out her hands.
+"Well, you see me--in one of my most becoming gowns, too. What do you
+think of the fit?"
+
+She swept round and faced him again with an expectant look. Tavernake,
+who knew nothing of women's fashions, still realized the superbness of
+that one unbroken line.
+
+"I can't think how you can move a step in it," he said, "but you look--"
+
+He paused. It was as though he had lost his breath. Then he set his
+teeth and finished.
+
+"You look beautiful," he declared. "I suppose you know that. I suppose
+they've all been telling you so."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"They haven't all your courage, dear Briton," she remarked, "and if they
+did tell me so, I am not sure that I should be convinced. You see, most
+of my friends have lived so long and lived so quickly that they have
+learned to play with words until one never knows whether the things they
+speak come from their hearts. With you it is different."
+
+"Yes," Tavernake admitted, "with me it is different!"
+
+She glanced at the clock.
+
+"Well," she said, "you have seen me and I am glad to have seen you, and
+you may kiss my fingers if you like, and then you must run away. I am
+engaged to have supper with my friends downstairs."
+
+He raised her fingers clumsily enough to his lips and kept them there
+for a moment. When he let them go, she wrung them as though in pain,
+and looked at him. She turned abruptly away. In a sense she was
+disappointed. After all, he was an easy victim!
+
+"Elise," she called out, "my cloak."
+
+Her maid came hurrying from the next room. Elizabeth turned towards her,
+holding out her shoulders. She nodded to Tavernake.
+
+"You know the way down, Mr. Tavernake? I shall see you again soon,
+sha'n't I? Good-night!"
+
+She scarcely glanced at him as she sent him away, yet Tavernake walked
+on air.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV. A WARNING FROM Mr. PRITCHARD
+
+
+Tavernake hesitated for a moment under the portico of the Milan Court,
+looking out at the rain which had suddenly commenced to descend. He
+scarcely noticed that he had a companion until the man who was standing
+by his side addressed him.
+
+"Say, your name is Tavernake, isn't it?"
+
+Tavernake, who had been on the point of striding away, turned sharply
+around. The man who had spoken to him was wearing morning clothes of
+dark gray tweed and a soft Homburg hat. His complexion was a little
+sallow and he was clean-shaven except for a slight black moustache. He
+was smoking a black cigar and his accent was transatlantic. Something
+about his appearance struck Tavernake as being vaguely familiar, but he
+could not at first recall where he had seen him before.
+
+"That is my name, certainly," Tavernake admitted.
+
+"I am going to ask you a somewhat impertinent question," his neighbor
+remarked.
+
+"I suppose you can ask it," Tavernake rejoined. "I am not obliged to
+answer, am I?"
+
+The man smiled.
+
+"Come," he said, "that's honest, at any rate. Are you in a hurry for a
+few minutes?"
+
+"I am in no particular hurry," Tavernake answered. "What do you want?"
+
+"A few nights ago," the stranger continued, lowering his voice a little,
+"I met you with a young lady whose appearance, for some reason which
+we needn't go into, interested me. To-night I happened to overhear you
+inquiring, only a few minutes ago, for the sister of the same young
+lady."
+
+"What you heard doesn't concern me in the least," Tavernake retorted. "I
+should say that you had no business to listen."
+
+His companion smiled.
+
+"Well," he declared, "I have always heard a good deal about British
+frankness, and it seems to me that I'm getting some. Anyway, I'll
+tell you where I come in. I am interested in Mrs. Wenham Gardner. I am
+interested, also, in her sister, whom I think you know--Miss Beatrice
+Franklin, not Miss Tavernake!"
+
+Tavernake made no immediate reply. The man was an American, without a
+doubt. Perhaps he knew something of Beatrice. Perhaps this was one
+of the friends of that former life concerning which she had told him
+nothing.
+
+"You are not, by any chance, proposing," Tavernake said at last, "to
+discuss either of these ladies with me? I do not know you or what your
+business may be. In any case, I am going now."
+
+The other laid his hand on Tavernake's shoulder.
+
+"You'll be soaked to the skin," he protested. "I want you to come into
+the smoking-room here with me for a few minutes. We will have a drink
+together and a little conversation, if you don't mind."
+
+"But I do mind," Tavernake declared. "I don't know who you are and I
+don't want to know you, and I am not going to talk about Mrs. Gardner,
+or any other lady of my acquaintance, with strangers. Good-night!"
+
+"One moment, please, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+Tavernake hesitated. There was something curiously compelling in the
+other's smooth, distinct voice.
+
+"I'd like you to take this card," he said. "I told you my name before
+but I expect you've forgotten it,--Pritchard--Sam Pritchard. Ever heard
+of me before?"
+
+"Never!"
+
+"Not to have heard of me in the United States," the other continued,
+with a grim smile, "would be a tribute to your respectability. Most of
+the crooks who find their way over here know of Sam Pritchard. I am a
+detective and I come from New York."
+
+Tavernake turned and looked the man over. There was something convincing
+about his tone and appearance. It did not occur to him to doubt for a
+moment a word of this stranger's story.
+
+"You haven't anything against her--against either of them?" he asked,
+quickly.
+
+"Nothing directly," the detective answered. "All the same, you have been
+calling upon Mrs. Wenham Gardner this evening, and if you are a friend
+of hers I think that you had better come along with me and have that
+talk."
+
+"I will come," Tavernake agreed, "but I come as a listener. Remember
+that I have nothing to tell you. So far as you are concerned, I do not
+know either of those ladies."
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"Well," he said, "I guess we'll let it go at that. All the same, if you
+don't mind, we'll talk. Come this way and we'll get to the smoking-room
+through the hotel. It's under cover."
+
+Tavernake moved restlessly in his chair.
+
+"What the devil is all this talk about crooks!" he exclaimed
+impatiently. "I didn't come here to listen to this sort of thing. I am
+not sure that I believe a word of what you say."
+
+"Why should you," Pritchard remarked, "without proof? Look here."
+
+He drew a leather case from his pocket and spread it out. There were a
+dozen photographs there of men in prison attire. The detective pointed
+to one, and with a little shiver Tavernake recognized the face of the
+man who had been sitting at the right hand of Elizabeth.
+
+"You don't mean to say," he faltered, "that Mrs. Gardner--"
+
+The detective folded up his case and replaced it in his pocket.
+
+"No," he said, "we haven't any photographs of your lady friend there,
+nor of her sister. And yet, it may not be so far off."
+
+"If you are trying to fasten anything upon those ladies,--" Tavernake
+began, threateningly.
+
+The detective laughed and patted him on the shoulder.
+
+"It isn't my business to try and fasten things upon any one," he
+interrupted. "At the same time, you seem to be a friend of Mrs. Wenham
+Gardner, and it is just as well that some one should warn her."
+
+"Warn her of what?" Tavernake asked.
+
+The detective looked at his cigar meditatively.
+
+"Make her understand that there is trouble ahead," he replied.
+
+Tavernake sipped his whiskey and soda and lit a cigarette. Then he
+turned in his chair and looked thoughtfully at his companion. Pritchard
+was a striking-looking man, with hard, clean-cut features--a man of
+determination.
+
+"Mr. Pritchard, I am a clerk in an estate office. My people were
+work-people and I am trying to better myself in the world. I haven't
+learned how to beat about a subject, but I have learned a little of the
+world, and I know that people such as you are not in the habit of doing
+things without a reason. Why the devil have you brought me in here to
+talk about Mrs. Gardner and her sister? If you've anything to say, why
+don't you go to Mrs. Gardner herself and say it? Why do you come and
+talk to strangers about their affairs? I am here listening to you, but I
+tell you straight I don't like it."
+
+Pritchard nodded.
+
+"Say, I am not sure that I don't like that sort of talk," he declared.
+"I know all about you, young man. You're in Dowling & Spence's office
+and you've got to quit. You've got an estate you want financing.
+Miss Beatrice Franklin was living under your roof--as your sister, I
+understand--until yesterday, and Mrs. Gardner, for some reason of her
+own, seems to be doing her best to add you to the list of her admirers.
+I am not sure what it all means but I could make a pretty good guess.
+Here's my point, though. You're right. I didn't bring you here for your
+health. I brought you here because you can do me a service and yourself
+one at the same time, and you'll be doing no one any harm, nobody you
+care about, anyway. I have no grudge against Miss Beatrice. I'd just as
+soon she kept out of the trouble that's coming."
+
+"What is this service?" Tavernake asked.
+
+Pritchard for the moment evaded the point.
+
+"I dare say you can understand, Mr. Tavernake," he said, "that in my
+profession one has to sometimes go a long way round to get a man or a
+woman just where you want them. Now we merely glanced at that table as
+we came in, and I can tell you this for gospel truth--there isn't one
+of that crowd that I couldn't, if I liked, haul back to New York on some
+charge or another. You wonder why I don't do it. I'll tell you. It's
+because I am waiting--waiting until I can bring home something more
+serious, something that will keep them out of the way for just as long
+as possible. Do you follow me, Mr. Tavernake?"
+
+"I suppose I do," Tavernake answered, doubtfully. "You are only talking
+of the men, of course?"
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"My young friend," he agreed, "I am only talking of the men. At the same
+time, I guess I'm not betraying any confidence, or telling you anything
+that Mrs. Wenham Gardner doesn't know herself, when I say that she's
+doing her best to qualify for a similar position."
+
+"You mean that she is doing something against the law!" Tavernake
+exclaimed, indignantly. "I don't believe it for a moment. If she is
+associating with these people, it's because she doesn't know who they
+are."
+
+Pritchard flicked the ash from his cigar.
+
+"Well," he said, "every man has a right to his own opinions, and for my
+part I like to hear any one stick up for his friends. It makes no odds
+to me. However, here are a few facts I am going to bring before you.
+Four months ago, one of the turns at a vaudeville show down Broadway
+consisted of a performance by a Professor Franklin and his two
+daughters, Elizabeth and Beatrice. The professor hypnotized, told
+fortunes, felt heads, and the usual rigmarole. Beatrice sang, Elizabeth
+danced. People came to see the show, not because it was any good but
+because the girls, even in New York, were beautiful."
+
+"A music-hall in New York!" Tavernake muttered.
+
+The detective nodded.
+
+"Among the young bloods of the city," he continued, "were two brothers,
+as much alike as twins, although they aren't twins, whose names were
+Wenham and Jerry Gardner. There's nothing in fast life which those
+young men haven't tried. Between them, I should say they represented
+everything that was known of debauchery and dissipation. The eldest
+can't be more than twenty-seven to-day, but if you were to see them
+in the morning, either of them, before they had been massaged and
+galvanized into life, you'd think they were little old men, with just
+strength enough left to crawl about. Well, to cut a long story short,
+both of them fell in love with Elizabeth."
+
+"Brutes!" Tavernake interjected.
+
+"I guess they found Miss Elizabeth a pretty tough nut to crack," the
+detective went on. "Anyhow, you know what her price was from her name,
+which is hers right enough. Wenham, who was a year younger than his
+brother, was the first to bid it. Three months ago, Mr. and Mrs. Wenham
+Gardner, Miss Beatrice, and the devoted father left New York in the
+Lusitania and came to London."
+
+"Where is this Wenham Gardner, then?" Tavernake demanded.
+
+Pritchard took his cigar case from his pocket and selected another
+cigar.
+
+"Say, that's where you strike the nail right on the head," he remarked.
+"Where is this Wenham Gardner?"
+
+"I don't mind telling you, Mr. Tavernake, that to discover his
+whereabouts is exactly what I am over on this side for. I have a
+commission from the family to find out, and a blank cheque to do it
+with."
+
+"Do you mean that he has disappeared, then?" asked Tavernake.
+
+"Off the face of the earth, sir," Pritchard replied. "Something like two
+months ago, the young married couple, with Miss Beatrice, started for
+a holiday tour somewhere down in the west of England. A few days after
+they started, Miss Beatrice comes back to London alone. She goes to
+a boarding-house, is practically penniless, but she has shaken her
+sister--has, I believe, never spoken with her since. A little later,
+Elizabeth alone turns up in London. She has plenty of money, more
+money than she has ever had the control of before in her life, but no
+husband."
+
+"So far, I don't see anything remarkable about that," Tavernake
+interposed.
+
+"That may or may not be," Pritchard answered, drily. "This creature,
+Wenham Gardner--I hate to call him a man--was her abject slave--up till
+the time they reached London, at any rate. He would never have quit of
+his own accord. He stopped quite suddenly communicating with all his
+friends. None of their cables, even, were answered."
+
+"Why don't you go and ask Mrs. Gardner where he is?" Tavernake demanded
+bluntly.
+
+"I have already," Pritchard declared, "taken that liberty. With tears
+in her eyes, she assured me that after some slight quarrel, in which
+she admits that she was the one to blame, her husband walked out of the
+house where they were staying, and she has not seen him since. She was
+quite ready with all the particulars, and even implored me to help find
+him."
+
+"I cannot imagine," Tavernake said, "why any one should disbelieve her."
+
+The detective smiled.
+
+"There are a few little outside circumstances," he remarked, looking at
+the ash of his cigar. "In the first place, how do you suppose that this
+young Wenham Gardner spent the last week of his stay in New York?"
+
+"How should I know?" Tavernake replied, impatiently.
+
+"By realizing every cent of his property on which he could lay his
+hands," the detective continued. "It isn't at any time an easy business,
+and the Gardner interest is spread out in many directions, but he must
+have sailed with something like forty thousand pounds in hard cash.
+A suspicious person might presume that that forty thousand pounds has
+found its way to the stronger of the combination."
+
+"Anything else?" Tavernake asked.
+
+"I won't worry you much more," the detective answered. "There are a few
+other circumstances which seem to need explanation, but they can wait.
+There is one serious one, however, and that is where you come in."
+
+"Indeed!" Tavernake remarked. "I was hoping you would come to that
+soon."
+
+"The two sisters, Beatrice and Elizabeth, have been together ever
+since we can learn anything of their history. Those people who don't
+understand the disappearance of Wenham Gardner would like to know why
+they quarreled and parted, why Beatrice is keeping away from her sister
+in this strange manner. I personally, too, should like to know from Miss
+Beatrice when she last saw Wenham Gardner alive."
+
+"You want me to ask Miss Beatrice these things?" Tavernake demanded.
+
+"It might come better from you," Pritchard admitted. "I have written her
+to the theatre but naturally she has not replied."
+
+Tavernake looked curiously at his companion.
+
+"Do you really suppose," he asked, "that, even granted there were any
+unusual circumstances in connection with that quarrel--do you seriously
+suppose that Beatrice would give her sister away?"
+
+The detective sighed.
+
+"No doubt, Mr. Tavernake," he said, "these young ladies are friends of
+yours, and perhaps for that reason you are a little prejudiced in their
+favor. Their whole bringing-up and associations, however, have certainly
+not been of a strict order. I cannot help thinking that persuasion might
+be brought to bear upon Miss Beatrice, that it might be pointed out to
+her that a true story is the safest."
+
+"Well, if you've finished," Tavernake declared, "I'd like to tell you
+what I think of your story. I think it's all d--d silly nonsense! This
+Wenham Gardner, by your own saying, was half mad. There was a quarrel
+and he's gone off to Paris or somewhere. As to your suggestions about
+Mrs. Gardner, I think they're infamous."
+
+Pritchard was unmoved by his companion's warmth.
+
+"Why, that's all right, Mr. Tavernake," he affirmed. "I can quite
+understand your feeling like that just at first. You see, I've been
+among crime and criminals all my days, and I learn to look for a certain
+set of motives when a thing of this sort happens. You've been brought
+up among honest folk, who go the straightforward way about life, and
+naturally you look at the same matter from a different point of view.
+But you and I have got to talk this out. I want you to understand that
+those very charming young ladies are not quite the class of young women
+whom you know anything about. Mind you, I haven't a word to say against
+Miss Beatrice. I dare say she's as straight as they make 'em. But--you
+must take another whiskey and soda, Mr. Tavernake. Now, I insist upon
+it. Tim, come right over here."
+
+Mr. Pritchard seemed to have forgotten what he was talking about. The
+room had been suddenly invaded. The whole of the little supper party,
+whose individual members he had pointed out to his companion, came
+trooping into the room. They were all apparently on the best of terms
+with themselves, and they all seemed to make a point of absolutely
+ignoring Pritchard's presence. Elizabeth was the one exception. She was
+carrying a tiny Chinese spaniel under one arm; with the fingers of her
+other hand she held a tortoise-shell mounted monocle to her eye, and
+stared directly at the two men. Presently she came languidly across the
+room to them.
+
+"Dear me," she said, "I had no idea that even your wide circle of
+acquaintances, Mr. Pritchard, included my friend, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+The two men rose to their feet. Tavernake felt confused and angry. It
+was as though he had been playing the traitor in listening, even for a
+moment, to these stories.
+
+"Mr. Pritchard introduced himself to me only a few minutes ago," he
+declared. "He brought me in here and I have been listening to a lot of
+rubbish from him of which I don't believe a single word."
+
+She flashed a wonderful smile upon him.
+
+"Mr. Pritchard is so very censorious," she murmured. "He takes such a
+very low view of human nature. After all, though, I suppose we must not
+blame him. I think that as men and women we do not exist to him. We are
+simply the pegs by means of which he can climb a little higher in the
+esteem of his employers."
+
+Pritchard took up his soft hat and stick.
+
+"Mrs. Gardner," he said, "I will confess that I have been wasting my
+time with this young man. You are a trifle severe upon me. You may find,
+and before long, that I am your best friend."
+
+She laughed delightfully.
+
+"Dear Mr. Pritchard," she exclaimed, "it is a strange thought, that! If
+only I dared hope that some day it might come true!"
+
+"More unlikely things, madam, are happening every hour," the detective
+remarked. "The world--our little corner of it, at any rate--is full
+of anomalies. There might even come a time to any one of us three when
+liberty was more dangerous than the prison cell itself."
+
+He nodded carelessly to Tavernake, and with a bow to Elizabeth turned
+and left the room. Elizabeth remained as though turned to stone, looking
+after him as he descended the stairs.
+
+"The man is a fool!" Tavernake cried, roughly.
+
+Elizabeth shook her head and sighed.
+
+"He is something far more ineffective," she said. "He is just a little
+too clever."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER, XV. GENERAL DISCONTENT
+
+
+Elizabeth did not at once rejoin her friends. Instead, she sank on to
+the low settee close to where she had been standing, and drew Tavernake
+down to her side. She waved her hand across at the others, who were
+calling for her.
+
+"In a moment, dear people," she said.
+
+Then she leaned back among the cushions and laughed at her companion.
+
+"Tell me, Mr. Tavernake," she asked, "don't you feel that you have
+stepped into a sort of modern Arabian Nights?"
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Oh, I know Mr. Pritchard's weakness," she continued. "He loves to throw
+a glamour around everything he says or does. Because he honors me by
+interesting himself in my concerns, he has probably told you all sorts
+of wonderful things about me and my friends. A very ingenious romancer,
+Mr. Pritchard, you know. Confess, now, didn't he tell you some stories
+about us?"
+
+She might have spared herself the trouble of beating about the bush.
+There was no hesitation about Tavernake.
+
+"He said that your friends were every one of them criminals," Tavernake
+declared, "and he admitted that he was working hard at the present
+moment to discover that you were one, too."
+
+She laughed softly but heartily.
+
+"I wonder what was his object," she remarked, "in taking you into his
+confidence."
+
+"He happened to know," Tavernake explained, "that I was intimate with
+your sister. He wanted me to ask Beatrice a certain question."
+
+Elizabeth laughed no more. She looked steadfastly into his eyes.
+
+"And that question?"
+
+"He wanted me to ask Beatrice why she left you and hid herself in
+London."
+
+She tried to smile but not very successfully.
+
+"According to his story," Tavernake continued, "you and Beatrice and
+your husband were away together somewhere in the country. Something
+happened there, something which resulted in the disappearance of your
+husband. Beatrice came back alone and has not been near you since. Soon
+afterwards, you, too, came back alone. Mr. Gardner has not been seen or
+heard of."
+
+Elizabeth was bending over her dog, but even Tavernake, unobservant
+though he was, could see that she was shaken.
+
+"Pritchard is a clever man, generally," she remarked, "diabolically
+clever. Why has he told you all this, I wonder? He must have known that
+you would probably repeat it to me. Why does he want to show me his
+hand?"
+
+"I have no idea," Tavernake replied. "These matters are all beyond
+me. They do not concern me in any way. I am not keeping you from your
+friends? Please send me away when you like."
+
+"Don't go just yet," she begged. "Sit with me for a moment. Can't you
+see," she added, whispering, "that I have had a shock? Sit with me. I
+can't go back to those others just yet."
+
+Tavernake did as he was bidden. The woman at his side was still
+caressing the little animal she carried. Watching her, however,
+Tavernake could see that her bosom was rising and falling quickly. There
+was an unnatural pallor in her cheeks, a terrified gleam in her eyes.
+Nevertheless, these things passed. In a very few seconds she was herself
+again.
+
+"Come," she said, "it is not often that I give way. The only time I am
+ever afraid is when there is something which I do not understand. I do
+not understand Mr. Pritchard to-night. I know that he is my enemy. I
+cannot imagine why he should talk to you. He must have known that you
+would repeat all he said. It is not like him. Tell me, Mr. Tavernake,
+you have heard all sorts of things about me. Do you believe them? Do
+you believe--it's rather a horrible thing to ask, isn't it?" she went on
+hurriedly,--"do you believe that I made away with my husband?"
+
+"You surely do not need to ask me that question," Tavernake answered,
+fervently. "I should believe your word, whatever you told me. I should
+not believe that you could do anything wrong."
+
+Her hand touched his for a moment and he was repaid.
+
+"Don't think too well of me," she begged. "I don't want to disappoint
+you."
+
+Some one pushed open the swing doors and she started nervously. It was
+only a waiter who passed through into the bar.
+
+"What I think of you," Tavernake said slowly, "nothing could alter, but
+because I am stupid, I suppose, there is quite a good deal that I cannot
+understand. I cannot understand, for instance, why they should suspect
+you of having anything to do with your husband's disappearance. You can
+prove where you were when he left you?"
+
+"Quite easily," she answered, "only, unfortunately, no one seems to
+have seen him go. He timed his departure so cunningly that he apparently
+vanished into thin air. Even then," she continued, "but for one thing
+I don't suppose that any one would have had suspicions. I dare say Mr.
+Pritchard told you that before we left New York my husband sold out some
+of his property and brought it over to Europe with him in cash. We had
+both determined that we would live abroad and have nothing more to do
+with America. It was not I who persuaded him to do this. It made no
+difference to me. If he had run away and left me, the courts would have
+given me money. If he had died and I had been a widow, he would have
+left me his property. But simply because there was all this money in
+our hands, and because he disappeared, his people and this man Pritchard
+suspect me."
+
+"It is wicked," he muttered.
+
+She turned slowly towards him.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she said, "do you know that you can help me very much
+indeed?"
+
+"I only wish I could," he replied. "Try me."
+
+"Can't you see," she went on, "that the great thing against me is that
+Beatrice left me suddenly when we were on that wretched expedition, and
+came back alone? She is in London, I know, quite close to me, and still
+she hides. Pritchard asks himself why. Mr. Tavernake, go and tell her
+what people are saying, go and tell her everything that has happened,
+let her understand that her keeping away is doing me a terrible injury,
+beg her to come and let people see that we are reconciled, and warn her,
+too, against Pritchard. Will you do this for me?"
+
+"Of course I will," Tavernake answered. "I will see her to-morrow."
+
+Elizabeth drew a little sigh of relief.
+
+"And you'll let me know what she says?" she asked, rising.
+
+"I shall be only too glad to," Tavernake assured her.
+
+"Good-night!"
+
+She looked up into his face with a smile which had turned the heads of
+hardened stagers in New York. No wonder that Tavernake felt his heart
+beat against his ribs! He took her hands and held them for a moment.
+Then he turned abruptly away.
+
+"Good-night!" he said.
+
+He disappeared through the swing doors. She strolled across the room to
+where her friends were sitting in a circle, laughing and talking. Her
+father, who had just come in and joined them, gripped her by the arm as
+she sat down.
+
+"What does it mean?" he demanded, with shaking voice. "Did you see
+that he was there with Pritchard--your young man--that wretched estate
+agent's clerk? I tell you that Pritchard was pumping him for all he was
+worth."
+
+"My dear father," she whispered, coldly, "don't be melodramatic. You
+give yourself away the whole time. Go to bed if you can't behave like a
+man."
+
+The lights had been turned low, there was no one else in the room. The
+little old gentleman with the eyeglass leaned forward.
+
+"Have you any notion, my dear Elizabeth," he asked, "why our friend
+Pritchard is so much in evidence just at present?"
+
+"Not on account of you, Jimmy," she answered, "nor of any one else here,
+in fact. The truth is he has conceived a violent admiration for me--an
+admiration so pronounced, indeed, that he hates to let me out of his
+sight."
+
+They all laughed uproariously. Then Walter Crease, the journalist,
+leaned forward,--a man with a long, narrow face, yellow-stained fingers,
+and hollow cheekbones. He glanced around the room before he spoke, and
+his voice sounded like a hoarse whisper.
+
+"See here," he said, "seems to me Pritchard is getting mighty awkward.
+He hasn't got his posse around him in this country, anyway."
+
+There was a dead silence for several seconds. Then the little old
+gentleman nodded solemnly.
+
+"I am a trifle tired of Pritchard myself," he admitted, "and he
+certainly knows too much. He carries too much in his head to go around
+safely."
+
+The eyes of Elizabeth were bright.
+
+"He treats us like children," she declared. "To-night he has told the
+whole of my affairs to a perfect stranger. It is intolerable!"
+
+The little party broke up soon after. Only Walter Crease and the
+man called Jimmy Post were left talking, and they retired into the
+window-seat, whispering together.
+
+Tavernake, with his hands thrust deep in his overcoat pockets, left the
+hotel and strode along the Strand. Some fancy seized him before he had
+gone many paces, and turning abruptly to the left he descended to the
+Embankment. He made his way to the very seat upon which he had sat once
+before with Beatrice. With folded arms he leaned back in the corner,
+looking out across the river, at the curving line of lights, at the
+black, turgid waters, the slowly-moving hulk of a barge on its way down
+the stream. It was a new thing, this, for him to have to accuse himself
+of folly, of weakness. For the last few days he had moved in a mist of
+uncertainty, setting his heel upon all reflection, avoiding every issue.
+To-night he could escape those accusing thoughts no longer; to-night he
+was more than ever bitter with himself. What folly was this which had
+sprung up in his life--folly colossal, unimaginable, as unexpected as
+though it had fallen a thunderbolt from the skies! What had happened to
+change him so completely!
+
+His thought traveled back to the boarding-house. It was there that the
+thing had begun. Before that night upon the roof, the finger-posts which
+he had set up with such care and deliberation along the road which led
+towards his coveted goal, had seemed to him to point with unfaltering
+directness towards everything in life worthy of consideration. To-night
+they were only dreary phantasms, marking time across a miserable plain.
+Perhaps, after all, there had been something in his nature, some rebel
+thing, intolerable yet to be reckoned with, which had been first born of
+that fateful curiosity of his. It had leapt up so suddenly, sprung with
+such scanty notice into strenuous and insistent life. Yet what place had
+it there? He must fight against it, root it out with both hands. What
+was this world of intrigue, this criminal, undesirable world, to him?
+His common sense forbade him altogether to dissociate Elizabeth from her
+friends, from her surroundings. She was the secret of the pain which was
+tearing at his heartstrings, of all the excitement, the joy, the passion
+which had swept like a full flood across the level way of his life,
+which had set him drifting among the unknown seas. Yet it was Beatrice
+who had brought this upon him. If she had never left, if he had not
+tasted the horrors of this new loneliness, he might have been able to
+struggle on. He missed her, missed her diabolically. The other things,
+marvelous though they were, had been more or less like a mirage.
+This world of new emotions had spread like a silken mesh over all his
+thoughts, over all his desires. Beatrice had been a tangible person,
+restful, delightful, a real companion, his one resource against this
+madness. And now she was gone, and he was powerless to get her back.
+He turned his head, he looked up the road along which he had torn that
+night with his arms around her. She owed him her life and she had gone!
+With all a man's inconsequence, it seemed to him as he rose heavily to
+his feet and started homeward, that she had repaid him with a certain
+amount of ingratitude, that she had left him at the one moment in his
+life when he needed her most.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI. AN OFFER OF MARRIAGE
+
+
+The next afternoon, at half-past four, Tavernake was having tea with
+Beatrice in the tiny flat which she was sharing with another girl, off
+Kingsway. She opened the door to him herself, and though she chattered
+ceaselessly, it seemed to him that she was by no means at her ease. She
+installed him in the only available chair, an absurd little wicker thing
+many sizes too small for him, and seated herself upon the hearth-rug a
+few feet away.
+
+"You have soon managed to find me out, Leonard," she remarked.
+
+"Yes," he answered. "I had to go to the stage doorkeeper for your
+address."
+
+"He hadn't the slightest right to give it you," she declared.
+
+Tavernake shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"I had to have it," he said simply.
+
+"The power of the purse again!" she laughed. "Now that you are here, I
+don't believe that you are a bit glad to see me. Are you?"
+
+He did not answer for a moment. He was thinking of that vigil upon
+the Embankment, of the long walk home, of the battle with himself, the
+continual striving to tear from his heart this new thing, for which,
+with a curious and most masculine inconsistency, he persisted in holding
+her responsible.
+
+"You know, Leonard," she continued, getting up abruptly and beginning to
+make the tea, "I believe that you are angry with me. If you are, all I
+can say is that you are a very foolish person. I had to come away. Can't
+you see that?"
+
+"I cannot," he answered stolidly.
+
+She sighed.
+
+"You are not a reasonable person," she declared. "I suppose it is
+because you have led such a queer life, and had no womenfolk to look
+after you. You don't understand. It was absurd, in a way, that I should
+ever have called myself your sister, that we should even have attempted
+such a ridiculous experiment. But after--after the other night--"
+
+"Can't we forget that?" he interrupted.
+
+She raised her eyes and looked at him.
+
+"Can you?" she asked.
+
+There was a curious, almost a pleading earnestness in her tone. Her eyes
+had something new to say, something which, though it failed to stir his
+blood, made him vaguely uncomfortable. Nevertheless, he answered her
+without hesitation.
+
+"Yes," he replied, "I could forget it. I will promise to forget it."
+
+It was unaccountable, but he almost fancied that he saw this new thing
+pass from her face, leaving her pale and tremulous. She looked away
+again and busied herself with the tea-caddy, but the fingers which held
+the spoon were shaking a little.
+
+"Oh, I suppose I could forget," she said, "but it would be very
+difficult for either of us to behave as though it had never happened.
+Besides, it really was an impossible situation, you know," she went on,
+looking down into the tea-caddy. "It is much better for me to be here
+with Annie. You can come and see me now and then and we can still be
+very good friends."
+
+Tavernake was annoyed. He said nothing, and Beatrice, glancing up,
+laughed at his gloomy expression.
+
+"You certainly are," she declared, "the most impossible, the most
+primitive person I ever met. London isn't Arcadia, you know, and you are
+not my brother. Besides, you were such an autocrat. You didn't even like
+my going out to supper with Mr. Grier."
+
+"I hate the fellow!" Tavernake admitted. "Are you seeing much of him?"
+
+"He took us all out to supper last night," she replied. "I thought it
+was very kind of him to ask me."
+
+"Kind, indeed! Does he want to marry you?" Tavernake demanded.
+
+She set down the teapot and again she laughed softly. In her plain black
+gown, very simple, adorned only by the little white bow at her neck,
+quakerlike and spotless, with the added color in her cheeks, too, which
+seemed to have come there during the last few moments, she was a very
+alluring person.
+
+"He can't," she declared. "He is married already."
+
+Then there came to Tavernake an inspiration, an inspiration so wonderful
+that he gripped the sides of his chair and sat up. Here, after all, was
+the way out for him, the way out from his garden of madness, the way to
+escape from that mysterious, paralyzing yoke whose burden was already
+heavy upon his shoulders. In that swift, vivid moment he saw something
+of the truth. He saw himself losing all his virility, the tool and
+plaything of this woman who had bewitched him, a poor, fond creature
+living only for the kind words and glances she might throw him at her
+pleasure. In those few seconds he knew the true from the false.
+Without hesitation, he gripped with all the colossal selfishness of his
+unthinking sex at the rope which was thrown to him.
+
+"Well, then, I do," he said firmly. "Will you marry me, Beatrice?"
+
+She threw her head back and laughed, laughed long and softly, and
+Tavernake, simple and unversed in the ways of women, believed that she
+was indeed amused.
+
+"Neither you nor any one else, dear Leonard!" she exclaimed.
+
+"But I want you to," he persisted. "I think that you will."
+
+There was coquetry now in the tantalizing look she flashed him.
+
+"Am I, too, then, one of these things to be attained in your life?" she
+asked. "Dear Leonard, you mustn't say it like that. I don't like the
+look of your jaw. It frightens me."
+
+"There is nothing to be afraid of in marrying me," he answered. "I
+should make you a very good husband. Some day you would be rich, very
+rich indeed. I am quite sure that I shall succeed, if not at once,
+very soon. There is plenty of money to be made in the world if one
+perseveres."
+
+She had the air of trying to take him seriously.
+
+"You sound quite convincing," she admitted, "but I do wish that you
+would put all these thoughts out of your mind, Leonard. It doesn't sound
+like you in the least. Remember what you told me that first night; you
+assured me that women had not the slightest part in your life."
+
+"I have changed," he confessed. "I did not expect anything of the sort
+to happen, but it has. It would be foolish of me to deny it. I have been
+all my life learning, Beatrice," he continued, with a sudden curious
+softness in his tone, "and yet, somehow or other, it seems to me that I
+never knew anything at all until lately. There was no one to direct me,
+no one to show me just what is worth while in life. You have taught me a
+great deal, you have taught me how little I know. And there are things,"
+he went on, solemnly, "of which I am afraid, things which I do not begin
+even to understand. Can't you see how it is with me? I am really very
+ignorant. I want some one who understands; I want you, Beatrice, very
+badly."
+
+She patted the back of his hand caressingly.
+
+"You mustn't talk like that, Leonard," she said. "I shouldn't make you a
+good wife. I am not going to marry any one."
+
+"And why?" he asked.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"That is my secret," she told him, looking into the fire.
+
+"You mean to say that, you will never marry?" he persisted.
+
+"Oh, I suppose I shall change, like other women," she answered. "Just at
+present, I feel like that."
+
+"Is it because your sister's marriage--"
+
+She caught hold of both his hands; her eyes were suddenly full of
+terror.
+
+"You mustn't talk about Elizabeth," she begged, "you please mustn't talk
+about her. Promise that you won't."
+
+"But I came here to talk about her," he replied.
+
+Beatrice, for a moment, said nothing. Then she threw down his hands and
+laughed once more. As she flung herself back in her place, it seemed to
+Tavernake that he saw once more the girl who had stood upon the roof of
+the boarding-house.
+
+"You came to talk about Elizabeth!" she exclaimed. "I forgot. Well, go
+on, what is it?"
+
+"Your sister is in trouble!"
+
+"Are you her confidant?" Beatrice asked.
+
+"I am not exactly that," he admitted, "but she has asked me to come and
+see you."
+
+Beatrice had suddenly grown hard, her lips were set together, even her
+attitude was uncompromising.
+
+"Say exactly what you have to say," she told him. "I will not
+interrupt."
+
+"It sounds foolish," Tavernake declared, "because I know so little, but
+it seems that your sister is being annoyed by a man named Pritchard, an
+American detective. She tells me that he suspects her of being concerned
+in some way with the disappearance of her husband. One of his reasons is
+that you left her abruptly and went into hiding, that you will not see
+or speak to her. She wishes you to be reconciled."
+
+"Is that all?" Beatrice asked.
+
+"It is all," he replied, "so long as you understand its significance.
+If you go to see your sister, or let her come to see you, this man
+Pritchard will have one of his causes for suspicion removed."
+
+"So you came as Elizabeth's ambassador," Beatrice said, half as though
+to herself. "Well, here is my answer. I will not go to Elizabeth. If she
+finds out my whereabouts and comes here, then I shall go away again and
+hide. I shall never willingly exchange another word with her as long as
+I live."
+
+Tavernake looked at her doubtfully.
+
+"But she is your sister!" he explained.
+
+"She is my sister," Beatrice repeated, "and yet what I have said to you
+I mean."
+
+There was a short silence. Tavernake felt unaccountably ill at ease.
+Something had sprung up between them which he did not understand. He was
+swift to recognize, however, the note of absolute finality in her tone.
+
+"I have given my message," he declared. "I shall tell her what you say.
+Perhaps I had better go now."
+
+He half rose to his feet. Suddenly she lost control of herself.
+
+"Leonard, Leonard," she cried, "don't you see that you are being very
+foolish indeed? You have been good to me. Let me try and repay it a
+little. Elizabeth is my sister, but listen! What I say to you now I say
+in deadly earnest. Elizabeth has no heart, she has no thought for other
+people, she makes use of them and they count for no more to her than
+the figures that pass through one's dreams. She has some sort of hateful
+gift," Beatrice continued, and her voice shook and her eyes flashed,
+"some hateful gift of attracting people to her and making them do her
+bidding, of spoiling their lives and throwing them away when they have
+ceased to be useful. Leonard, you must not let her do this with you."
+
+He rose to his feet awkwardly. Very likely it was all true, and yet,
+what difference did it make?
+
+"Thank you," he said.
+
+They stood, for a moment, hand in hand. Then they heard the sound of a
+key in the lock.
+
+"Here's Annie coming back!" Beatrice exclaimed.
+
+Tavernake was introduced to Miss Annie Legarde, who thought he was a
+very strange person indeed because he did not fit in with any of the
+types of men, young or old, of whom she knew anything. And as for
+Tavernake, he considered that Miss Annie Legarde would have looked at
+least as well in a hat half the size, and much better without the
+powder upon her face. Her clothes were obviously more expensive than
+Beatrice's, but they were put on with less care and taste.
+
+Beatrice came out on to the landing with him.
+
+"So you won't marry me, Beatrice?" he said, as she held out her hand.
+
+She looked at him for a moment and then turned away with a faint sob,
+without even a word of farewell. He watched her disappear and heard
+the door shut. Slowly he began to descend the stone steps. There was
+something to him a little fateful about the closed door above, the long
+yet easy descent into the street.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII. THE BALCONY AT IMANO'S
+
+
+At six o'clock that evening, Tavernake rang up the Milan Court and
+inquired for Elizabeth. There was a moment or two's delay and then he
+heard her reply. Even over the telephone wires, even though he stood,
+cramped and uncomfortable, in that stuffy little telephone booth, he
+felt the quick start of pleasure, the thrill of something different
+in life, which came to him always at the sound of her voice, at the
+slightest suggestion of her presence.
+
+"Well, my friend, what fortune?" she asked him.
+
+"None," he answered. "I have done my best. Beatrice will not listen to
+me."
+
+"She will not come and see me?"
+
+"She will not."
+
+Elizabeth was silent for a moment. When she spoke again, there was a
+change in her tone.
+
+"You have failed, then."
+
+"I did everything that could be done," Tavernake insisted eagerly. "I
+am quite sure that nothing anybody could say would move Beatrice. She is
+very decided indeed."
+
+"I have another idea," Elizabeth remarked, after a brief pause. "She
+will not come to me; very well, I must go to her. You must take me
+there."
+
+"I cannot do that," Tavernake answered.
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Beatrice has refused absolutely to permit me to tell you or any one
+else of her whereabouts," he declared. "Without her permission I cannot
+do it."
+
+"Do you mean that?" she asked.
+
+"Of course," he answered uncomfortably.
+
+There was another silence. When she spoke again, her voice had changed
+for the second time. Tavernake felt his heart sink as he listened.
+
+"Very well," she said. "I thought that you were my friend, that you
+wished to help me."
+
+"I do," he replied, "but you would not have me break my word?"
+
+"You are breaking your word with me," she told him.
+
+"It is a different thing," he insisted.
+
+"You will not take me there?" she said once more.
+
+"I cannot," Tavernake answered.
+
+"Very well, good-bye!"
+
+"Don't go," he begged. "Can't I see you somewhere for a few minutes this
+evening?"
+
+"I am afraid not," Elizabeth replied coolly.
+
+"Are you going out?" he persisted.
+
+"I am going to the Duke of York's Theatre with some friends," she
+answered. "I am sorry. You have disappointed me."
+
+She rang off and he turned away from the telephone booth into the
+street. It seemed to him, as he walked down the crowded thoroughfare,
+that some reflection of his own self-contempt was visible in the
+countenances of the men and women who were hurrying past him. Wherever
+he looked, he was acutely conscious of it. In his heart he felt the
+bitter sense of shame of a man who wilfully succumbs to weakness. Yet
+that night he made his efforts.
+
+For four hours he sat in his lonely rooms and worked. Then the unequal
+struggle was ended. With a groan he caught up his hat and coat and
+left the house. Half an hour later, he was among the little crowd of
+loiterers and footmen standing outside the doors of the Duke of York's
+Theatre.
+
+It was still some time before the termination of the performance. As the
+slow minutes dragged by, he grew to hate himself, to hate this new
+thing in his life which had torn down his everyday standards, which had
+carried him off his feet in this strange and detestable fashion. It
+was a dormant sense, without a doubt, which Elizabeth had stirred into
+life--the sense of sex, quiescent in him so long, chiefly through
+his perfect physical sanity; perhaps, too, in some measure, from his
+half-starved imagination. It was significant, though, that once aroused
+it burned with surprising and unwavering fidelity. The whole world of
+women now were different creatures to him, but they left him as utterly
+unmoved as in his unawakened days. It was Elizabeth only he wanted,
+craved for fiercely, with all this late-born passion of mingled
+sentiment and desire. He felt himself, as he hung round there upon the
+pavement, rubbing shoulders with the liveried servants, the loafers,
+and the passers-by, a thing to be despised. He was like a whipped dog
+fawning back to his master. Yet if only he could persuade her to come
+with him, if it were but for an hour! If only she would sit opposite him
+in that wonderful little restaurant, where the lights and the music, the
+laughter and the wine, were all outward symbols of this new life from
+before which her fingers seemed to have torn aside the curtains! His
+heart beat with a fierce impatience. He watched the thin stream of
+people who left before the play was over, suburbanites mostly, in
+a hurry for their trains. Very soon the whole audience followed,
+commissionaires were busy with their whistles, the servants eagerly
+looking right and left for their masters. And then Elizabeth! She came
+out in the midst of half-a-dozen others, brilliant in a wonderful
+cloak and dress of turquoise blue, laughing with her friends, to all
+appearance the gayest of the party. Tavernake stepped quickly forward,
+but at that moment there was a crush and he could not advance. She
+passed within a yard of him, escorted by a couple of men, and for a
+moment their eyes met. She raised her eyebrows, as though in surprise,
+and her recognition was of the slightest. She passed on and entered a
+waiting motorcar, accompanied by the two men. Tavernake stood and looked
+after it. She did not even glance round. Except for that little gesture
+of cold surprise, she had ignored him. Tavernake, scarcely knowing what
+he did, turned slowly towards the Strand.
+
+He was face to face now with a crisis before which he seemed powerless.
+Men were there in the world to be bullied, cajoled, or swept out of the
+way. What did one do with a woman who was kind one moment and insolent
+the next, who raised her eyebrows and passed on when he wanted her, when
+he was there longing for her? Those old solid dreams of his--wealth,
+power, his name on great prospectuses, a position in the world--these
+things now appeared like the day fancies of a child. He had seen his way
+towards them. Already he had felt his feet upon the rungs of the ladder
+which leads to material success. This was something different, something
+greater. Then a sense of despair chilled his heart. He felt how
+ignorant, how helpless he was. He had not even studied the first
+text-book of life. Those very qualities which had served him so well
+before were hopeless here. Persistence, Beatrice had told him once, only
+annoys a woman.
+
+He came to a standstill outside the entrance to the Milan Court, and
+retraced his steps. The thought of Beatrice had brought something
+soothing with it. He felt that he must see her, see her at once. He
+walked back along the Strand and entered the restaurant where Beatrice
+and he had had their memorable supper. From the vestibule he could just
+see Grier's back as he stood talking to a waiter by the side of a round
+table in the middle of the room. Tavernake slowly withdrew and made his
+way upstairs. There were one or two little tables there in the balcony,
+hidden from the lower part of the room. He seated himself at one,
+handing his coat and hat mechanically to the waiter who came hurrying
+up.
+
+"But, Monsieur," the man explained, with a deprecating gesture, "these
+tables are all taken."
+
+Tavernake, who kept an account book in which he registered even his car
+fares, put five shillings in the man's hand.
+
+"This one I will have," he said, firmly, and sat down.
+
+The man looked at him and turned aside to speak to the head waiter. They
+conversed together in whispers. Tavernake took no notice. His jaw was
+set. Himself unseen, he was gazing steadfastly at that table below. The
+head waiter shrugged his shoulders and departed; his other clients
+must be mollified. There was a finality which was unanswerable about
+Tavernake's methods.
+
+Tavernake ate and drank what they brought to him, ate and drank and
+suffered. Everything was as it had been that other night--the popping
+of corks, the soft music, the laughter of women, the pleasant, luxurious
+sense of warmth and gayety pervading the whole place.
+
+It was all just the same, but this time he sat outside and looked on.
+Beatrice was seated next Grier, and on her other side was a young man of
+the type which Tavernake detested, partly because it inspired him with
+a reluctant but insistent sense of inferiority. The young man was
+handsome, tall, and thin. His evening clothes fitted him perfectly,
+his studs and links were of the latest mode, his white tie arranged as
+though by the fingers of an artist. And yet he was no tailor's model.
+A gentleman, beyond a doubt, Tavernake decided, watching grudgingly the
+courteous movement of his head, listening sometimes to his well-bred but
+rather languid voice. Beatrice laughed often into his face. She admired
+him, of course. How could she help it! Grier sat at her other side. He,
+too, talked to her whenever he had the chance. It was a new fever which
+Tavernake was tasting, a new fever burning in his blood. He was jealous;
+he hated the whole party below. In imagination he saw Elizabeth with her
+friends, supping most likely in that other, more resplendent restaurant,
+only a few yards away. He imagined her the centre of every attention.
+Without a doubt, she was looking at her neighbor as she had looked at
+him. Tavernake bit his lip, frowning. If he had had it in his power,
+in those black moments, to have thrown a thunderbolt from his place, he
+would have wrecked every table in the room, he would have watched with
+joy the white, startled faces of the revelers as they fled away into
+the night. It was a new torture, indescribable, bitter. Indeed, this
+curiosity of his, of which he had spoken to Beatrice as they had walked
+together down Oxford Street on that first evening, was being satisfied
+with a vengeance! He was learning of those other things of life. He had
+sipped at the sweetness; he was drinking the bitters!
+
+An altercation by his side distracted him. Again there was the head
+waiter and a protesting guest. Tavernake looked up and recognized
+Professor Franklin. With his broad-brimmed hat in his hand, the
+professor, in fluent phraseology and a strong American accent, was
+making himself decidedly disagreeable.
+
+"You had better send for your manager right away, young man," he
+declared. "On Tuesday night he brought me here himself and I engaged
+this table for the week. No, I tell you I won't have any other! I guess
+my order was good enough. You send for Luigi right here. You know who I
+am? Professor Franklin's my name, from New York, and if I say I mean to
+have a thing, I expect to get it."
+
+For the first time he recognized Tavernake, and paused for a moment in
+his speech.
+
+"Have I got your table, Professor?" Tavernake asked, slowly.
+
+"You have, sir," the professor answered. "I did not recognize you when
+I came in or I would have addressed you personally. I have particular
+reasons for occupying a front table here every night this week."
+
+The thoughts began to crowd in upon Tavernake's brain. He hesitated.
+
+"Why not sit down with me?" he suggested.
+
+The professor acquiesced without a word. The head waiter, with a sigh
+of relief, took his hat and overcoat and accepted his order. Tavernake
+leaned across the table.
+
+"Professor," he said, "why do you insist upon sitting up here?"
+
+The professor moved his head slowly downwards.
+
+"My young friend, I speak to you in confidence?"
+
+"In confidence," Tavernake repeated.
+
+"I come here secretly," the professor continued, "because it is the only
+chance I have of seeing a very dear relative of mine. I am obliged to
+keep away from her just now, but from here I can watch, I can see that
+she is well."
+
+"You mean your daughter Beatrice," Tavernake said, calmly.
+
+The professor trembled all over.
+
+"You know!" he muttered.
+
+"Yes, I know," Tavernake answered. "I have been able to be of some
+slight assistance to your daughter Beatrice."
+
+The professor grasped his hand.
+
+"Yes, yes," he said, "Elizabeth is very angry with you because you
+will not tell her where to find the little girl. You are right, Mr.
+Tavernake. You must never tell her."
+
+"I don't intend it," Tavernake declared.
+
+"Say, this is a great evening for me!" the professor went on, eagerly.
+"I found out by accident myself. I was at the bar and I saw her come in
+with a lot of others."
+
+"Why don't you go and speak to her?" Tavernake asked.
+
+The professor shivered.
+
+"There has been a disagreement," he explained. "Beatrice and Elizabeth
+have quarreled. Mind you, Beatrice was right."
+
+"Then why don't you go to her instead of staying with Elizabeth?"
+Tavernake demanded, bluntly.
+
+The professor temporarily collapsed. He drank heavily of the whiskey and
+soda by his side, and answered gloomily.
+
+"My young friend," he said, "Beatrice, when she left us, was penniless.
+Mind you, Elizabeth is the one with brains. It is Elizabeth who has the
+money. She has a strong will, too. She keeps me there whether I will or
+not, she makes me do many things--many things, surely--which I hate. But
+Elizabeth has her way. If I had gone with Beatrice, if I were to go to
+her now, I should be only a burden upon her."
+
+"You have no money, then?" Tavernake remarked.
+
+The professor shook his head sadly.
+
+"Speculations, my young friend," he replied, "speculations undertaken
+solely with the object of making a fortune for my children. I have had
+money and lost it."
+
+"Can't you earn any?" Tavernake asked. "Beatrice doesn't seem
+extravagant."
+
+The professor regarded this outspoken young man with an air of hurt
+dignity.
+
+"If you will forgive me," he said. "I think that we will choose another
+subject of conversation."
+
+"At any rate," Tavernake declared, "you must be fond of your daughter or
+you would not come here night after night just to look at her."
+
+The professor shook out a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed his
+eyes.
+
+"Beatrice was always my favorite," he announced solemnly, "but
+Elizabeth--well, you can't get away from Elizabeth," he added, leaning
+across the table. "To tell you the truth, Mr. Tavernake, Elizabeth
+terrifies me sometimes, she is so bold. I am afraid where her scheming
+may land us. I would be happier with Beatrice if only she had the means
+to satisfy my trifling wants."
+
+He turned to the waiter and ordered a pint of champagne.
+
+"Veuve Clicquot '99," he instructed the man. "At my age," he remarked,
+with a sigh, "one has to be careful about these little matters. The
+wrong brand of champagne means a sleepless night."
+
+Tavernake looked at him in a puzzled way. The professor was a riddle
+to him. He represented no type which had come within the orbit of his
+experience. With the arrival of the champagne, the professor became
+almost eloquent. He leaned forward, gazing stealthily down at the round
+table.
+
+"If I could tell you of that girl's mother, Mr. Tavernake," he said, "if
+I could tell you what her history, our history, has been, it would seem
+to you so strange that you would probably regard me as a romancer. No,
+we have to carry our secrets with us."
+
+"By-the-bye," Tavernake asked, "what are you a professor of?"
+
+"Of the hidden sciences, sir," was the immediate reply. "Phrenology was
+my earliest love. Since then I have studied in the East; I have spent
+many years in a monastery in China. I have gratified in every way my
+natural love of the occult. I represent today those people of advanced
+thought who have traveled, even in spirit, for ever such a little
+distance across the line which divides the Seen from the Unseen, the
+Known from the Infinite."
+
+He took a long draught of champagne. Tavernake gazed at him in blank
+amazement.
+
+"I don't know much about science," he said. "It is only lately that I
+have begun to realize how ignorant I really am. Your daughter has helped
+to teach me."
+
+The professor sighed heavily.
+
+"A young woman of attainments, sir," he remarked, "of character, too.
+Look at the way she carries her head. That was a trick of her mother's."
+
+"Don't you mean to speak to her at all, then?" Tavernake asked.
+
+"I dare not," the professor replied. "I am naturally of a truthful
+disposition, and if Elizabeth were to ask me if I had spoken to her
+sister, I should give myself away at once. No, I look on and that is
+all."
+
+Tavernake drummed with his fingers upon the tablecloth. Something in
+the merriment of that little party downstairs had filled him with a very
+bitter feeling.
+
+"You ought to go and claim her, professor," he declared. "Look down at
+them now. Is that the best life for a girl? The men are almost strangers
+to her, and the girls are not fit for her to associate with. She has no
+friends, no relatives. Your daughter Elizabeth can do without you very
+well. She is strong enough to take care of herself."
+
+"But my dear sir," the professor objected, "Beatrice could not support
+me."
+
+Tavernake paid his bill without another word. Downstairs the lights had
+been lowered, the party at the round table were already upon their feet.
+
+"Good-night, professor!" he said. "I am going to see the last of
+Beatrice from the top of the stairs."
+
+The professor followed him--they stood there and watched her depart with
+Annie Legarde. The two girls got into a taxicab together, and Tavernake
+breathed a sigh of relief, a relief for which he was wholly unable to
+account, when he saw that Grier made no effort to follow them. As soon
+as the taxi had rolled away, they descended and passed into the street.
+Then the professor suddenly changed his tone.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," he said, "I know what you are thinking about me: I am a
+weak old man who drinks too much and who wasn't born altogether honest.
+I can't give up anything. I'd be happier, really happier, on a crust
+with Beatrice, but I daren't, I simply daren't try it. I prefer the
+flesh pots with Elizabeth, and you despise me for it. I don't blame you,
+Mr. Tavernake, but listen."
+
+"Well?" Tavernake interjected.
+
+The professor's fingers gripped his arm.
+
+"You've known Beatrice longer--you don't know Elizabeth very well,
+but let me tell you this. Elizabeth is a very wonderful person. I know
+something about character, I know something about those hidden powers
+which men and women possess--strange powers which no one can understand,
+powers which drag a man to a woman's feet, or which make him shiver when
+he passes another even in a crowd. You see, these things are a science
+with me, Mr. Tavernake, but I don't pretend to understand everything.
+All I know is that Elizabeth is one of those people who can just do what
+she likes with men. I am her father and I am her slave. I tell myself
+that I would rather be with Beatrice, and I am as powerless to go as
+though I were bound with chains. You are a young ignorant man, Mr.
+Tavernake, you know nothing of life, and I will give you a word of
+warning. It is better for you that you keep away from over there."
+
+He raised one hand and pointed across the street towards the Milan
+Court; with the other he once more gripped Tavernake's arm.
+
+"Why she should take the trouble even to speak with you for a moment, I
+do not know," the professor continued, "but she does. It has pleased her
+to talk with you--why I can't imagine--only if I were you I would get
+away while there is yet time. She is my daughter but she has no heart,
+no pity. I saw her smile at you. I am sorry always for the man she
+smiles upon like that. Goodnight, Mr. Tavernake!"
+
+The professor crossed the street. Tavernake watched him until he was out
+of sight. Then he felt an arm thrust through his.
+
+"Why, this is what I call luck!" a familiar voice exclaimed. "Mr.
+Tavernake, you're the very man I was looking for!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII. A MIDNIGHT ADVENTURE
+
+
+Tavernake was not sociably inclined and took no pains to conceal the
+fact. Mr. Pritchard, however, was not easily to be shaken off.
+
+"So you've been palling up to the old man, eh?" he remarked, in friendly
+fashion.
+
+"I came across the professor unexpectedly," Tavernake answered, coldly.
+"What do you want with me, please? I am on my way home."
+
+Pritchard laughed softly to himself.
+
+"Say, there's something about you Britishers I can't help admiring!" he
+declared. "You are downright, aren't you?"
+
+"I suppose you think we are too clumsy to be anything else," Tavernake
+replied. "This is my 'bus coming. Good-night!"
+
+Pritchard's hand, however, tightened upon his companion's arm.
+
+"Look here, young man," he said, "don't you be foolish. I'm a valuable
+acquaintance for you, if you only realized it. Come along across the
+street with me. My club is on the Terrace, just below. Stroll along
+there with me and I'll tell you something about the professor, if you
+like."
+
+"Thank you," Tavernake answered, "I don't think I care about hearing
+gossip. Besides, I think I know all there is to be known about him."
+
+"Did you give Miss Beatrice my message?" Pritchard asked suddenly.
+
+"If I did," Tavernake replied, "I have no answer for you."
+
+"Will you tell her this," Pritchard began,--
+
+"No, I will tell her nothing!" Tavernake interrupted. "You can look
+after your own affairs. I have no interest in them and I don't want to
+have. Good-night!"
+
+Pritchard laughed again but he did not relax his grasp upon the other's
+arm.
+
+"Now, Mr. Tavernake," he said, "it won't do for you to quarrel with me.
+I shouldn't be surprised if you discovered that I am one of the most
+useful acquaintances you ever met in your life. You needn't come into
+the club unless you like, but walk as far as there with me. When we get
+on to the Terrace, with closed houses on one side and a palisade upon
+the other, I am going to say something to you."
+
+"Very well," Tavernake decided, reluctantly. "I don't know what there is
+you can have to tell me, but I'll come as far as there, at any rate."
+
+They crossed the Strand and turned into Adam Street. As they neared the
+further corner, Pritchard stepped from the pavement into the middle of
+the street, and looked searchingly around.
+
+"Say, you'll excuse my being a little careful," he remarked. "This is
+rather a lonely part for the middle of London, and I have been followed
+for the last two days by people whose company I am not over keen about."
+
+"Followed? What for?" Tavernake demanded.
+
+"Oh, the usual thing!" answered the detective, with a shrug of the
+shoulders. "That company of crooks I showed you last night don't fancy
+having me around. They've a good many grudges up against Sam Pritchard.
+I am not quite so safe over here as I should be in New York. Most of
+them are off to Paris tomorrow, thank Heavens!"
+
+"And you?" Tavernake asked. "Are you going, too?"
+
+Pritchard shook his head.
+
+"If only those fools would believe it, I'm not over here on their
+business at all. I came over on a special commission this time, as you
+know. I have a word of warning for you, Mr. Tavernake. I guess you won't
+like to hear it, but you've got to."
+
+Tavernake stopped short.
+
+"I don't want your warnings!" he said angrily. "I don't want you
+interfering in my affairs!"
+
+The detective smiled quietly. Then a new expression suddenly tightened
+his lips.
+
+"Never mind about that just now!" he exclaimed. "See here, take this
+police whistle from my left hand, quick, and blow it for all that you
+are worth!"
+
+It was characteristic of Tavernake that he was prepared to obey without
+a second's hesitation. The opportunity, however, was denied him. The
+events which followed came and passed like a thought. A blow on his left
+wrist and the whistle fell into the road. A dark figure had sprung up,
+apparently from space; a long arm was twined around Pritchard's neck,
+bending him backwards; there was a gleam of steel within a few inches of
+his throat. And then Tavernake saw a wonderful thing. With a turn of his
+wrist, Pritchard suddenly seemed to lift the form of his assailant into
+the air. Tavernake caught a swift impression of a man's white face, the
+head pointing to the street, the legs twitching convulsively. Head
+over heels Pritchard seemed to throw him, while the knife clattered
+harmlessly into the roadway. The man lay crumpled up and moaning before
+the door of one of the houses. Pritchard sprang after him. The door had
+been cautiously opened and the man crawled through; Pritchard followed;
+then the door closed and Tavernake beat upon it in vain.
+
+For several seconds--it seemed to Tavernake much longer--he stood
+gazing at the door, breathing heavily, absolutely unable to collect his
+thoughts. The whole affair had happened with such amazing celerity! He
+could not bring himself to realize it, to believe that it was Pritchard
+who had been with him only a few seconds ago, who in danger of his
+life had performed that marvelous trick of jiu-jutsu, had followed
+his unknown assailant into that dark, mysterious house, from no single
+window of which was a single gleam of light visible. Tavernake had led
+an uneventful life. Of the passions which breed murder and the desire
+to kill he knew nothing. He was dazed with the suddenness of it all. How
+could such a thing happen in the midst of London, in a thoroughfare only
+momentarily deserted, at the further end of which, indeed, were many
+signs of life! Then the thought of that knife made him shiver--blue
+glittering steel cutting the air like whipcord. He remembered the look
+in the assassin's face--horrible, an epitome of the passions, which
+seemed to reveal to him in that moment the existence of some other, some
+unknown world, about which he had neither read nor dreamed.
+
+The sound of footsteps came as an immense relief. A man came round the
+corner, smoking a cigarette and humming softly to himself. The presence
+of another human being seemed suddenly to bring Tavernake's feet back
+upon the earth. He moved toward the pavement and addressed the newcomer.
+
+"Can you tell me how to get inside that house?" he asked quickly.
+
+The man removed the cigarette from his mouth and stared at his
+questioner.
+
+"I should ring the bell," he replied, "but surely it's unoccupied? What
+do you want to get in there for?"
+
+"Less than a minute ago," Tavernake told him, "I was walking here with
+a friend. A man came up behind us and tried deliberately to stab him.
+He bolted afterwards through that door, my friend followed him, the door
+was closed in my face."
+
+The newcomer was a youngish man, a musician, who had just come from
+a concert and was on his way to the club at the end of the street.
+Probably, had he been a journalist, his curiosity would have been
+greater than his incredulity. As it was, however, he gazed at Tavernake,
+for a moment, blankly.
+
+"Look here," he said, "this doesn't sound a very likely story of yours,
+you know."
+
+"I don't care whether it's likely or not," Tavernake answered hotly;
+"it's true! The knife's somewhere in the road there--it fell up against
+the railings."
+
+They crossed the road together and searched. There were no signs of the
+weapon. Tavernake peered over the railings.
+
+"When my friend struck the other man and twisted him over," he
+explained, "the knife seemed to fly up into the air; it might even have
+reached the gardens."
+
+His companion turned slowly away.
+
+"Well, it's no use looking down there for it," he remarked. "We might
+try the door, if you like."
+
+They leaned their weight against it, hammered at the panels, and waited.
+The door was fast closed and no reply came. The musician shrugged his
+shoulders and prepared to depart, after one more glance at Tavernake,
+half suspicious, half questioning.
+
+"If you think it worth while," he said, "you had better fetch the
+police, perhaps. If you take my advice, though, I think I should go home
+and forget all about it."
+
+He passed on, leaving Tavernake speechless. The idea that people might
+not believe his story had never seriously occurred to him. Yet all of a
+sudden he began to doubt it himself. He stepped back into the road and
+looked up at the windows of the house--dark, uncurtained, revealing
+no sign of life or habitation. Had he really taken that walk with
+Pritchard, stood on this spot with him only a minute or two ago? Then he
+picked up the police whistle and he had no longer any doubts. The whole
+scene was before him again, more vividly than ever. Even at this moment,
+Pritchard might be in need of help!
+
+He turned and walked sharply to the corner of the Terrace, finding
+himself almost immediately face to face with a policeman.
+
+"You must come into this house with me at once!" Tavernake exclaimed,
+pointing backwards. "A friend of mine was attacked here just now; a man
+tried to stab him. They are both in that house. The man ran away and my
+friend followed him. The door is closed and no one answers."
+
+The constable looked at Tavernake very much as the musician had done.
+
+"Do either of them live there, sir?" he asked.
+
+"How should I know!" Tavernake answered. "The man sprang upon my friend
+from behind. He had a knife in his hand--I saw it. My friend threw him
+over and he escaped into that house. They are both there now.
+
+"Which house is it, sir?" the policeman inquired.
+
+They were standing almost in front of it. The gate was open and
+Tavernake beat against the panels with the flat of his hand. Then, with
+a cry of triumph, he stooped down and picked something up from a crack
+in the flagged stones.
+
+"The key!" he cried. "Come on, quick!"
+
+He thrust it into the lock and turned it; the door swung smoothly open.
+The policeman laid his hand upon Tavernake's shoulder.
+
+"Look here," he said, "let's have that story of yours again, a little
+more clearly. Who is it that's in this house?"
+
+"Five minutes ago," Tavernake began, speaking rapidly, "I met a man in
+the Strand whom I know slightly--Pritchard, an American detective. He
+said that he had something to say to me and he asked me to walk round
+with him to a club in this Terrace. We were in the middle of the road
+there, talking, when a man sprang at him; he must have come up behind
+quite noiselessly. The man had a knife in his hand. My friend threw him
+head over heels--it was some trick of jiu-jutsu; I have seen it done at
+the Polytechnic. He fell in front of this door which must either have
+been ajar or else some one who was waiting must have let him in. He
+crawled through and my friend followed him. The door was slammed in my
+face."
+
+"How long ago was this?" the policeman asked.
+
+"Not much more than five minutes," Tavernake answered.
+
+The policeman coughed.
+
+"It's a very queer story, sir."
+
+"It's true!" Tavernake declared, fiercely. "You and I have got to search
+this house."
+
+The policeman nodded.
+
+"There's no harm in that, sir, anyway."
+
+He flashed his lantern around the hall--unfurnished, with paper hanging
+from the walls. Then they began to enter the rooms, one by one. Nowhere
+was there any sign of occupation. From floor to floor they passed, in
+grim silence. In the front chamber of the attic was a camp bedstead, two
+or three humble articles of furniture, and a small stove.
+
+"Caretaker's kit," the policeman muttered. "Nothing seems to have been
+used for some time."
+
+They descended the stairs again.
+
+"You say you saw the two men enter this house, sir?" the policeman
+remarked doubtfully.
+
+"I did," Tavernake declared. "There is no doubt about it."
+
+"The back entrances are all properly locked," the policeman pointed out.
+"None of the windows by which any one could escape have been opened.
+We've been into every room. There's no one in the house now, sir, is
+there?"
+
+"There doesn't seem to be," Tavernake admitted.
+
+The policeman looked him over once more; Tavernake certainly had not the
+appearance of one attempting a hoax.
+
+"I am afraid there is nothing more we can do, sir," the man said
+civilly. "You had better give me your name and address."
+
+"Can't we go over the place once more?" Tavernake suggested. "I tell you
+I saw them come in."
+
+"I have my beat outside to look after, sir," the constable answered. "If
+it wasn't that you seem respectable, I should begin to think that you
+wanted me out of the way for a bit. Name and address, please."
+
+Tavernake gave them readily. They passed out together into the street.
+
+"I shall report this matter," the man said, closing his book. "Perhaps
+the sergeant will have the house searched again. If you take my advice,
+sir," he added, "you'll go home."
+
+"I saw them both pass through that door," Tavernake repeated, half
+to himself, still standing upon the pavement and staring at the unlit
+windows.
+
+The constable made no reply but moved off. Soon he reached the corner of
+the Terrace and disappeared. Tavernake slowly crossed the road and with
+his back to the railings looked steadfastly at the dark front of
+gray stone houses. Big Ben struck one o'clock, several people passed
+backwards and forwards. Men were coming out from the club, and
+separating for the night; the roar of the city was growing fainter. Yet
+Tavernake felt indisposed to move. The look in that man's drawn white
+face and black eyes haunted him, There was tragedy there, the shadow of
+terrible things, fear, and the murderous desire to kill! Through that
+door they had passed, the two men, one in flight, the other in pursuit.
+Where were they now? Perhaps it had been a trap. Pritchard had spoken
+seriously enough of his enemies.
+
+Then, as he stood there, he saw for the first time a thin line of light
+through the closely-drawn curtains of a room on the ground floor of the
+adjoining house. Without a moment's hesitation, he crossed the road and
+rang the bell. The door was opened, after a trifling delay, by a man
+in plain clothes, who might, however, have been a servant in mufti. He
+looked at Tavernake suspiciously.
+
+"I am sorry to have disturbed you," Tavernake explained, "but I saw some
+one go in the house next to you, a little time ago. Can you tell me if
+you have heard any noises or voices during the last half-hour?"
+
+The man shook his head.
+
+"We have heard nothing, sir," he said.
+
+"Who lives here?" Tavernake asked.
+
+"Did you call me up at one o'clock in the morning to ask silly
+questions?" the man replied insolently. "Every one's in bed here and I
+was just going."
+
+"There's a light in your ground floor room," Tavernake remarked.
+"There's some one talking there now--I can hear voices."
+
+The man closed the door in his face. For some time Tavernake wandered
+restlessly about, starting at last reluctantly homewards. He had reached
+the Strand and was crossing Trafalgar Square when a sudden thought held
+him. He stood still for a moment in the middle of the street. Then he
+turned abruptly round. In less than five minutes he was once more on the
+Terrace.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX. TAVERNAKE INTERVENES
+
+
+Tavernake had the feelings of a man suddenly sobered as he turned once
+more into the Adelphi Terrace. Waiting until no one was in sight, he
+opened the door of the empty house with the Yale key which he had kept,
+and carefully closed it. He struck a match and listened for several
+minutes intently; not a sound from anywhere. He moved a few yards
+further to the bottom of the stairs, and listened again; still silence.
+He turned the handle of the ground floor apartment and commenced a fresh
+search. Room by room he examined by the light of his rapidly dwindling
+matches. This time he meant to leave behind him no possibility of any
+mistake. He even measured the depths of the walls for any secret hiding
+place. From room to room he passed, leisurely, always on the alert,
+always listening. Once, as he opened a door on the third floor there
+was a soft scurrying as though of a skirt across the floor. He struck
+a match quickly, to find a great rat sitting up and looking at him with
+black, beady eyes. It was the only sign of life he found in the whole
+building.
+
+When he had finished his search, he came down to the ground floor and
+entered the room corresponding with the one from which he had heard
+voices in the adjoining house. He crouched here upon the dusty boards
+for some time, listening. Now and then he fancied that he could still
+hear voices on the other side of the wall, but he was never absolutely
+certain.
+
+At last he rose to stretch himself, and almost as he did so a fresh
+sound from outside attracted his notice. A motor-car had turned into the
+Terrace. He walked to the uncurtained window and stood there, sure of
+being himself unseen. Then his heart gave a great leap. Unemotional
+though he was, this was a happening which might well have excited a
+more phlegmatic individual. A motor-car which he remembered very well,
+although it was driven now by a man in dark livery, had stopped at the
+next house. A woman and two men had descended. Tavernake never glanced
+at the latter; his eyes were fastened upon their companion. She was
+wrapped in a long cloak, but she lifted her skirts as she crossed the
+pavement, and he saw the flash of her silver buckles. Her carriage, her
+figure, were unmistakable. It was Elizabeth who was paying this early
+morning visit next door! Already the little party had disappeared. They
+did not even ring the bell. The door must have been opened silently
+at their coming. The motor-car glided off. Once more the Terrace was
+deserted.
+
+Tavernake felt sure that he knew now the solution,--there was a way from
+this house into the next one. He struck another match and, standing back
+a few yards, looked critically at the dividing wall. In ancient days
+this had evidently been a dwelling-house of importance, elaborately
+decorated, as the fresco work upon the ceiling still indicated. The wall
+had been divided into three panels, with a high wainscoting. Inch by
+inch he examined it from one end to the other; he started from the back
+and came toward the front. About three-quarters of the way there, he
+paused. It was very simple, after all. The solid wall for a couple of
+feet suddenly ceased, and the design was continued with an expanse of
+stretched canvas, which yielded easily to his finger. He leaned his ear
+against it; he could hear now distinctly the sound of voices--he heard
+even the woman's laughter. For the height of about four feet the wall
+had been bodily removed. He made a small hole in the canvas--there was
+still darkness. He enlarged the hole until he could thrust his hand
+through--there was nothing but canvas the other side. He knew now where
+he was. There was only that single thickness of canvas between him and
+the room. He had but to make the smallest hole in it and he would be
+able to see through. Even now, with the removal of the barrier on his
+side, the voices were more distinct. A complete section of the wall had
+evidently been taken out and replaced by a detachable framework of wood
+covered with stretched canvas. He stood back for a moment and felt with
+his finger; he could almost trace the spot where the woodwork fitted
+upon hinges. Then he went on his hands and knees again, and with his
+penknife in his hand he paused to listen. He could hear the man Crease
+talking--a slow, nasal drawl. Then he heard Pritchard's voice, followed
+by what seemed to be a groan. There was a silence, then Elizabeth seemed
+to ask a question. He heard her low laugh and some note in it sent a
+shiver through his body. Pritchard was speaking fiercely now. Then, in
+the middle of his sentence, there was silence once more, followed by
+another groan. He could almost feel the people in that room holding
+their breaths.
+
+Tavernake was rapidly forgetting all caution. The point of his knife was
+through the canvas. Slowly he worked it round until a small piece, the
+size of a half-crown, was partially cut through. With infinite pains he
+got his head and shoulders into the small recess and for the first time
+looked into the room. Pritchard was sitting almost in the middle of the
+apartment; his arms seemed to be bound to the chair and his legs were
+tied together. A few yards away, Elizabeth, her fur coat laid aside, was
+lounging back in an easy-chair, her dress all glittering with sequins,
+a curious light in her eyes, a cruel smile parting her lips. By her
+side--sitting, in fact, on the arm of her chair--was Crease, his long,
+worn face paler, even, than usual; his lips curled in a smile of cynical
+amusement. Major Post was there, carefully dressed as though he had been
+attending some social gathering, standing upon the hearth-rug with his
+coat-tails under his arms. The professor, in whose face seemed written
+the most abject terror, was talking. Tavernake now could hear every word
+distinctly.
+
+"My dear Elizabeth! My dear Crease! You are both too precipitate! I tell
+you that I protest--I protest most strongly. Mr. Pritchard, I am sure,
+with a little persuasion, will listen to reason. I will not be a party
+to any such proceeding as--as this. You understand, Crease? We have gone
+quite far enough as it is. I will not have it."
+
+Elizabeth laughed softly.
+
+"My dear father," she said, "you will really have to take something for
+your nerves. Nothing need happen to Mr. Pritchard at all unless he asks
+for it. He has his chance--. no one should expect more."
+
+"You are right, my dear Elizabeth," declared Crease, speaking very
+slowly and with his usual drawl. "This question of his health for
+the future--at any rate, for the immediate future--is entirely in
+Pritchard's own hands. There is no one who has received so many warnings
+as he. Bramley was cautioned twice; Mallison was warned three times and
+burned to death; Forsith had word from us only once, and he was shot in
+a drunken brawl. This man Pritchard has been warned a dozen times, he
+has escaped death twice. The time has come to show him that we are in
+earnest. Threats are useless; the time has come for deeds. I say that
+if Pritchard refuses this trifling request of ours, let us see that he
+leaves this house in such a state that he will not be able to do us any
+harm for some time at least."
+
+"But he will give his word!" the professor cried excitedly. "I am quite
+sure that if you allow me to talk to him reasonably, he will pledge
+his word to go back to the States and interfere no longer with your
+affairs."
+
+Pritchard turned his head slightly. He was a little pale, and the blood
+was dropping slowly on to the floor from a wound in his temple, but his
+tone was contemptuous.
+
+"I will give you my word, Professor, and you, Elizabeth Gardner, and
+you, Jim Post, and you, Walter Crease, that crippled, or straight, in
+evil or good health, from the very jaws of death I will hang on to life
+until you have paid your just debts. You understand that, all of you?
+I don't know what sort of a show this is. You may be in earnest, or you
+may be trying a rag. In any case, let me assure you of this. You won't
+get me to beg for mercy. If you force me to drink that stuff you are
+talking about, I'll find the antidote, and as sure as there's a prison
+in America, so surely I'll make you suffer for it! If you take my
+advice," he went on slowly, "and I know what I'm talking about, you'll
+cut these ropes and set open your front door. You 'll live longer, all
+of you."
+
+"An idiot," Elizabeth remarked pleasantly, "can do but little harm in
+the world. The word of a person of weak intellect is not to be relied
+upon. For my part, I am very tired of our friend, Mr. Pritchard. If you
+others had been disposed to go to much greater lengths, if you had said
+'Hang him from the ceiling,' I should have been well pleased."
+
+Pritchard made a slight movement in his chair--it was certainly not a
+movement of fear.
+
+"Madam," he said, "I admire your candor. Let me return it. I don't
+believe there's one of you here has the pluck to attempt to do me
+any serious injury. If there is, get on with it. You hear, Mr. Walter
+Crease? Bring out that bottle of yours."
+
+Crease removed his cigar from his lips and rose slowly to his feet. From
+his waistcoat pocket he produced a small phial, from which he drew the
+cork.
+
+"Seems to me it's up to us to do the trick," he remarked languidly.
+"Catch hold of his forehead, Jimmy."
+
+The man known as Major Post threw away his cigarette, and coming round
+behind Pritchard's chair, suddenly bent the man's head backward.
+Crease advanced, phial in hand. Then all Hell seemed to be let loose in
+Tavernake. He stepped back in his place and marked the extent of that
+wooden partition. Then, setting his teeth, he sprang at it, throwing
+the great weight of his massive shoulder against the framework door.
+Scratched and bleeding, but still upon his feet, he burst into the room,
+with the noise of bricks falling behind,--an apparition so unexpected
+that the little company gathered there seemed turned into some waxwork
+group from the Chamber of Horrors--motionless, without even the power of
+movement.
+
+Tavernake, in those few moments, was like a giant among a company of
+degenerates. He was strong, his muscles were like whipcord, and his
+condition was perfect. Walter Crease went over like a log before his
+fist; Major Post felt the revolver at which he had snatched struck from
+his hand, and he himself remembered nothing more till he came to his
+senses some time afterwards. A slash and a cut and Pritchard was free.
+The professor stood wringing his hands. Elizabeth had risen to her feet.
+She was pale, but she was still more nearly composed than any other
+person in the room. Tavernake and Pritchard were masters of the
+situation. Pritchard leaned toward the mirror and straightened his tie.
+
+"I am afraid," he said looking down at Walter Crease's groaning figure,
+"that our hosts are scarcely in fit condition to take leave of us. Never
+mind, Mrs. Gardner, we excuse ourselves to you. I cannot pretend to be
+sorry that my friend's somewhat impetuous entrance has disturbed your
+plans for the evening, but I do hope that you will realize now the
+fatuousness of such methods in these days. Good-night! It is time we
+finished our stroll together, Tavernake."
+
+They moved towards the door--there was no one to stop them. Only the
+professor tried to say a few words.
+
+"My dear Mr. Pritchard--my dear Pritchard, if you will allow me to call
+you so," he exclaimed, "let me beg of you, before you leave us, not to
+take this trifling adventure too seriously! I can assure you that it was
+simply an attempt to coerce you, not in the least an affair to be taken
+seriously!"
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"Professor," he said, "and you, Walter Crease, and you, Jimmy Post, if
+you're able to listen, listen to me. You have played the part of
+children to-night. So surely as men and women exist who live as you do,
+so surely must the law wait upon their heels. You cannot cheat justice.
+It is as inexorable as Time itself. When you try these little tricks,
+you simply give another turn to the wheel, add another danger to life.
+You had better learn to look upon me as necessary, all of you, for I am
+certainly inevitable."
+
+They passed backwards through the door, then they went down the silent
+hall and out into the street. Even as they did so, the clock struck a
+quarter to two.
+
+"My friend Tavernake," Pritchard declared, lighting a cigarette with
+steady fingers, "you are a man. Come into the club with me while I bathe
+my forehead. After all, we'll have that drink together before we say
+goodnight."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX. A PLEASANT REUNION
+
+
+Tavernake awoke some hours later with a puzzled sense of having lost
+his own identity, of having taken up another man's life, stepped into
+another man's shoes. From the day of his first arrival in London, a raw
+country youth, till the night when he had spoken to Beatrice on the roof
+of Blenheim House, nothing that could properly be called an adventure
+had ever happened to him. He had never for a moment felt the want of it;
+he had not even indulged in the reading of books of romance. The thing
+which had happened last night, as in the cold morning sunlight he sat up
+in his bed, seemed to him a thing grotesque, inconceivable. It was
+not really possible that those people--those well-bred, well-looking
+people--had seriously contemplated an enormity which seemed to belong
+to the back pages of history, or that he, Tavernake, had burst through
+a wall with no weapons in his hand, and had dominated the situation! He
+sat there steadily thinking. It was incredible, but it was true! There
+existed still in his mind some faint doubt as to whether they would
+really have proceeded to extremities. Pritchard himself had made light
+of the whole affair, afterwards had treated it, indeed, as a huge
+practical joke. Tavernake, remembering that little group as he had first
+seen it, remained doubtful.
+
+By degrees, his own personal characteristics began to assert themselves.
+He began to wonder how his action would affect his commercial interests.
+He had probably made an enemy of this wonderful sister of Beatrice's,
+the woman who had so completely filled his thoughts during the last few
+days, the woman, too, who was to have found the money by means of which
+he was to set his feet upon the first rung of the ladder. This was a
+thing, he decided, which must be settled at once. He must see her and
+know exactly what terms they were on, whether or not she meant to be off
+with her bargain. The thought of action of any sort was stimulating. He
+rose and dressed, had his breakfast, and set out on his pilgrimage.
+
+Soon after eleven o'clock, he presented himself at the Milan Court and
+asked for Mrs. Wenham Gardner. For several minutes he waited about in
+nervous anticipation, then he was told that she was not at home. More
+than a little disappointed, he pressed for news of her. The hall porter
+thought that she had gone down into the country, and if so it
+was doubtful when she would be back. Tavernake was now seriously
+disconcerted.
+
+"I want particularly to wire to her," he insisted. "Please find out from
+her maid how I shall direct a telegram."
+
+The hall porter, who was a most superior person, regarded him blandly.
+
+"We do not give addresses, sir," he explained, "unless at the expressed
+wish of our clients. If you leave a telegram here, I will send it up to
+Mrs. Gardner's rooms to be forwarded."
+
+Tavernake scribbled one out, begging for news of her return, added
+his address and left the place. Then he wandered aimlessly about the
+streets. There seemed something flat about the morning, some aftermath
+of the excitement of the previous night was still stirring in his blood.
+Nevertheless, he pulled himself together with an effort, called for a
+young surveyor whom he had engaged to assist him, and spent the rest of
+the day out upon the hill. Religiously he kept his thoughts turned
+upon his work until the twilight came. Then he hurried home to meet the
+disappointment which he had more than half anticipated. There was no
+telegram for him! He ate his dinner and sat with folded arms, looking
+out into the street. Still no telegram! The restlessness came back once
+more. Soon after ten o'clock it became unbearable. He found himself
+longing for company, the loneliness of his little room since the
+departure of Beatrice had never seemed so real a thing. He stood it as
+long as he could and then, catching up his hat and stick, he set his
+face eastwards, walking vigorously, and with frequent glances at the
+clocks he passed.
+
+A few minutes past eleven o'clock, he found himself once more in
+that dark thoroughfare at the back of the theatre. The lamp over
+the stage-door was flickering in the same uncertain manner, the same
+motor-cars were there, the same crowd of young men, except that each
+night they seemed to grow larger. This time he had a few minutes only to
+wait. Beatrice came out among the earliest. At the sight of her he was
+suddenly conscious that he had, after all, no excuse for coming, that
+she would probably cross-examine him about Elizabeth, would probably
+guess the secret of his torments. He shrank back, but he was a moment
+too late for she had seen him. With a few words of excuse to the others
+with whom she was talking, she picked up her skirts and came swiftly
+across the muddy street. Tavernake had no time to escape. He
+remained there until she came, but his cheeks were hot, and he had an
+uncomfortable feeling that his presence, that their meeting like this,
+was an embarrassment to both of them.
+
+"My dear Leonard," she exclaimed, "why do you hide over there?"
+
+"I don't know," he answered simply.
+
+She laughed.
+
+"It looks as though you didn't want to see me," she remarked. "If you
+didn't, why are you here?"
+
+"I suppose I did want to see you," he replied. "Anyhow, I was lonely. I
+wanted to talk to some one. I walked all the way up here from Chelsea."
+
+"You have something to tell me?" she suggested.
+
+"There was something," he admitted. "I thought perhaps you ought to
+know. I had supper with your father last night. We talked about you."
+
+She started as though he had struck her; her face was suddenly pale and
+anxious.
+
+"Are you serious, Leonard?" she asked. "My father?"
+
+He nodded.
+
+"I am sorry," he said. "I ought not to have blundered it out like that.
+I forgot that you--you were not seeing anything of him."
+
+"How did you meet him?"
+
+"By accident," he answered. "I was sitting alone up in the balcony at
+Imano's, and he wanted my table because he could see you from there, so
+we shared it, and then we began talking. I knew who he was, of course;
+I had seen him in your sister's room. He told me that he had engaged the
+table for every night this week."
+
+She looked across the road.
+
+"I can't go out with those people now," she declared. "Wait here for
+me."
+
+She went back to her friends and talked to them for a moment or two.
+Tavernake could hear Grier's protesting voice and Beatrice's light
+laugh. Evidently they were trying uselessly to persuade her to change
+her mind. Soon she came back to him.
+
+"I am sorry," he said reluctantly. "I am afraid that I have spoiled your
+evening."
+
+"Don't be foolish, please," she replied taking his arm. "Do you believe
+that my father will be up in the balcony at Imano's to-night?"
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+"He told me so."
+
+"We will go and sit up there," she decided. "He knows where I am to be
+found now so it doesn't matter. I should like to see him."
+
+They walked off together. Though she was evidently absent and
+distressed, Tavernake felt once more that sense of pleasant
+companionship which her near presence always brought him.
+
+"There is something else I must ask you," she began presently. "I want
+to know if you have seen Pritchard lately."
+
+"I was with him last night," Tavernake answered.
+
+She shivered.
+
+"He was asking questions?"
+
+"Not about you," Tavernake assured her quickly. "It is your sister in
+whom he is interested."
+
+Beatrice nodded, but she seemed very little relieved. Tavernake could
+see that the old look of fear was back in her face.
+
+"I am sorry, Beatrice," he said, regretfully. "I seem just now to be
+always bringing you reminiscences of the people whom it terrifies you to
+hear about."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"It isn't your fault, Leonard," she declared, "only it is rather strange
+that you should be mixed up with them in any way, isn't it? I suppose
+some day you'll find out everything about me. Perhaps you'll be sorry
+then that you ever even called yourself my brother."
+
+"Don't be foolish," he answered, brusquely.
+
+She patted his hand.
+
+"Is the speculation going all right?" she asked.
+
+"I am hoping to get the money together this week," he replied. "If I get
+it, I shall be well off in a year, rich in five years."
+
+"There is just a doubt about your getting it, then?" she inquired.
+
+"Just a doubt," he admitted. "I have a solicitor who is doing his best
+to raise a loan, but I have not heard from him for two days. Then I have
+also a friend who has promised it to me, a friend upon whom I am not
+quite sure if I can rely."
+
+They turned into the Strand.
+
+"Tell me about my father, Leonard," she begged.
+
+He hesitated; it was hard to know exactly how to speak of the professor.
+
+"Perhaps if you have talked with him at all," she went on, "it will help
+you to understand one of the difficulties I had to face in life."
+
+"He is, I should imagine, a little weak," Tavernake suggested,
+hesitatingly.
+
+"Very," she answered. "My mother left him in my charge, but I cannot
+keep him."
+
+"Your sister--" he began.
+
+She nodded.
+
+"My sister has more influence than I. She makes life easier for him."
+
+They reached the restaurant and made their way upstairs. Tavernake
+appropriated the same table and once more the head waiter protested.
+
+"If the gentleman comes again to-night," Tavernake said, "you will find
+that he will be only too glad to have supper with us."
+
+Then the professor came. He made his usual somewhat theatrical
+entrance, carrying his broad-brimmed hat in his hand, brandishing his
+silver-topped cane. When he saw Tavernake and Beatrice, he stopped
+short. Then he held out both hands, which Beatrice immediately seized.
+There were tears in his eyes, tears running down his cheeks. He sat down
+heavily in the chair which Tavernake was holding for him.
+
+"Beatrice," he exclaimed, "why, this is most affecting! You have come
+here to have supper with your old father. You trust me, then?"
+
+"Absolutely," she replied, still clasping his hands. "If you give me
+away to Elizabeth, it will be the end. The next time I shall never be
+found."
+
+"For some days," he assured her, "I have known exactly where you were to
+be found. I have never spoken of it. You are safe. My meals up here,"
+he added, with a little sigh, "have been sad feasts. To-night we will
+be cheerful. Some quails, I think, quails and some Clicquot for you, my
+dear. You need it. Ah, this is a happiness indeed!"
+
+"You know Mr. Tavernake, father," she remarked, after he had given a
+somewhat lengthy order to the waiter.
+
+"I met and talked with Mr. Tavernake here the other night," the
+professor admitted, with condescension.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake was very good to me at a time when I needed help,"
+Beatrice told him.
+
+The professor grasped Tavernake's hands.
+
+"You were good to my child," he said, "you were good to me. Waiter,
+three cocktails immediately," he ordered, turning round. "I must drink
+your health, Mr. Tavernake--I must drink your health at once."
+
+Tavernake leaned forward towards Beatrice.
+
+"I wonder," he suggested, "whether you would not rather be alone with
+your father."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"You know so much," she replied, "and it really doesn't seem to matter.
+Tell me, father, how do you spend your time?"
+
+"I must confess, dear," the professor said, "that I have little to do.
+Your sister Elizabeth is quite generous."
+
+Beatrice sat back in her chair as though she had been struck.
+
+"Father," she exclaimed, "listen! You are living on that money! Doesn't
+it seem terrible to you? Oh, how can you do it!"
+
+The professor looked at his daughter with an expression of pained
+surprise.
+
+"My dear," he explained, "your sister Elizabeth has always been the
+moneyed one of the family. She has brains and I trust her. It is not for
+me to inquire as to the source of the comforts she provides for me. I
+feel myself entitled to receive them, and so I accept."
+
+"But, father," she went on, "can't you see--don't you know that it's his
+money--Wenham's?"
+
+"It is not a matter, this, my child," the professor observed, sharply,
+"which we can discuss before strangers. Some day we will speak of it,
+you and I."
+
+"Has he--been heard of?" she asked, in a whisper.
+
+The professor frowned.
+
+"A hot-tempered young man, my dear," he declared uneasily, "a hot
+tempered young man, indeed. Elizabeth gives me to understand that it was
+just an ordinary quarrel and away he went."
+
+Beatrice was white to the lips.
+
+"An ordinary quarrel!" she muttered.
+
+She sat quite still. Tavernake unconsciously found himself watching her.
+There were things in her eyes which frightened him. It seemed as though
+she were looking out of the gay little restaurant, with its lights and
+music and air of comfort, out into some distant quarter of the world,
+some other and very different place. She was living through something
+which chilled her heart, something terrifying. Tavernake saw those
+things in her face and his eyes spelt them out mercilessly.
+
+"Father," she whispered, leaning towards him, "do you believe what you
+have just been saying to me?"
+
+It was the professor's turn to be disturbed. He concealed his
+discomfiture, however, with a gesture of annoyance.
+
+"That is scarcely a proper question, Beatrice," he answered sharply.
+"Ah," he added, with more geniality, "the cocktails! My young friend
+Tavernake, I drink to our better acquaintance! You are English, as I
+can see, a real Britisher. Some day you must come out to our own great
+country--my daughter, of course, has told you that we are Americans. A
+great country, sir,--the greatest I have ever lived in--room to breathe,
+room to grow, room for a young man like you to plant his ambitions and
+watch them blossom. To our better acquaintance, Mr. Tavernake, and may
+we meet some day in the United States!"
+
+Tavernake drank the first cocktail in his life and wiped the tears from
+his eyes. The professor found safety in conversation.
+
+"You know," he went on, "that I am a man of science. Physiognomy
+delights me. Men and women as I meet them represent to me varying types
+of humanity, all interesting, all appealing to my peculiar love of the
+science of psychology. You, my dear Mr. Tavernake, if I may venture to
+be so personal, represent to me, as you sit there, the exact prototype
+of the young working Englishman. You are, I should judge, thorough,
+dogmatic, narrow, persistent, industrious, and bound to be successful
+according to the scope and nature of your ambitions. In this country
+you will never develop. In my country, sir, we should make a colossus of
+you. We should teach you not to be content with small things; we should
+raise your hand which you yourself kept to your side, and we should
+point your finger to the skies. Waiter," he added, turning abruptly
+round, "if the quails are not yet ready I will take another of these
+excellent cocktails."
+
+Tavernake was embarrassed. He saw that Beatrice was anxious to talk to
+her father; he saw, also, that her father was determined not to talk
+to her. With a little sigh, however, she resigned herself to the
+inevitable.
+
+"I have lectured, sir," the professor continued, "in most of the cities
+of the United States, upon the human race. The tendencies of every
+unit of the human race are my peculiar study. When I speak to you of
+phrenology, sir, you smile, and you think, perhaps, of a man who sits in
+a back room and takes your shilling for feeling the bumps of your head.
+I am not of this order of scientific men, sir. I have diplomas from
+every university worth mentioning. I blend the sciences which treat with
+the human race. I know something of all of them. Character reading to me
+is at once a passion and a science. Leave me alone with a man or a woman
+for five minutes, paint me a map of Life, and I will set the signposts
+along which that person will travel, and I shall not miss one."
+
+"You are doing no work over here, father, are you?" Beatrice asked.
+
+"None, my dear," he answered, with a faint note of regret in his tone.
+"Your sister Elizabeth seemed scarcely to desire it. Her movements are
+very uncertain and she likes to have me constantly at hand. My daughter
+Elizabeth," he continued, turning to Tavernake, "is a very beautiful
+young woman, left in my charge under peculiar circumstances. I feel it
+my duty, therefore, to be constantly at hand."
+
+Again there was a flash of that strange look in the girl's face. She
+leaned forward, but her father declined to meet her gaze.
+
+"May I ask one or two personal questions?" she faltered. "Remember, I
+have not seen or heard anything from either of you for seven months."
+
+"By all means, my dear," the professor declared. "Your sister, I am glad
+to say, is well. I myself am as you see me. We have had a pleasant time
+and we have met some dear old friends from the other side. Our greatest
+trouble is that you are temporarily lost to us."
+
+"Elizabeth doesn't guess--"
+
+"My child," the professor interrupted, "I have been loyal to you.
+If Elizabeth knew that I could tell her at any moment your exact
+whereabouts, I think that she would be more angry with me than ever she
+has been in her life, and, my dear," he added, "you know, when Elizabeth
+is angry, things are apt to be unpleasant. But I have been dumb. I have
+not spoken, nor shall I. Yet," the professor went on, "you must not
+think, Beatrice, that because I yield to your whim in this matter I
+recognize any sufficient cause why you should voluntarily estrange
+yourself from those whose right and privilege it is to look after you.
+You are able, I am glad to see, to make your way in the world. I have
+attended the Atlas Theatre, and I am glad to see that you have lost
+none of your old skill in the song and dance. You are deservedly popular
+there. Soon, I have no doubt, you will aspire to more important parts.
+Still, my dear child," the professor continued, disposing of his second
+cocktail, "I see no reason why your very laudable desire to remain
+independent should be incompatible with a life under your sister's roof
+and my protection. Mr. Tavernake here, with his British instincts, will,
+I am sure, agree with me that it is not well for a young lady--my own
+daughter, sir, but I may say it--of considerable personal attractions,
+to live alone or under the chaperonage merely of these other young
+ladies of the theatre."
+
+"I think,", Tavernake said, "that your daughter must have very strong
+reasons for preferring to live alone."
+
+"Imaginary ones, my dear sir," the professor assured him,--"altogether
+imaginary. The quails at last! And the Clicquot! Now this is really a
+delightful little meeting. I drink to its repetition. This is indeed a
+treat for me. Beatrice, my love to you! Mr. Tavernake, my best respects!
+The only vintage, sir," he concluded, setting down his empty glass
+appreciatively.
+
+"To go back to what you were saying just now," Tavernake remarked, "I
+quite agree with you about Beatrice's living alone. I am very anxious
+for her to marry me."
+
+The professor set down his knife and fork. His appearance was one of
+ponderous theatricality.
+
+"Sir," he declared, "this is indeed a most momentous statement. Am I to
+take it as a serious offer for my daughter's hand?"
+
+Beatrice leaned over and laid her fingers upon his.
+
+"Father," she said, "it doesn't matter please. I am not willing to marry
+Mr. Tavernake."
+
+The professor looked from one to the other and coughed.
+
+"Are Mr. Tavernake's means," he asked, "of sufficient importance to
+warrant his entering into matrimony?"
+
+"I have no money at all to speak of," Tavernake answered. "That really
+isn't important. I shall very soon make all that your daughter can
+spend."
+
+"I agree with my daughter, sir," the professor declared. "The subject
+might well be left until such time as you have improved your position.
+We will dismiss it, therefore,--dismiss it at once. We will talk--"
+
+"Father," Beatrice interrupted, "let us talk about yourself. Don't
+you think you would be more contented, happier, if you were to try to
+arrange for a few--a few demonstrations or lectures over here, as you
+at first intended? I know that you must find having nothing to do such a
+strain upon you," she added.
+
+It was perhaps by accident that her eyes were fixed upon the glass which
+the professor was carrying to his lips. He set it down at once.
+
+"My child," he said, in a low tone, "I understand you."
+
+"No, no," she insisted, "I didn't mean that, but you are always better
+when you are working. A man like you," she went on, a little wistfully,
+"should not waste his talents."
+
+He sighed.
+
+"You are perhaps right, my child," he admitted. "I will go and see my
+agents to-morrow. Up till now," he went on, "I have refused all offers.
+I have felt that Elizabeth, the care of Elizabeth in her peculiar
+position, demanded my whole attention. Perhaps you are right. Perhaps I
+have over-estimated the necessity of being constantly at her right
+hand. She is a very clever woman Elizabeth," he concluded, "very clever
+indeed."
+
+"Where is she now, father?" Beatrice asked.
+
+"She motored into the country early this morning with some friends,"
+the professor said. "They went to a party last night with Walter Crease,
+London correspondent to the New York Gazette," he explained, turning a
+little away from Tavernake. "They were all home very late, I understand,
+and Elizabeth complained of a headache this morning. Personally, I
+regret to say that I was not up when they left."
+
+Beatrice leaned quite close to her father.
+
+"Do you see anything of the man Pritchard?" she inquired.
+
+The professor was suddenly flabby. He set down his glass, spilling half
+its contents. He stole a quick glance at Tavernake.
+
+"My child," he exclaimed, "you ought to consider my nerves! You know
+very well that the sudden mention of any one whom I dislike so intensely
+is bad for me. I am surprised at you, Beatrice. You show a culpable lack
+of consideration for my infirmities."
+
+"I am sorry, father," she whispered, "but is he here?"
+
+"He is," the professor admitted. "Between ourselves," he added, a white,
+scared look upon his pale face, "he is spoiling my whole peace of mind.
+My enjoyment of the comforts which Elizabeth is able to provide for me
+is interfered with by that man's constant presence. He seldom speaks,
+and yet he seems always to be watching. I do not trust him, Beatrice. I
+am a judge of men and I tell you that I do not trust him."
+
+"I wish that Elizabeth would go away," Beatrice said in a low tone. "Of
+course, I have no right--to say things. Nothing serious has perhaps ever
+happened. And yet--and yet, for her own sake, I do not think that she
+should stay here in London with Pritchard close at hand."
+
+The professor raised his glass with shaking fingers.
+
+"Elizabeth knows what is best," he declared, "I am sure that Elizabeth
+knows what is best, but I, too, am beginning to wish that she would go
+away. Last night we met him at Walter Crease's."
+
+Once more he turned a little nervously towards Tavernake, who was
+looking down into the body of the restaurant with immovable face.
+
+"We tried to persuade him then to go away. He is really in rather a
+dangerous position here. Jimmy Post has sworn that he will not be taken
+back to New York, and there are one or two others--a pretty desperate
+crew. We tried last night to reason with Pritchard."
+
+"It was no good?" she whispered.
+
+"No good at all," the professor answered, drily. "Perhaps, if we had not
+been interrupted, we might have convinced him."
+
+"Tell me about it," she begged.
+
+The professor shook his head. Tavernake still had that air of paying no
+attention whatever to their conversation.
+
+"It is not for you to know about, my dear," he concluded. "You have
+chosen very wisely to keep out of these matters. Elizabeth has such
+wonderful courage. My own nerve, I regret to say, is not quite what it
+was. Waiter, I will take a liqueur of the old brandy in a large glass."
+
+The brandy was brought, but the professor seemed haunted by memories and
+his spirits never wholly returned. Not until the lights were turned down
+and Tavernake had paid the bill, did he partially recover his former
+manner.
+
+"Dear child," he said, as they stood up together, "I cannot tell you
+what the pleasure has been of this brief reunion."
+
+She rested her fingers upon his shoulders and looked up into his face.
+
+"Father," she begged, softly, "come to me. I can keep you, if you don't
+mind for a short time being poor. You shall have all my salary except
+just enough for my clothes, and anything will do for me to wear. I will
+try so hard to make you comfortable."
+
+He looked at her with an air of offended dignity.
+
+"My child," he replied, "you must not talk to me like that. If I did not
+feel that my duty lay with Elizabeth, I should insist upon your coming
+to me, and under those conditions it would be I who should provide, not
+you. But for the moment I cannot leave your elder sister altogether. She
+needs me."
+
+Beatrice turned away a little sadly. They all three descended the
+stairs.
+
+"I shall leave our young friend, Mr. Tavernake, to escort you to your
+home," the professor announced. "I myself shall telephone to see if
+Elizabeth has returned. If she is still away, I shall spend an hour or
+two, I think, with my friends at the Blue Room Club. Beatrice, this has
+been a joy to me, a joy soon, I hope, to be repeated."
+
+He took both her hands. She smiled at him with an attempt at
+cheerfulness.
+
+"Good-night, father!" she said.
+
+"And to you, sir, also, good-night!" the professor added, taking
+Tavernake's hand and holding it for a minute in his, while he looked
+impressively in his face. "I will not say too much, but I will say this:
+so much as I have seen of you, I like. Good-night!"
+
+He turned and strode away. Both Beatrice and Tavernake watched him until
+he disappeared. Then, with a sigh, she picked up her skirts with her
+right hand, and took Tavernake's arm.
+
+"Do you mind walking home?" she asked. "My head aches."
+
+Tavernake looked for a moment wistfully across the road toward the Milan
+Court. Beatrice's hand, however, only held his arm the tighter.
+
+"I am going to make you come with me every step of the way," she
+declared, "so you can just as well make the best of it. Afterwards--"
+
+"What about afterwards?" he interrupted.
+
+"Afterwards," she continued, with decision, "you are to go straight
+home!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI. SOME EXCELLENT ADVICE
+
+
+Tavernake, in response to a somewhat urgent message, walked into his
+solicitor's office almost as soon as they opened on the following
+morning. The junior partner of the firm, who took an interest in him,
+and was anxious, indeed, to invest a small amount in the Marston Rise
+Building Company, received him cordially but with some concern.
+
+"Look here, Tavernake," he said, "I thought I'd better write a line and
+ask you to come down. You haven't forgotten, have you, that our option
+of purchase lasts only three days longer?"
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+"Well, what of it?" he asked.
+
+"It's just as well that you should understand the situation," the lawyer
+continued. "Your old people are hard upon our heels in this matter,
+and there will be no chance of any extension--not even for an hour. Mr.
+Dowling has already put in an offer a thousand pounds better than yours;
+I heard that incidentally yesterday afternoon; so you may be sure
+that the second your option has legally expired, the thing will be off
+altogether so far as you're concerned."
+
+"That's all very well," Tavernake remarked, "but what about the plots
+that already belong to me?"
+
+"They have some sort of scheme for leaving those high and dry," the
+solicitor explained. "You see, the drainage and lighting will be largely
+influenced by the purchaser of the whole estate. If Dowling gets it,
+he means to treat your plots so that they will become practically
+valueless. It's rather a mean sort of thing, but then he's a mean little
+man."
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+"Well," he announced, "I was coming to see you, anyhow, this morning, to
+talk to you about the money."
+
+"Your friend isn't backing out?" the lawyer asked, quickly.
+
+"My friend has not said anything about backing out yet," Tavernake
+replied, "but circumstances have arisen during the last few days which
+have altered my own views as to the expediency of business relations
+with this person. I haven't any reason to suppose that the money won't
+be forthcoming, but if I could get it from any other source, I should
+prefer it."
+
+The solicitor looked blank.
+
+"Of course," he said, "I'll do what I can, if you like, but I may as
+well tell you at once that I don't think I should have a ghost of a
+chance of raising the whole amount."
+
+"I suppose," Tavernake inquired, thoughtfully, "your firm couldn't do
+anything?"
+
+"We could do something, certainly," the solicitor answered, "on account
+of our own clients. We might, perhaps, manage up to five thousand
+pounds. That would still leave us wanting seven, however, and I scarcely
+see where we could get it."
+
+Tavernake was silent for a few moments.
+
+"You haven't quarreled with your friend, have you?" the solicitor asked.
+
+"No, there has been no quarrel," Tavernake replied. "I have another
+reason."
+
+"If I were you, I'd try and forget it," his friend advised. "To tell you
+the truth, I have been feeling rather anxious about this affair. It's
+a big thing, you know, and the profit is as sure as the dividend on
+Consols. I should hate to have that little bounder Dowling get in and
+scoop it up."
+
+"It's a fine investment," admitted Tavernake, "and, as you say, there
+isn't the slightest risk. That's why I was hoping you might have been
+able to manage it without my calling upon my friend."
+
+Mr. Martin shook his head.
+
+"It isn't so easy to convince other people. All the same, I don't want
+to get left. If you'll take my advice, you'll go and call on your friend
+at once, and see exactly how matters stand. If everything's O.K. and you
+can induce him to part a few hours before it is absolutely necessary, I
+must confess that it would take a load off my mind. I don't like these
+affairs that have to be concluded at the last possible moment."
+
+"Well," Tavernake agreed, "I must try what I can do, then. There is
+nothing else fresh, I suppose?"
+
+"Nothing," the solicitor answered. "Come back, if you can make any
+definite arrangement, or telephone. The matter is really bothering me a
+little. I don't want to have the other people slip in now."...
+
+Tavernake, instead of obeying his first impulse and making his way
+direct to the Milan Court, walked to the flat in Kingsway, climbed up
+the stone steps, and asked for Beatrice. She met him at her own door,
+fully dressed.
+
+"My dear Leonard!" she exclaimed, in surprise. "What an early caller!"
+
+"I want a few words with you," he said. "Can you spare me five minutes?"
+
+"You must walk with me to the theatre," she replied, "I am just off to
+rehearsal."
+
+They descended the stairs together.
+
+"I have something to tell you," Tavernake began, "something to tell you
+which you won't like to hear."
+
+"Something which I won't like to hear," she repeated, fearfully. "Go on,
+Leonard. It can't be worse than it sounds."
+
+"I don't know why I've come to tell you," he went on. "I never meant to.
+It came into my mind all of a sudden and I felt that I must. It has to
+do with your sister and the Marston Rise affair."
+
+"My sister and the Marston Rise affair!" Beatrice exclaimed,
+incredulously.
+
+Then a sudden light broke in upon her. She stopped short and clutched at
+his hand.
+
+"You don't mean that it was Elizabeth who was going to find you the
+money?" she cried.
+
+"I do," he answered. "She offered it of her own accord. I do not know
+why I talked to her of my own affairs, but she led me on to speak of
+them. Your sister is a wonderful person," he continued, dropping his
+voice. "I don't know why, but she made me talk as no one else has ever
+made me talk before. I simply had to tell her things. Then, when I had
+finished, she showed me her bankbooks and suggested that she should
+invest some of her money in the Rise."
+
+"But do you mean to tell me," Beatrice persisted, "that it is her money
+upon which you are relying for this purchase?"
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+"You see," he explained, "Mr. Dowling dropped upon us before I was
+prepared. As soon as he found out, he went to the owners of the estate
+and made them a bid for it. The consequence was that they shortened my
+option and gave me very little chance indeed to find the money. When
+your sister offered it, it certainly seemed a wonderful stroke of
+fortune. I could give her eight or ten per cent, whereas she would only
+get four anywhere else, and I should make a profit for myself of over
+ten thousand pounds, which I cannot do unless I find the money to buy
+the estate."
+
+"But you mustn't touch that money, you mustn't have anything to do with
+it!" Beatrice exclaimed, walking very fast and looking straight ahead.
+"You don't understand. How should you?"
+
+"Do you mean that the money was stolen?" Tavernake asked, after a
+moment's pause.
+
+"No, not stolen," Beatrice replied, "but it comes--oh! I can't tell you,
+only Elizabeth has no right to it. My own sister! It is all too awful!"
+
+"Do you think that she has come by this money dishonestly?"
+
+"I am not sure," Beatrice murmured. "There are worse things, more
+terrible things even than theft."
+
+The practical side of Tavernake's nature was very much to the fore
+that morning. He began to wonder whether women, after all, strange and
+fascinating creatures though they were, possessed judgment which could
+be relied upon--whether they were not swayed too much by sentiment.
+
+"Beatrice," he said, "you must understand this. I have no time to raise
+the money elsewhere. If I don't get it from your sister, supposing she
+is still willing to let me have it, my chance has gone. I shall have to
+take a situation in some one else's office as a clerk--probably not so
+good a place as I held at Dowling & Spence's. On the other hand, the use
+of that money for a very short time would be the start of my career. All
+that you say is so vague. Why need I know anything about it? I met your
+sister in the ordinary way of business and she has made an ordinary
+business proposition to me, one by which she will be, incidentally, very
+greatly benefited. I never thought of telling you this at all, but when
+the time came I hated to go and draw that money from your sister without
+having said anything to you. So I came this morning, but I want you, if
+you possibly can, to look at the matter from my point of view."
+
+She was silent for several moments. Then she glanced at him curiously.
+
+"Why on earth," she asked, "should my sister make this offer to you? She
+isn't a fool. She doesn't usually trust strangers."
+
+"She trusted me, apparently," Tavernake answered.
+
+"Can you understand why?" Beatrice demanded.
+
+"I think that I can," he replied. "If one can rely upon one's
+perception, she is surrounded by people whom she might find agreeable
+companions but whom she is scarcely likely to have much confidence in.
+Perhaps she realized that I wasn't like them."
+
+"And you want very much to take this money?" she said, half to herself.
+
+"I want to very much indeed," Tavernake admitted. "I was on my way
+to see her this morning and to ask her to let me have it a day or two
+before the time, but I felt, somehow, that there seemed to be a certain
+amount of deceit in going to her and taking it without saying a word to
+you. I felt that I had to come here first. But Beatrice, don't ask me to
+give it up. It means such a long time before I can move again. It's the
+first step that's so difficult, and I must--I must make a start. It's
+such a chance, this. I have spent so many hours thinking about it. I
+have planned and worked and sketched it all out as no one else could do.
+I must have that money."
+
+They walked on in silence until they reached the stage door. Beatrice
+was thinking of her companion as she had seen him so often, poring over
+his plans, busy with ruler and india-rubber, absolutely absorbed in the
+interest of his task. She remembered the first time he had talked
+about this scheme of his, how his whole face had changed, the almost
+passionate interest with which he had worked the thing out even to its
+smallest details. She realized how great a part of his life the thing
+had become, what a terrible blow it would be to him to have to abandon
+it. She turned and faced him.
+
+"Leonard," she said, "perhaps, after all, you are right. Perhaps I give
+way too much to what, after all, is only a sentimental feeling. I am
+thankful that you came and told me; I shall always be thankful for that.
+Take the money, but pay it back as soon as you can."
+
+"I shall do that," he answered. "I shall do that you may rely upon it."
+
+She laid her hand upon his arm.
+
+"Leonard," she begged, "I know that Elizabeth is very beautiful and very
+fascinating, and I don't wonder that you like to go and see her, but I
+want to ask you to promise me one thing."
+
+He felt as though he were suddenly turned into stone. It was not
+possible--it could not be possible that she had guessed his secret!
+
+"Well?" he demanded.
+
+"Don't let her introduce you to her friends; don't spend too much time
+there," she continued. "Elizabeth is my sister and I don't--really I
+don't want to say anything that doesn't sound kind, but her friends are
+not fit people for you to know, and Elizabeth--well she hasn't very much
+heart."
+
+He was silent for several moments.
+
+"How did you know I liked going to see your sister?" he asked,
+abruptly.
+
+She smiled.
+
+"My dear Leonard," she said, "you are not very clever at hiding your
+feelings. When you came to see me the other day, do you imagine I
+believed for a single moment that you asked me to marry you simply
+because you cared? I think, Leonard, that it was because you were
+afraid, you were afraid of something coming into your life so big,
+so terrifying, that you were ready to clutch at the easiest chance of
+safety."
+
+"Beatrice, this is absurd!" he exclaimed.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"No, it isn't that," she declared. "Do you know, my dear Leonard, what
+there was about you from the very first which attracted me?"
+
+"No," he answered.
+
+"It was your honesty," she continued. "You remember that night upon the
+roof at Blenheim House? You were going to tell a lie for me, and I know
+how you hated it. You love the truth, you are truthful naturally; I
+would rely upon you wherever I was. I know that you would keep your
+word, I know that you would be honest. A woman loves to feel that about
+a man--she loves it--and I don't want you to be brought near the people
+who sneer at honesty and all good things. I don't want you to hear their
+point of view. You may be simple and commonplace in some respects; I
+want you to stay just as you are. Do you understand?"
+
+"I understand," Tavernake replied gravely.
+
+A call boy shouted her name down the stone passage. She patted him on
+the shoulder and turned away.
+
+"Run along now and get the money," she said. "Come and see me when it's
+all over."
+
+Tavernake left her with a long breath of relief and made his way towards
+the Strand. At the corner of Wellington Street he came face to face
+with Pritchard. They stopped at once. There seemed to be something
+embarrassing about this meeting. Pritchard patted him familiarly on the
+shoulder.
+
+"How goes it, old man?" he asked.
+
+"I am all right," Tavernake answered, somewhat awkwardly. "How are you?"
+
+"I guess I'd be the better for a drink," Pritchard declared. "Come
+along. Pretty well done up the other night, weren't we? We'll step into
+the American Bar here and try a gin fizz."
+
+They found themselves presently perched upon two high stools in a
+deserted corner of the bar to which Pritchard had led the way. Tavernake
+sipped his drink tentatively.
+
+"I should like," he said, "to ask you a question or two about Wednesday
+night."
+
+Pritchard nodded.
+
+"Go right ahead," he invited.
+
+"You seem to take the whole affair as a sort of joke," Tavernake
+remarked.
+
+"Well, isn't that what it was?" the detective asked, smiling.
+
+Tavernake shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"There didn't seem to me to be much joke about it!" he exclaimed.
+
+Pritchard laughed gayly.
+
+"You are not used to Americans, my young friend," he said. "Over on this
+side you are all so fearfully literal. You are not seriously supposing
+that they meant to dose me with that stuff the other night, eh?"
+
+"I never thought that there was any doubt about it at all," Tavernake
+declared deliberately.
+
+Pritchard stroked his moustache meditatively.
+
+"Well," he remarked, "you are certainly green, and yet I don't know why
+you shouldn't be. Americans are always up to games of that sort. I am
+not saying that they didn't mean to give me a scare, if they could, or
+that they wouldn't have been glad to get a few words of information out
+of me, or a paper or two that I keep pretty safely locked up. It would
+have been a better joke on me then. But as for the rest, as for really
+trying to make me take that stuff, of course, that was all bunkum."
+
+Tavernake sat quite still in his chair for several minutes.
+
+"Will you take another gin fizz, Mr. Pritchard?" he asked.
+
+"Why not?"
+
+Tavernake gave the order. He sat on his stool whistling softly to
+himself.
+
+"Then I suppose," he said at last, "I must have looked a pretty sort of
+an ass coming through the wall like a madman."
+
+Pritchard shook his head.
+
+"You looked just about what you were," he answered, "a d----d good sort.
+I'm not playing up to you that it was all pretense. You can never trust
+that gang. The blackguard outside was in earnest, anyway. After all, you
+know, they wouldn't miss me if I were to drop quietly out. There 's no
+one else they 're quite so much afraid of. There 's no one else knows
+quite as much about them."
+
+"Well, we'll let it go at that," Tavernake declared. "You know so much
+of all these people, though, that I rather wish you 'd tell me something
+I want very much to know."
+
+"It's by telling nothing," the detective replied quickly, "that I know
+as much as I do. Just one cocktail, eh?"
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+"I drank my first cocktail last night," he remarked. "I had supper with
+the professor and his daughter."
+
+"Not Elizabeth?" Pritchard asked swiftly.
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+"With Miss Beatrice," he answered.
+
+Pritchard set down his glass.
+
+"Say, Tavernake," he inquired, "you are friendly with that young lady,
+Miss Beatrice, aren't you?"
+
+"I certainly am," Tavernake answered. "I have a very great regard for
+her."
+
+"Then I can tell you how to do her a good turn," Pritchard continued,
+earnestly. "Keep her away from that old blackguard. Keep her away from
+all the gang. Believe me, she is looking for trouble by even speaking to
+them."
+
+"But the man's her father," Tavernake objected, "and he seems fond of
+her."
+
+"Don't you believe it," Pritchard went on. "He's fond of nothing and
+nobody but himself and easy living. He's soft, mind you, he's got plenty
+of sentiment, he 'll squeeze a tear out of his eye, and all that sort
+of thing, but he'd sell his soul, or his daughter's soul, for a little
+extra comfort. Now Elizabeth doesn't know exactly where her sister is,
+and she daren't seem anxious, or go around making inquiries. Beatrice
+has her chance to keep away, and I can tell you it will be a thundering
+sight better for her if she does."
+
+"Well, I don't understand it at all," Tavernake declared. "I hate
+mysteries."
+
+Pritchard set down his empty glass.
+
+"Look here," he remarked, "this affair is too serious, after all, for us
+to talk round like a couple of gossips. I have given you your warning,
+and if you're wise you 'll remember it."
+
+"Tell me this one thing," Tavernake persisted. "Tell me what is the
+cause of the quarrel between the two? Can't something be done to bring
+them together again?"
+
+Pritchard shook his head.
+
+"Nothing," he answered. "As things are at present, they are better
+apart. Coming my way?"
+
+Tavernake followed him out of the place. Pritchard took his arm as he
+turned down toward the Strand.
+
+"My young friend," he said, "here is a word of advice for you. The
+Scriptures say that you cannot serve God and mammon. Paraphrase that to
+the present situation and remember that you cannot serve Elizabeth and
+Beatrice."
+
+"What then?" Tavernake demanded.
+
+The detective waited until he had lit the long black cigar between his
+teeth.
+
+"I guess you'd better confine your attentions to Beatrice," he
+concluded.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII. DINNER WITH ELIZABETH
+
+
+The rest of that day was for Tavernake a period of feverish anxieties.
+He received two telegrams from Mr. Martin, his solicitor, and he
+himself was more uneasy than he cared to admit. At three o'clock in
+the afternoon, at eight in the evening, and again at eleven o'clock at
+night, he presented himself at the Milan Court, always with the same
+inquiry. On the last occasion, the hall porter had cheering news for
+him.
+
+"Mrs. Wenham Gardner returned from the country an hour ago, sir," he
+announced. "I can send your name up now, if you wish to see her."
+
+Tavernake was conscious of a sense of immense relief. Of course, he had
+known that she had not really gone away for good, but all the same her
+absence, especially after the event of the night before last, was a
+little disquieting.
+
+"My name is Tavernake," he said. "I do not wish to intrude at such an
+hour, but if she could see me for a moment, I should be glad."
+
+He sat down and waited patiently. Soon a message came that Mr. Tavernake
+was to go up. He ascended in the lift and knocked at the door of her
+suite. Her maid opened it grudgingly. She scarcely took the pains to
+conceal her disapproval of this young man--so ordinary, so gauche. Why
+Madame should waste her time upon such a one, she could not imagine!
+
+"Mrs. Gardner will see you directly," she told him. "Madame is dressing
+now to go out for supper. She will be able to spare you only a few
+seconds."
+
+Tavernake remained alone in the luxurious little sitting-room for nearly
+ten minutes. Then the door of the inner room was opened and Elizabeth
+appeared. Tavernake, rising slowly to his feet, looked at her for a
+moment in reluctant but wondering admiration. She was wearing an ivory
+satin gown, without trimming or lace of any sort, a gown the fit of
+which seemed to him almost a miracle. Her only jewelry was a long rope
+of pearls and a small tiara. Tavernake had never been brought into close
+contact with any one quite like this.
+
+She was putting on her gloves as she entered and she gave him her left
+hand.
+
+"What an extraordinary person you are, Mr. Tavernake!" she exclaimed.
+"You really do seem to turn up at the most astonishing times."
+
+"I am very sorry to have intruded upon you to-night," he said. "As
+regards the last occasion, however, upon which I made an unexpected
+appearance, I make no apologies whatever," he added coolly.
+
+She laughed softly. She was looking full into his eyes and yet he could
+not tell whether she was angry with him or only amused.
+
+"You were by way of being a little melodramatic, were you not?" she
+remarked. "Still, you were very much in earnest, and one forgives a
+great deal to any one who is really in earnest. What do you want with me
+now? I am just going downstairs to supper."
+
+"It is a matter of business," Tavernake replied. "I have a friend who
+is a partner with me in the Marston Rise building speculation, and he is
+worried because there is some one else in the field wanting to buy the
+property, and the day after to-morrow is our last chance of paying over
+the money."
+
+She looked at him as though puzzled.
+
+"What money?"
+
+"The money which you agreed to lend me, or rather to invest in our
+building company," he reminded her.
+
+She nodded.
+
+"Of course! Why, I had forgotten all about it for the moment. You are
+going to give me ten per cent interest or something splendid, aren't
+you? Well, what about it? You don't want to take it away with you now, I
+suppose?"
+
+"No," he answered, "it isn't that. To be honest with you, I came to make
+sure that you hadn't changed your mind."
+
+"And why should I change my mind?"
+
+"You might be angry with me," he said, "for interfering in your concerns
+the night before last."
+
+"Perhaps I am," she remarked, indifferently.
+
+"Do you wish to withdraw from your promise?" he asked.
+
+"I really haven't thought much about it," she replied, carelessly.
+"By-the-bye, have you seen Beatrice lately?"
+
+"We agreed, I think," he reminded her, "that we would not talk about
+your sister."
+
+She looked at him over her shoulder.
+
+"I do not remember that I agreed to anything of the sort," she declared.
+"I think it was you who laid down the law about that. As a matter of
+fact, I think that your silence about her is very unkind. I suppose you
+have seen her?"
+
+"Yes, I have seen her," Tavernake admitted.
+
+"She continues to be tragic," Elizabeth asked, "whenever my name is
+mentioned?"
+
+"I should not call it tragic," Tavernake answered, reluctantly. "One
+gathers, however, that something transpired between you before she left,
+of a serious nature."
+
+She looked at him earnestly.
+
+"Really," she said, "you are a strange, stolid young man. I wonder," she
+went on, smiling into his face, "are you in love with my sister?"
+
+Tavernake made no immediate response, only something flashed for a
+moment in his eyes which puzzled her.
+
+"Why do you look at me like that?" she demanded. "You are not angry with
+me for asking?"
+
+"No, I am not angry," he replied. "It isn't that. But you must know--you
+must see!"
+
+Then she indeed did see that he was laboring under a very great emotion.
+She leaned towards him, laughing softly.
+
+"Now you are really becoming interesting," she murmured. "Tell me--tell
+me all about it."
+
+"I don't know what love is!" Tavernake declared fiercely. "I don't know
+what it means to be in love!"
+
+Again she laughed in his face.
+
+"Are you so sure?" she whispered.
+
+She saw the veins stand out upon his temples, watched the passion which
+kept him at first tongue-tied.
+
+"Sure!" he muttered. "Who can be sure when you look like that!"
+
+He held out his arms. With a swift little backward movement she flitted
+away and leaned against the table.
+
+"What a brother-in-law you would make!" she laughed. "So steady, so
+respectable, alas! so serious! Dear Mr. Tavernake, I wish you joy. As a
+matter of fact, you and Beatrice are very well suited for one another."
+
+The telephone bell rang. She moved over and held the receiver to her
+ear. Her face changed. After the first few words to which she listened,
+it grew dark with anger.
+
+"You mean to say that Professor Franklin has not been in since
+lunch-time?" she exclaimed. "I left word particularly that I should
+require him to-night. Is Major Post there, then? No? Mr. Crease--no?
+Nor Mr. Faulkes? Not one of them! Very well, ring me up directly the
+professor comes in, or any of them."
+
+She replaced the receiver with a gesture of annoyance. Tavernake was
+astonished at the alteration in her expression. The smile had gone, and
+with its passing away lines had come under her eyes and about her mouth.
+Without a word to him she strode away into her bedroom. Tavernake was
+just wondering whether he should retire, when she came back.
+
+"Listen, Mr. Tavernake," she said, "how far away are your rooms?"
+
+"Down at Chelsea," he answered, "about two miles and a half."
+
+"Take a taxi and drive there," she commanded, "or stop. You will find my
+car outside. I will telephone down to say that you are to use it. Change
+into your evening clothes and come back for me. I want you to take me
+out to supper."
+
+He looked at her in amazement. She stamped her foot.
+
+"Don't stand there hesitating!" she ordered. "Do as I say! You don't
+expect I am going to help you to buy your wretched property if you
+refuse me the simplest of favors? Hurry, I say! Hurry!"
+
+"I am really very sorry," Tavernake interposed, "but I do not possess a
+dress suit. I would go, with pleasure, but I haven't got such a thing."
+
+She looked at him for a moment incredulously. Then she broke into a fit
+of uncontrollable laughter. She sat down upon the edge of a couch and
+wiped the tears from her eyes.
+
+"Oh, you strange, you wonderful person!" she exclaimed. "You want to buy
+an estate and you want to borrow twelve thousand pounds, and you know
+where Beatrice is and you won't tell me, and you are fully convinced,
+because you burst into a house through the wall, that you saved poor
+Pritchard from being poisoned, and you don't possess a dress suit! Never
+mind, as it happens it doesn't matter about the dress suit. You shall
+take me out as you are."
+
+Tavernake felt in his pockets and remembered that he had only thirty
+shillings with him.
+
+"Here, carry my purse," she said carelessly. "We are going downstairs to
+the smaller restaurant. I have been traveling since six o'clock, and I
+am starving."
+
+"But how about my clothes?" Tavernake objected. "Will they be all
+right?"
+
+"It doesn't matter where we are going," she answered. "You look very
+well as you are. Come and let me put your tie straight."
+
+She came close to him and her fingers played for a moment with his tie.
+She was very near to him and she laughed deliberately into his face.
+Tavernake held himself quite stiff and felt foolish. He also felt
+absurdly happy.
+
+"There," she remarked, when she had arranged it to her satisfaction,
+"you look all right now. I wonder," she added, half to herself, "what
+you do look like. Something Colonial and forceful, I think. Never
+mind, help me on with my cloak and come along. You are a most
+respectable-looking escort, and a very useful one."
+
+
+Although Tavernake was nominally the host, it was Elizabeth who selected
+the table and ordered the supper. There were very few other guests in
+the room, the majority being down in the larger restaurant, but among
+these few Tavernake noticed two of the girls from the chorus at the
+Atlas. Elizabeth had chosen a table from which she had a view of the
+door, and she took the seat facing it. From the first Tavernake felt
+certain that she was watching for some one.
+
+"Talk to me now, please, about this speculation," she insisted. "I
+should like to know all about it, and whether you are sure that I shall
+get ten per cent for my money."
+
+Tavernake was in no way reluctant. It was a safe topic for conversation,
+and one concerning which he had plenty to say. But after a time she
+stopped him.
+
+"Well," she said, "I have discovered at any rate one subject on which
+you can be fluent. Now I have had enough of building properties, please,
+and house building. I should like to hear a little about Beatrice."
+
+Tavernake was dumb.
+
+"I do not wish to talk about Beatrice," he declared, "until I understand
+the cause of this estrangement between you."
+
+Her eyes flashed angrily and her laugh sounded forced.
+
+"Not even talk of her! My dear friend," she protested, "you scarcely
+repay the confidence I am placing in you!"
+
+"You mean the money?"
+
+"Precisely," she continued. "I trust you, why I do not know--I suppose
+because I am something of a physiognomist--with twelve thousand pounds
+of my hard-earned savings. You refuse to trust me with even a few simple
+particulars about the life of my own sister. Come, I don't think that
+things are quite as they should be between us."
+
+"Do you know where I first met your sister?" Tavernake asked.
+
+She shook her head pettishly.
+
+"How should I? You told me nothing."
+
+"She was staying in a boarding-house where I lived," Tavernake went on.
+"I think I told you that but nothing else. It was a cheap boarding-house
+but she had not enough money to pay for her meals. She was tired of
+life. She was in a desperate state altogether."
+
+"Are you trying to tell me, or rather trying not to tell me, that
+Beatrice was mad enough to think of committing suicide?" Elizabeth
+inquired.
+
+"She was in the frame of mind when such a step was possible," he
+answered, gravely. "You remember that night when I first saw you in the
+chemist's shop across the street? She had been very ill that evening,
+very ill indeed. You could see for yourself the effect meeting you had
+upon her."
+
+Elizabeth nodded, and crumbled a little piece of roll between her
+fingers. Then she leaned over the table towards Tavernake.
+
+"She seemed terrified, didn't she? She hurried you away--she seemed
+afraid."
+
+"It was very noticeable," he admitted. "She was terrified. She dragged
+me out of the place. A few minutes later she fainted in the cab."
+
+Elizabeth smiled.
+
+"Beatrice was always over-sensitive," she remarked. "Any sudden shock
+unnerved her altogether. Are you terrified of me, too, Mr. Tavernake?"
+
+"I don't know," he answered, frankly. "Sometimes I think that I am."
+
+She laughed softly.
+
+"Why?" she whispered.
+
+He looked into her eyes and he felt abject. How was it possible to sit
+within a few feet of her and remain sane!
+
+"You are so wonderful," he said, in a low tone, "so different from any
+one else in the world!"
+
+"You are glad that you met me, then--that you are here?" she asked.
+
+He raised his eyes once more.
+
+"I don't know," he answered simply. "If I really believed--if you were
+always kind like this--but, you see, you make two men of me. When I am
+with you I am a fool, your fool, to do as you will with. When I am away,
+some glimmerings of common sense come back, and I know."
+
+"You know what?" she murmured.
+
+"That you are not honest," he added.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake!" she exclaimed, lifting her head a little.
+
+"Oh, I don t mean dishonest in the ordinary way!" he protested, eagerly.
+"What I mean is that you look things which you don't feel, that you are
+willing for any one who can't help admiring you very much to believe for
+a moment that you, too, feel more kindly than you really do. This is so
+clumsy," he broke off, despairingly, "but you understand what I mean!"
+
+"You have an adorable way of making yourself understood," she laughed.
+"Come, do let us talk sense for a minute or two. You say that when
+you are with me you are my slave. Then why is it that you do not bring
+Beatrice here when I beg you to?"
+
+"I am your slave," he answered, "in everything that has to do with
+myself and my own actions. In that other matter it is for your sister to
+decide."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"Well," she said, "I suppose I shall be able to endure life without
+her. At any rate, we will talk of something else. Tell me, are you not
+curious to know why I insisted upon bringing you here?"
+
+"Yes," he admitted, "I am."
+
+"Spoken with your usual candor, my dear Briton!" she exclaimed. "Well, I
+will gratify your curiosity. This, as you see, is not a popular supping
+place. A few people come in--mostly those who for some reason or other
+don't feel smart enough for the big restaurants. The people from the
+theatres come in here who have not time to change their clothes. As you
+perceive; the place has a distinctly Bohemian flavor."
+
+Tavernake looked around.
+
+"They seem to come in all sorts of clothes," he remarked. "I am glad."
+
+"There is a man now in London," Elizabeth continued, "whom I am just
+as anxious to see as I am to find my sister. I believe that this is the
+most likely place to find him. That is why I have come. My father was
+to have been here to take me, but as you heard he has gone out somewhere
+and not returned. None of my other friends were available. You happened
+to come in just in time."
+
+"And this man whom you want to see," Tavernake asked, "is he here?"
+
+"Not yet," she answered.
+
+There were, indeed, only a few scattered groups in the place, and most
+of these were obviously theatrical. But even at that moment a man came
+in alone through the circular doors, and stood just inside, looking
+around him. He was a man of medium height, thin, and of undistinguished
+appearance. His hair was light-colored and plastered a little in front
+over his forehead. His face was thin and he walked with a slight stoop.
+Something about his clothes and his manner of wearing them stamped him
+as an American. Tavernake glanced at his companion, wondering whether
+this, perhaps, might not be the person for whom she was watching. His
+first glance was careless enough, then he felt his heart thump against
+his ribs. A tragedy had come into the room! The woman at his side sat as
+though turned to stone. There was a look in her face as of one who sees
+Death. The small patch of rouge, invisible before, was now a staring
+daub of color in an oasis of ashen white. Her eyes were as hard as
+stones; her lips were twitching as though, indeed, she had been stricken
+with some disease. No longer was he sitting with this most beautiful
+lady at whose coming all heads were turned in admiration. It was as
+though an image of Death sat there, a frozen presentment of horror
+itself!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII. ON AN ERRAND OF CHIVALRY
+
+
+The seconds passed; the woman beside him showed no sign of life.
+Tavernake felt a fear run cold in his blood, such as in all his days
+he had never known. This, indeed, was something belonging to a world of
+which he knew nothing. What was it? Illness? Pain? Surprise? There was
+only his instinct to tell him. It was terror, the terror of one who
+looks beyond the grave.
+
+"Mrs. Gardner!" he exclaimed. "Elizabeth!"
+
+The sound of his voice seemed to break the spell. A half-choked sob came
+through her teeth; the struggle for composure commenced.
+
+"I am ill," she murmured. "Give me my glass. Give it to me."
+
+Her fingers were feeling for it but it seemed as though she dared not
+move her head. He filled it with wine and placed the stem in her hand.
+Even then she spilled some of it upon the tablecloth. As she raised
+it to her lips, the man who stood still upon the threshold of the
+restaurant looked into her face. Slowly, as though his quest were over,
+he came down the room.
+
+"Go away," she said to Tavernake. "Go away, please. He is coming to
+speak to me. I want to be alone with him."
+
+Strangely enough, at that moment Tavernake saw nothing out of the common
+in her request. He rose at once, without any formal leave-taking, and
+made his way toward the other end of the cafe. As he turned the corner
+towards the smoking-room, he glanced once behind. The man had approached
+quite close to Elizabeth; he was standing before her table, they seemed
+to be exchanging greetings.
+
+Tavernake went on into the smoking-room and threw himself into an
+easy-chair. He had been there perhaps for ten minutes when Pritchard
+entered. Certainly it was a night of surprises! Even Pritchard, cool,
+deliberate, slow in his movements and speech, seemed temporarily
+flurried. He came into the room walking quickly. As the door swung
+back, he turned round as though to assure himself that he was not being
+followed. He did not at first see Tavernake. He sat on the arm of an
+easy-chair, his hands in his pockets, his eternal cigar in the corner
+of his mouth, his eyes fixed upon the doors through which he had issued.
+Without a doubt, something had disturbed him. He had the look of a man
+who had received a blow, a surprise of some sort over which he was still
+ruminating. Then he glanced around the room and saw Tavernake.
+
+"Hullo, young man!" he exclaimed. "So this is the way you follow my
+advice!"
+
+"I never promised to follow it," Tavernake reminded him.
+
+Pritchard wheeled an easy-chair across the room and called to the
+waiter.
+
+"Come," he said, "you shall stand me a drink. Two whiskies and sodas,
+Tim. And now, Mr. Leonard Tavernake, you are going to answer me a
+question."
+
+"Am I?" Tavernake muttered.
+
+"You came down in the lift with Mrs. Wenham Gardner half an hour ago,
+you went into the restaurant and ordered supper. She is there still and
+you are here. Have you quarreled?"
+
+"No, we did not quarrel," Tavernake answered. "She explained that she
+was supping in the cafe only for the sake of meeting one man. She wanted
+an escort. I filled that post until the man came."
+
+"He is there now?" Pritchard asked.
+
+"He is there now," Tavernake assented.
+
+Pritchard withdrew the cigar from his mouth and watched it for a moment.
+
+"Say, Tavernake," he went on, "is that man who is now having supper with
+Mrs. Wenham Gardner the man whom she expected?"
+
+"I imagine so," Tavernake replied.
+
+"Didn't she seem in any way scared or disturbed when he first turned
+up?"
+
+"She looked as I have seen no one else on earth look before," Tavernake
+admitted. "She seemed simply terrified to death. I do not know why--she
+didn't explain--but that is how she looked."
+
+"Yet she sent you away!"
+
+"She sent me away. She didn't care what became of me. She was watching
+the door all the time before he came. Who is he, Pritchard?"
+
+"That sounds a simple question," Pritchard answered gravely, "but it
+means a good deal. There's mischief afoot to-night, Tavernake."
+
+"You seem to thrive on it," Tavernake retorted, drily. "Any more
+bunkum?"
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"Come," he said, "you're a sensible chap. Take these things for what
+they're worth. Believe me when I tell you now that there is a great deal
+more in the coming of this man than Mrs. Wenham Gardner ever bargained
+for."
+
+"I wish you'd tell me who he is," Tavernake begged. "All this mystery
+about Beatrice and her sister, and that lazy old hulk of a father, is
+most irritating."
+
+Pritchard nodded sympathetically.
+
+"You'll have to put up with it a little longer, I'm afraid, my young
+friend," he declared. "You've done me a good turn; I'll do you one. I'll
+give you some good advice. Keep out of this place so long as the old man
+and his daughter are hanging out here. The girl 's clever--oh, she's
+as clever as they make them--but she's gone wrong from the start. They
+ain't your sort, Tavernake. You don't fit in anywhere. Take my advice
+and hook it altogether."
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+"I can't do that just now," he said. "Good-night! I'm off for the
+present, at any rate."
+
+Pritchard, too, rose to his feet. He passed his arm through Tavernake's.
+
+"Young man," he remarked, "there are not many in this country whom I can
+trust. You're one of them. There's a sort of solidity about you that I
+rather admire. You are not likely to break out and do silly things. Do
+you care for adventures?"
+
+"I detest them," Tavernake answered, "especially the sort I tumbled into
+the other night."
+
+Pritchard laughed softly. They had left the room now and were walking
+along the open space at the end of the restaurant, leading to the main
+exit.
+
+"That's the difference between us," he declared thoughtfully. "Now
+adventures to me are the salt of my life. I hang about here and watch
+these few respectable-looking men and women, and there doesn't seem to
+be much in it to an outsider, but, gee whiz! there's sometimes things
+underneath which you fellows don't tumble to. A man asks another in
+there to have a drink. They make a cheerful appointment to meet for
+lunch, to motor to Brighton. It all sounds so harmless, and yet there
+are the seeds of a conspiracy already sown. They hate me here, but they
+know very well that wherever they went I should be around. I suppose
+some day they'll get rid of me."
+
+"More bunkum!" Tavernake muttered.
+
+They stood in front of the door and passed through into the courtyard.
+On their right, the interior of the smaller restaurant was shielded from
+view by a lattice-work, covered with flowers and shrubs. Pritchard came
+to a standstill at a certain point, and stooping down looked through.
+He remained there without moving for what seemed to Tavernake an
+extraordinarily long time. When he stood up again, there was a distinct
+change in his face. He was looking more serious than Tavernake had ever
+seen him. But for the improbability of the thing, Tavernake would have
+thought that he had turned pale.
+
+"My young friend," he said, "you've got to see me through this. You 've
+a sort of fancy for Mrs. Wenham Gardner, I know. To-night you shall be
+on her side."
+
+"I don't want any more mysteries," Tavernake protested. "I'd rather go
+home."
+
+"It can't be done," Pritchard declared, taking his arm once more.
+"You've got to see me through this. Come up to my rooms for a minute."
+
+They entered the Court and ascended to the eighth floor. Pritchard
+turned on the lights in his room, a plainly furnished and somewhat bare
+apartment. From a cupboard he took out a pair of rubber-soled shoes and
+threw them to Tavernake.
+
+"Put those on," he directed.
+
+"What are we going to do?" Tavernake asked.
+
+"You are going to help me," Pritchard answered. "Take my word for it,
+Tavernake, it's all right. I could tackle the job alone, but I'd rather
+not. Now drink this whiskey and soda and light a cigarette. I shall be
+ready in five minutes."
+
+"But where are we going?" Tavernake demanded.
+
+"You are going," Pritchard replied, "on an errand of chivalry. You are
+going to become once more a rescuer of woman in distress. You are going
+to save the life of your beautiful friend Elizabeth."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV. CLOSE TO TRAGEDY
+
+
+The actual words of greeting which passed between Elizabeth and the
+man whose advent had caused her so much emotion were unimpressive. The
+newcomer, with the tips of his fingers resting upon the tablecloth,
+leaned slightly towards her. At close quarters, he was even more
+unattractive than when Tavernake had first seen him. He was faultily
+shaped; there was something a little decadent about his deep-set eyes
+and receding forehead. Neither was his expression prepossessing. He
+looked at her as a man looks upon the thing he hates.
+
+"So, Elizabeth," he said, "this pleasure has come at last!"
+
+"I heard that you were back in England," she replied. "Pray sit down."
+
+Even then her eyes never left his. All the time they seemed to be
+fiercely questioning, seeking for something in his features which eluded
+them. It was terrible to see the change which the last few minutes had
+wrought in her. Her smooth, girlish face had lost its comeliness. Her
+eyes, always a little narrow, seemed to have receded. It was such a
+change, this, as comes to a brave man who, in the prime of life, feels
+fear for the first time.
+
+"I am glad to find you at supper," he declared, taking up the menu. "I
+am hungry. You can bring me some grilled cutlets at once," he added to
+the waiter who stood by his side, "and some brandy. Nothing else."
+
+The waiter bowed and hurried off. The woman played with her fan but her
+fingers were shaking.
+
+"I fear," he remarked, "that my coming is rather a shock to you. I am
+sorry to see you looking so distressed."
+
+"It is not that," she answered with some show of courage. "You know me
+too well to believe me capable of seeking a meeting which I feared. It
+is the strange thing which has happened to you during these last few
+months--this last year. Do you know--has any one told you--that you seem
+to have become even more like--the image of--"
+
+He nodded understandingly.
+
+"Of poor Wenham! Many people have told me that. Of course, you know that
+we were always appallingly alike, and they always said that we should
+become more so in middle-age. After all, there is only a year between
+us. We might have been twins."
+
+"It is the most terrible thing in likenesses I have ever seen," the
+woman continued slowly. "When you entered the room a few seconds ago, it
+seemed to me that a miracle had happened. It seemed to me that the dead
+had come to life."
+
+"It must have been a shock," the man murmured, with his eyes upon the
+tablecloth.
+
+"It was," she agreed, hoarsely. "Can't you see it in my face? I do not
+always look like a woman of forty. Can't you see the gray shadows
+that are there? You see, I admit it frankly. I was terrified--I am
+terrified!"
+
+"And why?" he asked.
+
+"Why?" she repeated, looking at him wonderingly. "Doesn't it seem to you
+a terrible thing to think of the dead coming back to life?"
+
+He tapped lightly upon the tablecloth for a minute with the fingers of
+one hand. Then he looked at her again.
+
+"It depends," he said, "upon the manner of their death."
+
+An executioner of the Middle Ages could not have played with his victim
+more skillfully. The woman was shivering now, preserving some outward
+appearance of calm only by the most fierce and unnatural effort.
+
+"What do you mean by that, Jerry?" she asked. "I was not even
+with--Wenham, when he was lost. You know all about it, I suppose,--how
+it happened?"
+
+The man nodded thoughtfully.
+
+"I have heard many stories," he admitted. "Before we leave the subject
+for ever, I should like to hear it from you, from your own lips."
+
+There was a bottle of champagne upon the table, ordered at the
+commencement of the meal. She touched her glass; the waiter filled
+it. She raised it to her lips and set it down empty. Her fingers were
+clutching the tablecloth.
+
+"You ask me a hard thing, Jerry," she said. "It is not easy to talk
+of anything so painful. From the moment we left New York, Wenham
+was strange. He drank a good deal upon the steamer. He used to talk
+sometimes in the most wild way. We came to London. He had an attack of
+delirium tremens. I nursed him through it and took him into the country,
+down into Cornwall. We took a small cottage on the outskirts of a
+fishing village--St. Catherine's, the place was called. There we lived
+quietly for a time. Sometimes he was better, sometimes worse. The doctor
+in the village was very kind and came often to see him. He brought a
+friend from the neighboring town and they agreed that with complete rest
+Wenham would soon be better. All the time my life was a miserable one.
+He was not fit to be alone and yet he was a terrible companion. I did my
+best. I was with him half of every day, sometimes longer. I was with him
+till my own health began to suffer. At last I could stand the solitude
+no longer. I sent for my father. He came and lived with us."
+
+"The professor," her listener murmured.
+
+She nodded.
+
+"It was a little better then for me," she went on, "except that poor
+Wenham seemed to take such a dislike to my father. However, he hated
+every one in turn, even the doctors, who always did their best for
+him. One day, I admit, I lost my temper. We quarreled; I could not help
+it--life was becoming insupportable. He rushed out of the house--it was
+about three o'clock in the afternoon. I have never seen him since."
+
+The man was looking at her, looking at her closely although he was
+blinking all the time.
+
+"What do you think became of him?" he asked. "What do people think?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"The only thing he cared to do was swim," she said. "His clothes and hat
+were found down in the little cove near where we had a tent."
+
+"You think, then, that he was drowned?" the man asked.
+
+She nodded. Speech seemed to be becoming too painful.
+
+"Drowning," her companion continued, helping himself to brandy, "is not
+a pleasant death. Once I was nearly drowned myself. One struggles for a
+short time and one thinks--yes, one thinks!" he added.
+
+He raised his glass to his lips and set it down.
+
+"It is an easy death, though," he went on, "quite an easy death. By the
+way, were those clothes that were found of poor Wenham's identified as
+the clothes he wore when he left the house?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"One could not say for certain," she answered. "I never noticed how he
+was dressed. He wore nearly always the same sort of things, but he had
+an endless variety."
+
+"And this was seven months ago--seven months."
+
+She assented.
+
+"Poor Wenham," he murmured. "I suppose he is dead. What are you going to
+do, Elizabeth?"
+
+"I do not know," she replied. "Soon I must go to the lawyers and ask for
+advice. I have very little more money left. I have written several times
+to New York to you, to his friends, but I have had no answer. After all,
+Jerry, I am his wife. No one liked my marrying him, but I am his wife.
+I have a right to a share of his property if he is dead. If he has
+deserted me, surely I shall be allowed something. I do not even know how
+rich he was."
+
+The man at her side smiled.
+
+"Much better off than I ever was," he declared. "But, Elizabeth!"
+
+"Well?"
+
+"There were rumors that, before you left New York, Wenham converted very
+large sums of money into letters of credit and bonds, very large sums
+indeed." She shook her head. "He had a letter of credit for about a
+thousand pounds, I think," she said. "There is very little left of the
+money he had with him."
+
+"And you find living here expensive, I dare say?"
+
+"Very expensive indeed," she agreed, with a sigh. "I have been looking
+forward to seeing you, Jerry. I thought, perhaps, for the sake of old
+times you might advise me."
+
+"Of old times," he repeated to himself softly. "Elizabeth, do you think
+of them sometimes?"
+
+She was becoming more herself. This was a game she was used to playing.
+Of old times, indeed! It seemed only yesterday that these two brothers,
+who had the reputation in those days of being the richest young men
+in New York, were both at her feet. So far, she had scarcely been
+fortunate. There was still a chance, however. She looked up. It seemed
+to her that he was losing his composure. Yes, there was something of the
+old gleam in his eyes! Once he had been madly enough in love with her.
+It ought not to be impossible!
+
+"Jerry," she said, "I have told you these things. It has been so very,
+very painful for me. Won't you try now and be kind? Remember that I
+am all alone and it is all very difficult for me. I have been looking
+forward to your coming. I have thought so often of those times we spent
+together in New York. Won't you be my friend again? Won't you help me
+through these dark days?"
+
+Her hand touched his. For a moment he snatched his away as though stung.
+Then he caught her fingers in his and held them as though in a vice. She
+smiled, the smile of conscious power. The flush of beauty was streaming
+once more into her face. Poor fellow, he was still in love, then! The
+fingers which had closed upon hers were burning. What a pity that he was
+not a little more presentable!
+
+"Yes," he muttered, "we must be friends, Elizabeth. Wenham had all the
+luck at first. Perhaps it's going to be my turn now, eh?"
+
+He bent towards her. She laughed into his face for a moment and then was
+once more suddenly colorless, the smile frozen upon her lips. She began
+to shiver.
+
+"What is it?" he asked. "What is it, Elizabeth?"
+
+"Nothing," she faltered, "only I wish--I do wish that you were not so
+much like Wenham. Sometimes a trick of your voice, the way you hold your
+head--it terrifies me!"
+
+He laughed oddly.
+
+"You must get used to that, Elizabeth," he declared. "I can't help
+being like him, you know. We were great friends always until you came. I
+wonder why you preferred Wenham."
+
+"Don't ask me--please don't ask me that," she begged. "Really, I think
+he happened to be there just at the moment I felt like making a clean
+sweep of everything, of leaving New York and every one and starting life
+again, and I thought Wenham meant it. I thought I should be able to keep
+him from drinking and to help him start a new life altogether over here
+or on the Continent."
+
+"Poor little woman," he said, "you have been disappointed, I am afraid."
+
+She sighed.
+
+"I am only human, you know," she went on. "Every one told me that Wenham
+was a millionaire, too. See how much I have benefited by it. I am almost
+penniless, I do not know whether he is dead or alive, I do not know what
+to do to get some money. Was Wenham very rich, Jerry?"
+
+The man laughed.
+
+"Oh, he was very rich indeed!" he assured her. "It is terrible that you
+should be left like this. We will talk about it together presently, you
+and I. In the meantime, you must let me be your banker."
+
+"Dear Jerry," she whispered, "you were always generous."
+
+"You have not spoken of the little prude--dear Miss Beatrice," he
+reminded her suddenly.
+
+Elizabeth sighed.
+
+"Beatrice was a great trial from the first," she declared. "You know how
+she disliked you both--she was scarcely even civil to Wenham, and she
+would never have come to Europe with us if father hadn't insisted upon
+it. We took her down to Cornwall with us and there she became absolutely
+insupportable. She was always interfering between Wenham and me and
+imagining the most absurd things. One day she left us without a word of
+warning. I have never seen her since."
+
+The man stared gloomily into his plate.
+
+"She was a queer little thing," he muttered. "She was good, and she
+seemed to like being good."
+
+Elizabeth laughed, not quite pleasantly.
+
+"You speak as though the rest of us," she remarked, "were qualified to
+take orders in wickedness."
+
+He helped himself to more brandy.
+
+"Think back," he said. "Think of those days in New York, the life we
+led, the wild things we did week after week, month after month, the same
+eternal round of turning night into day, of struggling everywhere to
+find new pleasures, pulling vice to pieces like children trying to find
+the inside of their playthings."
+
+"I don't like your mood in the least," she interrupted.
+
+He drummed for a moment upon the tablecloth with his fingers.
+
+"We were talking of Beatrice. You don't even know where she is now,
+then?"
+
+"I have no idea," Elizabeth declared.
+
+"She was with you for long in Cornwall?" he asked.
+
+Elizabeth toyed with her wineglass for a minute.
+
+"She was there about a month," she admitted.
+
+"And she didn't approve of the way you and Wenham behaved?" he demanded.
+
+"Apparently not. She left us, anyway. She didn't understand Wenham in
+the least. I shouldn't be surprised," Elizabeth went on, "to hear that
+she was a hospital nurse, or learning typing, or a clerk in an office.
+She was a young woman of gloomy ideas, although she was my sister."
+
+He came a little closer towards her.
+
+"Elizabeth," he said, "we will not talk any more about Beatrice. We will
+not talk any more about anything except our two selves."
+
+"Are you really glad to see me again, Jerry?" she asked softly.
+
+"You must know it, dear," he whispered. "You must know that I loved you
+always, that I adored you. Oh, you knew it! Don't tell me you didn't.
+You knew it, Elizabeth!"
+
+She looked down at the tablecloth.
+
+"Yes, I knew it," she admitted, softly.
+
+"Can't you guess what it is to me to see you again like this?" he
+continued.
+
+She sighed.
+
+"It is something for me, too, to feel that I have a friend close at
+hand."
+
+"Come," he said, "they are turning out the lights here. You want to know
+about Wenham's property. Let me come upstairs with you for a little time
+and I will tell you as much as I can from memory."
+
+He paid the bill, helped her on with her cloak. His fingers seemed like
+burning spots upon her flesh. They went up in the lift. In the corridors
+he drew her to him and she began to tremble.
+
+"What is there strange about you, Jerry?" she faltered, looking into his
+face. "You terrify me!"
+
+"You are glad to see me? Say you are glad to see me?"
+
+"Yes, I am glad," she whispered.
+
+Outside the door of her rooms, she hesitated.
+
+"Perhaps," she suggested, faintly,--"wouldn't it be better if you came
+to-morrow morning?"
+
+Once more his fingers touched her and again that extraordinary sense of
+fear seemed to turn her blood cold.
+
+"No," he replied, "I have been put off long enough! You must let me in,
+you must talk with me for half an hour. I will go then, I promise. Half
+an hour! Elizabeth, haven't I waited an eternity for it?"
+
+He took the keys from her fingers and opened the door, closing it again
+behind them. She led the way into the sitting-room. The whole place was
+in darkness but she turned on the electric light. The cloak slipped from
+her shoulders. He took her hands and looked at her.
+
+"Jerry," she whispered, "you mustn't look at me like that. You terrify
+me! Let me go!"
+
+She wrenched herself free with an effort. She stepped back to the corner
+of the room, as far as she could get from him. Her heart was beating
+fiercely. Somehow or other, neither of these two young men, over whose
+lives she had certainly brought to bear a very wonderful influence, had
+ever before stirred her pulses like this. What was it, she wondered?
+What was the meaning of it? Why didn't he speak? He did nothing but
+look, and there were unutterable things in his eyes. Was he angry with
+her because she had married Wenham, or was he blaming her because Wenham
+had gone? There was passion in his face, but such passion! Desire,
+perhaps, but what else? She caught up a telegram which lay upon her
+writing desk, and tore it open. It was an escape for a moment. She read
+the words, stared, and read them aloud incredulously. It was from her
+father.
+
+"Jerry Gardner sailed for New York to-day."
+
+She looked up at the man, and as she looked her face grew gray and the
+thin sheet went quivering from her lifeless fingers to the floor. Then
+he began to laugh, and she knew.
+
+"Wenham!" she shrieked. "Wenham!"
+
+There was murder in his face, murder almost in his laugh.
+
+"Your loving husband!" he answered.
+
+She sprang for the door but even as she moved she heard the click of the
+bolt shot back. He touched the electric switch and the room was suddenly
+in darkness. She heard him coming towards her, she felt his hot breath
+upon her cheek.
+
+"My loving wife!" he whispered. "At last!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV. THE MADMAN TALKS
+
+
+Tavernake turned on the light. Pritchard, with a quick leap forward,
+seized Wenham around the waist and dragged him away. Elizabeth had
+fainted; she lay upon the floor, her face the color of marble.
+
+"Get some water and throw over her," Pritchard ordered.
+
+Tavernake obeyed. He threw open the window and let in a current of air.
+In a moment or two the woman stirred and raised her head.
+
+"Look after her for a minute," Pritchard said. "I Il lock this fierce
+little person up in the bathroom."
+
+Pritchard carried his prisoner out. Tavernake leaned over the woman who
+was slowly coming back to consciousness.
+
+"Tell me about it," she asked, hoarsely. "Where is he?"
+
+"Locked up in the bathroom," Tavernake answered. "Pritchard is taking
+care of him. He won't be able to get out."
+
+"You know who it was?" she faltered.
+
+"I do not," Tavernake replied. "It isn't my business. I'm only here
+because Pritchard begged me to come. He thought he might want help."
+
+She held his fingers tightly.
+
+"Where were you?" she asked.
+
+"In the bathroom when you arrived. Then he bolted the door behind and we
+had to come round through your bedroom."
+
+"How did Pritchard find out?"
+
+"I know nothing about it," Tavernake replied. "I only know that he
+peered through the latticework and saw you sitting there at supper."
+
+She smiled weakly.
+
+"It must have been rather a shock to him," she said. "He has been
+convinced for the last six months that I murdered Wenham, or got rid of
+him by some means or other. Help me up."
+
+She staggered to her feet. Tavernake assisted her to an easy chair. Then
+Pritchard came in.
+
+"He is quite safe," he announced, "sitting on the edge of the bath
+playing with a doll."
+
+She shivered.
+
+"What is he doing with it?" she asked.
+
+"Showing me exactly, with a shawl pin, where he meant to have stabbed
+you," Pritchard answered, drily. "Now, my dear lady," he continued, "it
+seems to me that I have done you one injustice, at any rate. I certainly
+thought you'd helped to relieve the world of that young person. Where
+did he come from? Perhaps you can tell me that."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"I suppose I may as well," she said. "Listen, you have seen what he was
+like to-night, but you don't know what it was to live with him. It was
+Hell!"--she sobbed--"absolute Hell! He drank, he took drugs, it was
+all his servant could do to force him even to make his toilet. It was
+impossible. It was crushing the life out of me."
+
+"Go on," Pritchard directed.
+
+"There isn't much more to tell," she continued. "I found an old
+farmhouse--the loneliest spot in Cornwall. We moved there and I left
+him--with Mathers. I promised Mathers that he should have twenty pounds
+a week for every week he kept his master away from me. He has kept him
+away for seven months."
+
+"What about that story of yours--about his having gone in swimming?"
+Pritchard asked.
+
+"I wanted people to believe that he was dead," she declared defiantly.
+"I was afraid that if you or his relations found him, I should have to
+live with him or give up the money."
+
+Pritchard nodded.
+
+"And to-night you thought--"
+
+"I thought he was his brother Jerry," she went on. "The likeness was
+always amazing, you know that. I was told that Jerry was in town. I felt
+nervous, somehow, and wired to Mathers. I had his reply only last night.
+He wired that Wenham was quite safe and contented, not even restless."
+
+"That telegram was sent by Wenham himself," Pritchard remarked. "I think
+you had better hear what he has to say."
+
+She shrank back.
+
+"No. I couldn't bear the sight of him again!"
+
+"I think you had better," Pritchard insisted. "I can assure you that he
+is quite harmless. I will guarantee that."
+
+He left the room. Soon he returned, his arm locked in the arm of Wenham
+Gardner. The latter had the look of a spoilt child who is in disgrace.
+He sat sullenly upon a chair and glared at every one. Then he produced a
+small crumpled doll, with a thread of black cotton around its neck, and
+began swinging it in front of him, laughing at Elizabeth all the time.
+
+"Tell us," Pritchard asked, "what has become of Mathers?"
+
+He stopped swinging the doll, shivered for a moment, and then laughed.
+
+"I don't mind," he declared. "I guess I don't mind telling. You see,
+whatever I was when I did it, I am mad now--quite mad. My friend
+Pritchard here says I am mad. I must have been mad or I shouldn't have
+tried to hurt that dear beautiful lady over there."
+
+He leered at Elizabeth, who shrank back.
+
+"She ran away from me some time ago," he went on, "sick to death of me
+she was. She thought she'd got all my money. She hadn't. There's plenty
+more, plenty more. She ran away and left me with Mathers. She was paying
+him so much a week to keep me quiet, not to let me go anywhere where I
+should talk, to keep me away from her so that she could live up here and
+see all her friends and spend my money. And at first I didn't mind, and
+then I did mind, and I got angry with Mathers, and Mathers wouldn't let
+me come away, and three nights ago I killed Mathers."
+
+There was a little thrill of horror. He looked from one to the other. By
+degrees their fear seemed to become communicated to him.
+
+"What do you mean by looking like that, all of you?" he exclaimed.
+"What does it matter? He was only my man-servant. I am Wenham Gardner,
+millionaire. No one will put me in prison for that. Besides, he
+shouldn't have tried to keep me away from my wife. Anyway, it don't
+matter. I am quite mad. Mad people can do what they like. They have to
+stop in an asylum for six months, and then they're quite cured and
+they start again. I don't mind being mad for six months. Elizabeth,"
+he whined, "come and be mad, too. You haven't been kind to me. There's
+plenty more money--plenty more. Come back for a little time and I'll
+show you."
+
+"How did you kill Mathers?" Pritchard asked.
+
+"I stabbed him when he was stooping down," Wenham Gardner explained.
+"You see, when I left college my father thought it would be good for me
+to do something. I dare say it would have been but I didn't want to. I
+studied surgery for six months. The only thing I remember was just where
+to kill a man behind the left shoulder. I remembered that. Mathers was
+a fat man, and he stooped so that his coat almost burst. I just leaned
+over, picked out the exact spot, and he crumpled all up. I expect," he
+went on, "you'll find him there still. No one comes near the place
+for days and days. Mathers used to leave me locked up and do all the
+shopping himself. I expect he's lying there now. Some one ought to go
+and see."
+
+Elizabeth was sobbing quietly to herself. Tavernake felt the
+perspiration break out upon his forehead. There was something appalling
+in the way this young man talked.
+
+"I don't understand why you all look so serious," he continued. "No one
+is going to hurt me for this. I am quite mad now. You see, I am playing
+with this doll. Sane men don't play with dolls. I hope they'll try me
+in New York, though. I am well-known in New York. I know all the lawyers
+and the jurymen. Oh, they're up to all sorts of tricks in New York!
+Say, you don't suppose they'll try me over here?" he broke off suddenly,
+turning to Pritchard. "I shouldn't feel so much at home here."
+
+"Take him away," Elizabeth begged. "Take him away." Pritchard nodded.
+
+"I thought you'd better hear," he said. "I am going to take him away
+now. I shall send a telegram to the police-station at St. Catherine's.
+They had better go up and see what's happened."
+
+Pritchard took his captive once more by the arm. The young man struggled
+violently.
+
+"I don't like you, Pritchard," he shrieked. "I don't want to go with
+you. I want to stay with Elizabeth. I am not really afraid of her. She'd
+like to kill me, I know, but she's too clever--oh, she's too clever! I'd
+like to stay with her."
+
+Pritchard led him away.
+
+"We'll see about it later on," he said. "You'd better come with me just
+now."
+
+The door closed behind them. Tavernake staggered up.
+
+"I must go," he declared. "I must go, too."
+
+Elizabeth was sobbing quietly to herself. She seemed scarcely to hear
+him. On the threshold Tavernake turned back.
+
+"That money," he asked, "the money you were going to lend me--was that
+his?"
+
+She looked up and nodded. Tavernake went slowly out.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI. A CRISIS
+
+
+Pritchard was the first visitor who had ever found his way into
+Tavernake's lodgings. It was barely eight o'clock on the same morning.
+Tavernake, hollow-eyed and bewildered, sat up upon the sofa and gazed
+across the room.
+
+"Pritchard!" he exclaimed. "Why, what do you want?"
+
+Pritchard laid his hat and gloves upon the table. Already his first
+swift glance had taken in the details of the little apartment. The
+overcoat and hat which Tavernake had worn the night before lay by his
+side. The table was still arranged for some meal of the previous day.
+Apart from these things, a single glance assured him that Tavernake had
+not been to bed.
+
+Pritchard drew up an easy-chair and seated himself deliberately.
+
+"My young friend," he announced, "I have come to the conclusion that you
+need some more advice."
+
+Tavernake rose to his feet. His own reflection in the looking-glass
+startled him. His hair was crumpled, his tie undone, the marks of his
+night of agony were all too apparent. He felt himself at a disadvantage.
+
+"How did you find me out?" he asked. "I never gave you my address."
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"Even in this country, with a little help," he said, "those things are
+easy enough. I made up my mind that this morning would be to some extent
+a crisis with you. You know, Tavernake, I am not a man who says much,
+but you are the right sort. You've been in with me twice when I should
+have missed you if you hadn't been there."
+
+Tavernake seemed to have lost the power of speech. He had relapsed again
+into his place upon the sofa. He simply waited.
+
+"How in the name of mischief," Pritchard continued, impressively, "you
+came to be mixed up in the lives of this amiable trio, I cannot imagine!
+I am not saying a word against Miss Beatrice, mind. All that surprises
+me is that you and she should ever have come together, or, having come
+together, that you should ever have exchanged a word. You see, I am here
+to speak plain truths. You are, I take it, a good sample of the hard,
+stubborn, middle-class Briton. These three people of whom I have spoken,
+belong--Miss Beatrice, perhaps, by force of circumstances--but still
+they do belong to the land of Bohemia. However, when one has got over
+the surprise of finding you on intimate terms with Miss Beatrice,
+there comes a more amazing thing. You, with hard common sense written
+everywhere in your face, have been prepared at any moment, for all I
+know are prepared now, to make an utter and complete idiot of yourself
+over Elizabeth Gardner."
+
+Still Tavernake did not speak. Pritchard looked at him curiously.
+
+"Say," he went on, "I have come here to do you a service, if I can. So
+far as I know at present, this very wonderful young lady has kept on the
+right side of the law. But see here, Tavernake, she's been on the wrong
+side of everything that's decent and straight all her days. She married
+that poor creature for his money, and set herself deliberately to drive
+him off his head. Last night's tragedy was her doing, not his, though
+he, poor devil, will have to end his days in an asylum, and the lady
+will have his money to make herself more beautiful than ever with. Now I
+am going to let you behind the scenes, my young friend."
+
+Then Tavernake rose to his feet. In the shabby little room he seemed to
+have grown suddenly taller. He struck the crazy table with his clenched
+fist so that the crockery upon it rattled. Pritchard was used to seeing
+men--strong men, too--moved by various passions, but in Tavernake's face
+he seemed to see new things.
+
+"Pritchard," Tavernake exclaimed, "I don't want to hear another word!"
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"Look here," he said, "what I am going to tell you is the truth. What
+I am going to tell you I'd as soon say in the presence of the lady as
+here."
+
+Tavernake took a step forward and Pritchard suddenly realized the man
+who had thrown himself through that little opening in the wall, one
+against three, without a thought of danger.
+
+"If you say a single word more against her," Tavernake shouted hoarsely,
+"I shall throw you out of the room!"
+
+Pritchard stared at him. There was something amazing about this young
+man's attitude, something which he could not wholly grasp. He could see,
+too, that Tavernake's words were so few simply because he was trembling
+under the influence of an immense passion.
+
+"If you won't listen," Pritchard declared, slowly, "I can't talk.
+Still, you've got common sense, I take it. You've the ordinary powers
+of judging between right and wrong, and knowing when a man or a woman's
+honest. I want to save you--"
+
+"Silence!" Tavernake exclaimed. "Look here, Pritchard," he went on,
+breathing a little more naturally now, "you came here meaning to do the
+right thing--I know that. You're all right, only you don't understand.
+You don't understand the sort of person I am. I am twenty-four years
+old, I have worked for my own living up here in London since I was
+twelve. I was a man, so far as work and independence went, at fifteen.
+Since then I have had my shoulder to the wheel; I have lived on nothing;
+I have made a little money where it didn't seem possible. I have worried
+my way into posts which it seemed that no one could think of giving
+me, but all the time I have lived in a little corner of the world--like
+that."
+
+His finger suddenly described a circle in the air.
+
+"You don't understand--you can't," he went on, "but there it is. I never
+spoke to a woman until I spoke to Beatrice. Chance made me her friend.
+I began to understand the outside of some of those things which I had
+never even dreamed of before. She set me right in many ways. I began to
+read, think, absorb little bits of the real world. It was all wonderful.
+Then Elizabeth came. I met her, too, by accident--she came to my office
+for a house--Elizabeth!"
+
+Pritchard found something almost pathetic in the sudden dropping of
+Tavernake's voice, the softening of his face.
+
+"I don't know how to talk about these things," Tavernake said, simply.
+"There's a literature that's reached from before the Bible to now, full
+of nothing else. It's all as old as the hills. I suppose I am about
+the only sane man in this city who knew nothing of it; but I did know
+nothing of it, and she was the first woman. Now you understand. I can't
+hear a word against her--I won't! She may be what you say. If so, she's
+got to tell me so herself!"
+
+"You mean that you are going to believe any story she likes to put up?"
+
+"I mean that I am going to her," Tavernake answered, "and I have no idea
+in the world what will happen--whether I shall believe her or not. I can
+see what you think of me," he went on, becoming a little more himself
+as the stress of unaccustomed speech passed him by. "I will tell you
+something that will show you that I realize a good deal. I know the
+difference between Beatrice and Elizabeth. Less than a week ago, I asked
+Beatrice to marry me. It was the only way I could think of, the only way
+I could kill the fever."
+
+"And Beatrice?" Pritchard asked, curiously.
+
+"She wouldn't," Tavernake replied. "After all, why should she? I have my
+way to make yet. I can't expect others to believe in me as I believe in
+myself. She was kind but she wouldn't."
+
+Pritchard lit a cigar.
+
+"Look here, Tavernake," he said, "you are a young man, you've got your
+life before you and life's a biggish thing. Empty out those romantic
+thoughts of yours, roll up your shirt sleeves and get at it. You are
+not one of these weaklings that need a woman's whispers in their ears
+to spur them on. You can work without that. It's only a chapter in your
+life--the passing of these three people. A few months ago, you knew
+nothing of them. Let them go. Get back to where you were."
+
+Then Tavernake for the first time laughed--a laugh that sounded even
+natural.
+
+"Have you ever found a man who could do that?" he asked. "The candle
+gives a good light sometimes, but you'll never think it the finest
+illumination in the world when you've seen the sun. Never mind me,
+Pritchard. I'm going to do my best still, but there's one thing that
+nothing will alter. I am going to make that woman tell me her story, I
+am going to listen to the way she tells it to me. You think that where
+women are concerned I am a fool. I am, but there is one great boon which
+has been vouchsafed to fools--they can tell the true from the false.
+Some sort of instinct, I suppose. Elizabeth shall tell me her story and
+I shall know, when she tells it, whether she is what you say or what she
+has seemed to me."
+
+Pritchard held out his hand.
+
+"You're a queer sort, Tavernake," he declared. "You take life plaguy
+seriously. I only hope you 'll get all out of it you expect to. So
+long!"
+
+Tavernake opened the window after his visitor had gone, and leaned out
+for some few minutes, letting the fresh air into the close, stifling
+room. Then he went upstairs, bathed and changed his clothes, made
+some pretense at breakfast, went through his letters with methodical
+exactness. At eleven o'clock he set out upon his pilgrimage.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII. TAVERNAKE CHOOSES
+
+
+Tavernake was kept waiting in the hall of the Milan Court for at least
+half an hour before Elizabeth was prepared to see him. He wandered
+aimlessly about watching the people come and go, looking out into the
+flower-hung courtyard, curiously unconscious of himself and of his
+errand, unable to concentrate his thoughts for a moment, yet filled all
+the time with the dull and uneasy sensation of one who moves in a dream.
+Every now and then he heard scraps of conversation from the servants and
+passers-by, referring to the last night's incident. He picked up a paper
+but threw it down after only a casual glance at the paragraph. He saw
+enough to convince him that for the present, at any rate, Elizabeth
+seemed assured of a certain amount of sympathy. The career of poor
+Wenham Gardner was set down in black and white, with little extenuation,
+little mercy. His misdeeds in Paris, his career in New York, spoke for
+themselves. He was quoted as a type, a decadent of the most debauched
+instincts, to whom crime was a relaxation and vice a habit. Tavernake
+would read no more. He might have been all these things, and yet she had
+become his wife!
+
+At last came the message for which he was waiting. As usual, her maid
+met him at the door of her suite and ushered him in. Elizabeth was
+dressed for the part very simply, with a suggestion even of mourning in
+her gray gown. She welcomed him with a pathetic smile.
+
+"Once more, my dear friend," she said, "I have to thank you."
+
+Her fingers closed upon his and she smiled into his face. Tavernake
+found himself curiously unresponsive. It was the same smile, and he knew
+very well that he himself had not changed, yet it seemed as though life
+itself were in a state of suspense for him.
+
+"You, too, are looking grave this morning, my friend," she continued.
+"Oh, how horrible it has all been! Within the last two hours I have had
+at least five reporters, a gentleman from Scotland Yard, another from
+the American Ambassador to see me. It is too terrible, of course," she
+went on. "Wenham's people are doing all they can to make it worse. They
+want to know why we were not together, why he was living in the country
+and I in town. They are trying to show that he was under restraint
+there, as if such a thing were possible! Mathers was his own
+servant--poor Mathers!"
+
+She sighed and wiped her eyes. Still Tavernake said nothing. She looked
+at him, a little surprised.
+
+"You are not very sympathetic," she observed. "Please come and sit down
+by my side and I will show you something."
+
+He moved towards her but he did not sit down. She stretched out her
+hand and picked something up from the table, holding it towards him.
+Tavernake took it mechanically and held it in his fingers. It was a
+cheque for twelve thousand pounds.
+
+"You see," she said, "I have not forgotten. This is the day, isn't it?
+If you like, you can stay and have lunch with me up here and we will
+drink to the success of our speculation."
+
+Tavernake held the cheque in his fingers; he made no motion to put it in
+his pocket. She looked at him with a puzzled frown upon her face.
+
+"Do talk or say something, please!" she exclaimed. "You look at me like
+some grim figure. Say something. Sit down and be natural."
+
+"May I ask you some questions?"
+
+"Of course you may," she replied. "You may do anything sooner than stand
+there looking so grim and unbending. What is it you want to know?"
+
+"Did you understand that Wenham Gardner was this sort of man when you
+married him?"
+
+She shrugged her shoulders slightly.
+
+"I suppose I did," she admitted.
+
+"You married him, then, only because he was rich?"
+
+She smiled.
+
+"What else do women marry for, my dear moralist?" she demanded. "It
+isn't my fault if it doesn't sound pretty. One must have money!"
+
+Tavernake inclined his head gravely; he made no sign of dissent.
+
+"You two came over to England," he went on, "with Beatrice and your
+father. Beatrice left you because she disapproved of certain things."
+
+Elizabeth nodded.
+
+"You may as well know the truth," she said. "Beatrice has the most
+absurd ideas. After a week with Wenham, I knew that he was not a person
+with whom any woman could possibly live. His valet was really only his
+keeper; he was subject to such mad fits that he needed some one always
+with him. I was obliged to leave him in Cornwall. I can't tell you
+everything, but it was absolutely impossible for me to go on living with
+him."
+
+"Beatrice," Tavernake remarked, "thought otherwise."
+
+Elizabeth looked at him quickly from below her eyelids. It was hard,
+however, to gather anything from his face.
+
+"Beatrice thought otherwise," Elizabeth admitted. "She thought that I
+ought to nurse him, put up with him, give up all my friends, and try and
+keep him alive. Why, it would have been absolute martyrdom, misery for
+me," she declared. "How could I be expected to do such a thing?"
+
+Tavernake nodded gravely.
+
+"And the money?" he asked.
+
+"Well, perhaps there I was a trifle calculating," she confessed. "But
+you," she added, nodding at the cheque in his hand, "shouldn't grumble
+at that. I knew when we were married that I should have trouble. His
+people hated me, and I knew that in the event of anything happening
+like this thing which has happened, they would try to get as little as
+possible allowed me. So before we left New York, I got Wenham to turn as
+much as ever he could into cash. That we brought away with us."
+
+"And who took care of it?"
+
+Elizabeth smiled.
+
+"I did," she answered, "naturally."
+
+"Tell me about last night," Tavernake said. "I suppose I am stupid but I
+don't quite understand."
+
+"How should you?" she answered. "Listen, then. Wenham, I suppose got
+tired of being shut up with Mathers, although I am sure I don't see what
+else was possible. So he waited for his opportunity, and when the man
+wasn't looking--well, you know what happened," she added, with a shiver.
+"He got up to London somehow and made his way to Dover Street."
+
+"Why Dover Street?"
+
+"I suppose you know," Elizabeth explained, "that Wenham has a
+brother--Jerry--who is exactly like him. These two had rooms in Dover
+Street always, where they kept some English clothes and a servant. Jerry
+Gardner was over in London. I knew that, and was expecting to see him
+every day. Wenham found his way to the rooms, dressed himself in his
+brother's clothes, even wore his ring and some of his jewelry, which he
+knew I should recognize, and came here. I believed--yes, I believed all
+the time," she went on, her voice trembling, "that it was Jerry who was
+sitting with me. Once or twice I had a sort of terrible shiver. Then I
+remembered how much they were alike and it seemed to me ridiculous to be
+afraid. It was not till we got upstairs, till the door was closed behind
+me, that he turned round and I knew!"
+
+Her head fell suddenly into her hands. It was almost the first sign of
+emotion. Tavernake analyzed it mercilessly. He knew very well that it
+was fear, the coward's fear of that terrible moment.
+
+"And now?"
+
+"Now," she went on, more cheerfully, "no one will venture to deny that
+Wenham is mad. He will be placed under restraint, of course, and the
+courts will make me an allowance. One thing is absolutely certain, and
+that is that he will not live a year."
+
+Tavernake half closed his eyes. Was there no sign of his suffering, no
+warning note of the things which were passing out of his life! The woman
+who smiled upon him seemed to see nothing. The twitching of his fingers,
+the slight quivering of his face, she thought was because of his fear
+for her.
+
+"And now," she declared, in a suddenly altered tone, "this is all over
+and done with. Now you know everything. There are no more mysteries,"
+she added, smiling at him delightfully. "It is all very terrible, of
+course, but I feel as though a great weight had passed away. You and I
+are going to be friends, are we not?"
+
+She rose slowly to her feet and came towards him. His eyes watched her
+slow, graceful movements as though fascinated. He remembered on that
+first visit of his how wonderful he had thought her walk. She was still
+smiling up at him; her fingers fell upon his shoulders.
+
+"You are such a strange person," she murmured. "You aren't a little bit
+like any of the men I've ever known, any of the men I have ever cared
+to have as friends. There is something about you altogether different. I
+suppose that is why I rather like you. Are you glad?"
+
+For a single wild moment Tavernake hesitated. She was so close to him
+that her hair touched his forehead, the breath from her upturned lips
+fell upon his cheeks. Her blue eyes were half pleading, half inviting.
+
+"You are going to be my very dear friend, are you not--Leonard?" she
+whispered. "I do feel that I need some one strong like you to help me
+through these days."
+
+Tavernake suddenly seized the hands that were upon his shoulders, and
+forced them back. She felt herself gripped as though by a vice, and a
+sudden terror seized her. He lifted her up and she caught a glimpse of
+his wild, set face. Then the breath came through his teeth. He shook all
+over but the fit had passed. He simply thrust her away from him.
+
+"No," he said, "we cannot be friends! You are a woman without a heart,
+you are a murderess!"
+
+He tore her cheque calmly in pieces and flung them scornfully away. She
+stood looking at him, breathing quickly, white to the lips though the
+murder had gone from his eyes.
+
+"Beatrice warned me," he went on; "Pritchard warned me. Some things I
+saw for myself, but I suppose I was mad. Now I know!"
+
+He turned away. Her eyes followed him wonderingly.
+
+"Leonard," she cried out, "you are not going like this? You don't mean
+it!"
+
+Ever afterwards his restraint amazed him. He did not reply. He closed
+both doors firmly behind him and walked to the lift. She came even to
+the outside door and called down the corridor.
+
+"Leonard, come back for one moment!"
+
+He turned his head and looked at her, looked at her from the corner of
+the corridor, steadfastly and without speech. Her fingers dropped from
+the handle of the door. She went back into her room with shaking knees,
+and began to cry softly. Afterwards she wondered at herself. It was the
+first time she had cried for many years.
+
+
+Tavernake walked to the city and in less than half an hour's time found
+himself in Mr. Martin's office. The lawyer welcomed him warmly.
+
+"I'm jolly glad to see you, Tavernake," he declared. "I hope you've got
+the money. Sit down."
+
+Tavernake did not sit down; he had forgotten, indeed, to take of his
+hat.
+
+"Martin," he said, "I am sorry for you. I have been fooled and you have
+to pay as well as I have. I can't take up the option on the property.
+I haven't a penny toward it except my own money, and you know how much
+that is. You can sell my plots, if you like, and call the money your
+costs. I've finished."
+
+The lawyer looked at him with wide-open mouth.
+
+"What on earth are you talking about, Tavernake?" he exclaimed. "Are you
+drunk, by any chance?"
+
+"No, I am quite sober," Tavernake answered. "I have made one or two bad
+mistakes, that's all. You have a power of attorney for me. You can do
+what you like with my land, make any terms you please. Good-day!"
+
+"But, Tavernake, look here!" the lawyer protested, springing to his
+feet. "I say, Tavernake!" he called out.
+
+But Tavernake heard nothing, or, if he heard, he took no notice. He
+walked out into the street and was lost among the hurrying throngs upon
+the pavements.
+
+
+
+
+BOOK TWO
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I. NEW HORIZONS
+
+
+Towards the sky-line, across the level country, stumbling and crawling
+over the deep-hewn dikes, wading sometimes through the mud-oozing swamp,
+Tavernake, who had left the small railway terminus on foot, made his
+way that night steadily seawards, as one pursued by some relentless
+and indefatigable enemy. Twilight had fallen like a mantle around him,
+fallen over that great flat region of fens and pastureland and bog.
+Little patches of mist, harbingers of the coming obscurity, were being
+drawn now into the gradual darkness. Lights twinkled out from the
+far-scattered homesteads. Here and there a dog barked, some lonely bird
+seeking shelter called to its mate, but of human beings there seemed to
+be no one in sight save the solitary traveler.
+
+Tavernake was in grievous straits. His clothes were caked with mud,
+his hair tossed with the wind, his cheeks pale, his eyes set with the
+despair of that fierce upheaval through which he had passed. For many
+hours the torture which had driven him back towards his birthplace had
+triumphed over his physical exhaustion. Now came the time, however, when
+the latter asserted itself. With a half-stifled moan he collapsed. Sheer
+fatigue induced a brief but merciful spell of uneasy slumber. He lay
+upon his back near one of the broader dikes, his arms outstretched, his
+unseeing eyes turned toward the sky. The darkness deepened and passed
+away again before the light of the moon. When at last he sat up, it was
+a new world upon which he looked, a strange land, moonlit in places, yet
+full of shadowy somberness. He gazed wonderingly around--for the moment
+he had forgotten. Then memory came, and with memory once more the stab
+at his heart. He rose to his feet and went resolutely on his way.
+
+Almost until the dawn he walked, keeping as near as he could to that
+long monotonous line of telegraph posts, yet avoiding the road as much
+as possible. With the rising of the sun, he crept into a wayside hovel
+and lay there hidden for hours. Hunger and thirst seemed like things
+which had passed him by. It was sleep only which he craved, sleep and
+forgetfulness.
+
+Dusk was falling again before he found himself upon his feet, starting
+out once more upon this strangely thought-of pilgrimage. This time he
+kept to the road, plodding along with tired, dejected footsteps, which
+had in them still something of that restless haste which drove him
+ceaselessly onward as though he were indeed possessed of some unquiet
+spirit. He was recovering now, however, a little of his natural common
+sense. He remembered that he must have food and drink, and he sought
+them from the wayside public-house like an ordinary traveler, conquering
+without any apparent effort that first invincible repugnance of his
+toward the face of any human being. Then on again across this strange
+land of windmills and spreading plains, until the darkness forced him
+to take shelter once more. That night he slept like a child. With the
+morning, the fever had passed from his blood. A great wind blew in his
+face even as he opened his eyes, touched to wakefulness by the morning
+sun, a wind that came booming over the level places, salt with the touch
+of the ocean and fragrant with the perfume of many marsh plants. He was
+coming toward the sea now, and within a very short distance from where
+he had spent the night, he found a broad, shining river stealing into
+the land. With eager fingers he stripped himself and plunged in, diving
+again and again below the surface, swimming with long, lazy strokes
+backwards and forwards. Afterwards he lay down in the warm, dry grass,
+dressed himself slowly, and went on his way. The wind, which had
+increased now since the early morning, came thundering across the level
+land, bending the tops of the few scattered trees, sending the sails of
+the windmills spinning, bringing on its bosom now stronger than ever the
+flavor of the sea itself, salt and stimulating. Tavernake told himself
+that this was a new world into which he was coming. He would pass into
+its embrace and life would become a new thing.
+
+Towards evening with many a thrill of reminiscence, he descended a steep
+hill and walked into a queer time-forgotten village, whose scattered
+red-tiled cottages were built around an arm of the sea. Boldly enough
+now he entered the one inn which flaunted its sign upon the cobbled
+street, and, taking a seat in the stone-floored kitchen, ate and drank
+and bespoke a bed. Later on, he strolled down to the quay and made
+friends with the few fishermen who were loitering there. They answered
+his questions readily, although he found it hard at first to pick up
+again the dialect of which he himself had once made use. The little
+place was scarcely changed. All progress, indeed, seemed to have
+passed it by. There were a handful of fishermen, a boat-builder and a
+fish-curer in the village. There was no other industry save a couple of
+small farmhouses on the outskirts of the place, no railway within twelve
+miles. Tourists came seldom, excursionists never. In the half contented,
+half animal-like expression which seemed common to all the inhabitants,
+Tavernake read easily enough the history of their uneventful days. It
+was such a shelter as this, indeed, for which he had been searching.
+
+On the second night after his arrival, he walked with the boatbuilder
+upon the wooden quay. The boatbuilder's name was Nicholls, and he was
+a man of some means, deacon of the chapel, with a fair connection as
+a jobbing carpenter, and possessor of the only horse and cart in the
+place.
+
+"Nicholls," Tavernake said, "you don't remember me, do you?"
+
+The boat-builder shook his head slowly and ponderously.
+
+"There was Richard Tavernake who farmed the low fields," he remarked,
+reminiscently. "Maybe you're a son of his. Now I come to think of it, he
+had a boy apprenticed to the carpentering."
+
+"I was the boy," Tavernake answered. "I soon had enough of it and went
+to London."
+
+"You'm grown out of all knowledge," Nicholls declared, "but I mind you
+now. So you've been in London all these years?"
+
+"I've been in London," Tavernake admitted, "and I think, of the two,
+that Sprey-by-the-Sea is the better place."
+
+"Sprey is well enough," the boat-builder confessed, "well enough for a
+man who isn't set on change."
+
+"Change," Tavernake asserted, grimly, "is an overrated joy. I have had
+too much of it in my life. I think that I should like to stay here for
+some time."
+
+The boat-builder was surprised, but he was a man of heavy and deliberate
+turn of mind and he did not commit himself to speech. Tavernake
+continued.
+
+"I used to know something of carpentering in my younger days," he said,
+"and I don't think that I have forgotten it all. I wonder if I could
+find anything to do down here?"
+
+Matthew Nicholls stroked his beard thoughtfully.
+
+"The folk round about are not over partial to strangers," he observed,
+"and you'm been away so long I reckon there's not many as'd recollect
+you. And as for carpentering jobs, there's Tom Lake over at Lesser
+Blakeney and his brother down at Brancaster, besides me on the spot,
+as you might say. It's a poor sort of opening there'd be, if you ask my
+opinion, especially for one like yourself, as 'as got education."
+
+"I should be satisfied with very little," Tavernake persisted. "I want
+to work with my hands. I should like to forget for a time that I have
+had any education at all."
+
+"That do seem mightily queer to me," Nicholls remarked, thoughtfully.
+
+Tavernake smiled.
+
+"Come," he said, "it isn't altogether unnatural. I want to make
+something with my hands. I think that I could build boats. Why do you
+not take me into your yard? I could do no harm and I should not want
+much pay."
+
+Matthew Nicholls stroked his beard once more and this time he counted
+fifty, as was his custom when confronted with a difficult matter. He had
+no need to do anything of the sort, for nothing in the world would have
+induced him to make up his mind on the spot as to so weighty a proposal.
+
+"It's not likely that you're serious," he objected. "You are a young man
+and strong-limbed, I should imagine, but you've education--one can tell
+it by the way you pronounce your words. It's but a poor living, after
+all, to be made here."
+
+"I like the place," Tavernake declared doggedly. "I am a man of small
+needs. I want to work all through the day, work till I am tired enough
+to sleep at night, work till my bones ache and my arms are sore. I
+suppose you could give me enough to live on in a humble way?"
+
+"Take a bite of supper with me," Nicholls answered. "In these serious
+affairs, my daughter has always her say. We will put the matter before
+her and see what she thinks of it."
+
+They lingered about the quay until the light from Wells Lighthouse
+flashed across the sea, and until in the distance they could hear the
+moaning of the incoming tide as it rippled over the bar and began to
+fill the tidal way which stretched to the wooden pier itself. Then the
+two men made their way along the village street, through a field, and
+into the little yard over which stood the sign of "Matthew Nicholls,
+Boat-Builder." At one corner of the yard was the cottage in which he
+lived.
+
+"You'll come right in, Mr. Tavernake," he said, the instincts of
+hospitality stirring within him as soon as they had passed through
+the gate. "We will talk of this matter together, you and me and the
+daughter."
+
+Tavernake seemed, on his introduction to the household, like a man
+unused to feminine society. Perhaps he did not expect to find such a
+type of her sex as Ruth Nicholls in such a remote neighborhood. She was
+thin, and her cheeks were paler than those of any of the other young
+women whom he had seen about the village. Her eyes, too, were darker,
+and her speech different. There was nothing about her which reminded him
+in the least of the child with whom he had played. Tavernake watched
+her intently. Presently the idea came to him that she, too, was seeking
+shelter.
+
+Supper was a simple meal, but it was well and deftly served. The girl
+had the gift of moving noiselessly. She was quick without giving
+the impression of haste. To their guest she was courteous, but her
+recollection of him appeared to be slight, and his coming but a matter
+of slight interest. After she had cleared the cloth, however, and
+produced a jar of tobacco, her father bade her sit down with them.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," he began, ponderously, "is thinking some of settling
+down in these parts, Ruth."
+
+She inclined her head gravely.
+
+"It appears," her father continued, "that he is sick and tired of the
+city and of head-work. He is wishful to come into the yard with me, if
+so be that we could find enough work for two."
+
+The girl looked at their visitor, and for the first time there was a
+measure of curiosity in her earnest gaze. Tavernake was, in his way,
+good enough to look upon. He was well-built, his shoulders and physique
+all spoke of strength. His features were firmly cut, although his
+general expression was gloomy. But for a certain moroseness, an
+uncouthness which he seemed to cultivate, he might even have been deemed
+good-looking.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake would make a great mistake," she said, hesitatingly. "It
+is not well for those who have brains to work with their hands. It is
+not a place for those to live who have been out in the world. At most
+seasons of the year it is but a wilderness. Sometimes there is little
+enough to do, even for father."
+
+"I am not ambitious for over-much work or for over-much money, Miss
+Nicholls," Tavernake replied. "I will be frank with you both. Things out
+in the world there went ill with me; it was not my fault, but they went
+ill with me. What ambitions I had are finished--for the present, at any
+rate. I want to rest, I want to work with my hands, to grow my muscles
+again, to feel my strength, to believe that there is something effective
+in the world I can do. I have had a shock, a disappointment,--call it
+what you like."
+
+The old man Nicholls nodded deliberately.
+
+"Well," he pronounced, "it's a big change to make. I never thought of
+help in the yard before. When there's been more than I could do, I've
+just let it go. Come for a week on trial, Leonard Tavernake. If we are
+of any use to one another, we shall soon know of it."
+
+The girl, who had been looking out into the night, came back.
+
+"You are making a mistake, Mr. Tavernake," she said. "You are too young
+and strong to have finished your battle."
+
+He looked at her steadily and sighed. It was only too obvious that hers
+had been fought and lost.
+
+"Perhaps," he replied softly, "you are right. Perhaps it is only the
+rest I want. We shall see."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II. THE SIMPLE LIFE
+
+
+So Tavernake became a boat-builder. Summer passed into winter and this
+hamlet by the sea seemed, indeed, as though it might have been one of
+the forgotten spots upon the earth. Save for that handful of cottages,
+the two farmhouses a few hundred yards inland, and the deserted Hall
+half-hidden in its grove of pine trees, there was no dwelling-place
+nor any sign of human habitation for many miles. For eight hours a day
+Tavernake worked, mostly out of doors, in the little yard which hung
+over the beach. Sometimes he rested from his labors and looked seaward,
+looked around him as though rejoicing in that unbroken solitude, the
+emptiness of the gray ocean, the loneliness of the land behind. What
+things there were which lay back in the cells of his memory, no person
+there knew, for he spoke of his past to no one, not even to Ruth. He
+was a good workman, and he lived the simple life of those others without
+complaint or weariness. There was nothing in his manner to denote that
+he had been used to anything else. The village had accepted him without
+question. It was only Ruth who still, gravely but kindly enough,
+disapproved of his presence.
+
+One day she came and sat with him as he smoked his after-dinner pipe,
+leaning against an overturned boat, with his eyes fixed upon that line
+of gray breakers.
+
+"You spend a good deal of your time thinking, Mr. Tavernake," she
+remarked quietly.
+
+"Too much," he admitted at once, "too much, Miss Nicholls. I should be
+better employed planing down that mast there."
+
+"You know that I did not mean that," she said, reprovingly, "only
+sometimes you make me--shall I confess it?--almost angry with you."
+
+He took his pipe from his mouth and knocked out the ashes. As they fell
+on the ground so he looked at them.
+
+"All thought is wasted time," he declared, grimly, "all thought of the
+past. The past is like those ashes; it is dead and finished."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"Not always," she replied. "Sometimes the past comes to life again.
+Sometimes the bravest of us quit the fight too soon."
+
+He looked at her questioningly, almost fiercely. Her words, however,
+seemed spoken without intent.
+
+"So far as mine is concerned," he pronounced, "it is finished. There is
+a memorial stone laid upon it, and no resurrection is possible."
+
+"You cannot tell," she answered. "No one can tell."
+
+He turned back to his work almost rudely, but she stayed by his side.
+
+"Once," she remarked, reflectively, "I, too, went a little way into the
+world. I was a school-teacher at Norwich. I was very fond of some one
+there; we were engaged. Then my mother died and I had to come back to
+look after father."
+
+He nodded.
+
+"Well?"
+
+"We are a long way from Norwich," she continued, quietly. "Soon after I
+left, the man whom I was fond of grew lonely. He found some one else."
+
+"You have forgotten him?" Tavernake asked, quickly.
+
+"I shall never forget him," she replied. "That part of life is finished,
+but if ever my father can spare me, I shall go back to my work again.
+Sometimes those work the best and accomplish the most who carry the
+scars of a great wound."
+
+She turned away to the house, and after that it seemed to him that she
+avoided him for a time. At any rate, she made no further attempt to win
+his confidence. Propinquity, however, was too much for both of them. He
+was a lodger under her father's roof. It was scarcely possible for them
+to keep apart. Saturdays and Sundays they walked sometimes for miles
+across the frost-bound marshes, in the quickening atmosphere of the
+darkening afternoons, when the red sun sank early behind the hills, and
+the twilight grew shorter every day. They watched the sea-birds together
+and saw the wild duck come down to the pools; felt the glow of exercise
+burn their cheeks; felt, too, that common and nameless exultation
+engendered by their loneliness in the solitude of these beautiful empty
+places. In the evenings they often read together, for Nicholls, although
+no drinker, never missed his hour or so at the village inn. Tavernake,
+in time, began to find a sort of comfort in her calm, sexless
+companionship. He knew very well that he was to her as she was to him,
+something human, something that filled an empty place, yet something
+without direct personality. Little by little he felt the bitterness
+in his heart grow less. Then a late spring--late, at any rate, in this
+quaint corner of the world--stole like some wonderful enchantment across
+the face of the moors and the marshes. Yellow gorse starred with golden
+clumps the brown hillside; wild lavender gleamed in patches across the
+silver-streaked marshes; the dead hedges came blossoming into life.
+Crocuses, long lines of yellow and purple crocuses, broke from waxy buds
+into starlike blossoms along the front of Matthew Nicholls's garden. And
+with the coming o spring, Tavernake found himself suddenly able to thin
+of the past. It was a new phase of life. He could sit down and think of
+those things that had happened to him, without fearing to be wrecked by
+the storm. Often he sat out looking seaward, thinking of the days
+when he had first met Beatrice, of those early days of pleasant
+companionship, of the marvelous avidity with which he had learned from
+her. Only when Elizabeth's face stole into the foreground did he spring
+from his place and turn back to his work.
+
+One day Tavernake sat poring over the weekly local paper, reading it
+more out of curiosity than from any real interest. Suddenly a familiar
+name caught his eye. His heart seemed to stop beating for a moment, and
+the page swam before his eyes. Quickly he recovered himself and read:
+
+      THE QUEEN'S HALL, UNTHANK ROAD,
+                  NORWICH
+
+                TWICE DAILY.
+             PROFESSOR FRANKLIN
+          assisted by his daughter,
+           MISS BEATRICE FRANKLIN,
+     will give his REFINED and MARVELOUS
+     ENTERTAINMENT, comprising HYPNOTISM, feats
+     Of SECOND SIGHT never before attempted on
+     any stage, THOUGHT-READING, and a BRIEF
+     LECTURE upon the connection between ANCIENT
+     SUPERSTITIONS and the EXTRAORDINARY
+     DEVELOPMENTS OF THE NEW SCIENCE.
+
+     PROFESSOR FRANKLIN Can be CONSULTED PRIVATELY,
+     by letter or by appointment.  Address for this
+     week--The Golden Cow, Bell's Lane, Norwich.
+
+Twice Tavernake read the announcement. Then he went out and found Ruth.
+
+"Ruth," he told her, "there is something calling me back, perhaps for
+good."
+
+For the first time she gave him her hand.
+
+"Now you are talking like a man once more," she declared. "Go and seek
+it. Comeback and say good-bye to us, if you will, but throw your tools
+into the sea."
+
+Tavernake laughed and looked across at his workshop.
+
+"I don't believe," he said, "that you've any confidence in my boat."
+
+"I'm not sure that I would sail with you," she answered, "even if you
+ever finished it. A laborer's work for a laborer's hand. You must go
+back to the other things."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III. OLD FRIENDS MEET
+
+
+The professor set down his tumbler upon the zinc-rimmed counter. He was
+very little changed except that he had grown a shade stouter, and there
+was perhaps more color in his cheeks. He carried himself, too, like a
+man who believes in himself. In the small public-house he was, without
+doubt, an impressive figure.
+
+"My friends," he remarked, "our host's whiskey is good. At the same
+time, I must not forget--"
+
+"You'll have one with me, Professor," a youth at his elbow interrupted.
+"Two special whiskies, miss, if you please."
+
+The professor shrugged his shoulders--it was a gesture which he
+wished every one to understand. He was suffering now the penalty for a
+popularity which would not be denied!
+
+"You are very kind, sir," he said, "very kind, indeed. As I was about to
+say, I must not forget that in less than half an hour I am due upon the
+stage. It does not do to disappoint one's audience, sir. It is a poor
+place, this music-hall, but it is full, they tell me packed from floor
+to ceiling. At eight-thirty I must show myself."
+
+"A marvelous turn, too, Professor," declared one of the young men by
+whom he was surrounded.
+
+"I thank you, sir," the professor replied, turning towards the speaker,
+glass in hand. "There have been others who have paid me a similar
+compliment; others, I may say, not unconnected with the aristocracy of
+your country--not unconnected either, I might add," he went on, "with
+the very highest in the land, those who from their exalted position
+have never failed to shower favors upon the more fortunate sons of our
+profession. The science of which I am to some extent the pioneer--not a
+drop more, my young friend. Say, I'm in dead earnest this time! No more,
+indeed."
+
+The young man in knickerbockers who had just come in banged the head of
+his cane upon the counter.
+
+"You'll never refuse me, Professor," he asserted, confidently. "I'm
+an old supporter, I am. I've seen you in Blackburn and Manchester, and
+twice here. Just as wonderful as ever! And that young lady of yours,
+Professor, begging your pardon if she is your daughter, as no doubt she
+is, why, she's a nut and no mistake."
+
+The professor sighed. He was in his element but he was getting uneasy at
+the flight of time.
+
+"My young friend," he said, "your face is not familiar to me but
+I cannot refuse your kindly offer. It must be the last, however,
+absolutely the last."
+
+Then Tavernake, directed here from the music-hall, pushed open the swing
+door and entered. The professor set down his glass untasted. Tavernake
+came slowly across the room.
+
+"You haven't forgotten me, then, Professor?" he remarked, holding out
+his hand.
+
+The professor welcomed him a little limply; something of the bombast had
+gone out of his manner. Tavernake's arrival had reminded him of things
+which he had only too easily forgotten.
+
+"This is very surprising," he faltered, "very surprising indeed. Do you
+live in these parts?"
+
+"Not far away," Tavernake answered. "I saw your announcement in the
+papers."
+
+The professor nodded.
+
+"Yes," he said, "I am on the war-path again. I tried resting but I
+got fat and lazy, and the people wouldn't have it, sir," he continued,
+recovering very quickly something of his former manner. "The number
+of offers I got through my agents by every post was simply
+astounding--astounding!"
+
+"I am looking forward to seeing your performance this evening,"
+Tavernake said politely. "In the meantime--"
+
+"I know what you are thinking of," the professor interrupted. "Well,
+well, give me your arm and we will walk down to the hall together.
+My friends," the professor added, turning round, "I wish you all a
+good-night!"
+
+Then the door was pushed half-way open and Tavernake's heart gave a
+jump. It was Beatrice who stood there, very pale, very tired, and much
+thinner even than the Beatrice of the boardinghouse, but still Beatrice.
+
+"Father," she exclaimed, "do you know that it is nearly--"
+
+Then she saw Tavernake and said no more. She seemed to sway a little,
+and Tavernake, taking a quick step forward, grasped her by the hands.
+
+"Dear sister," he cried, "you have been ill!"
+
+She was herself again almost in a moment.
+
+"Ill? Never in my life," she replied. "Only I have been hurrying--we
+are late already for the performance--and seeing you there, well, it was
+quite a shock, you know. Walk down with us and tell me all about it.
+Tell us what you are doing here--or rather, don't talk for a moment! It
+is all so amazing."
+
+They turned down the narrow cobbled street, the professor walking in the
+middle of the roadway, swinging his cane, a very imposing and wonderful
+figure, with the tails of his frock-coat streaming in the wind, his
+long hair only half-hidden by his hat. He hummed a tune to himself
+and affected not to take any notice of the other two. Then Tavernake
+suddenly realized that he had done a cowardly action in leaving her
+without a word.
+
+"There is so much to ask," she began at last, "but you have come back."
+
+She looked at his workman's clothes.
+
+"What have you been doing?" she asked, sharply.
+
+"Working," Tavernake answered, "good work, too. I am the better for it.
+Don't mind my clothes, Beatrice. I have been mad for a time, but after
+all it has been a healthy madness."
+
+"It was a strange thing that you did," she said,--"you disappeared."
+
+He nodded.
+
+"Some day," he told her, "I may, perhaps, be able to make you
+understand. Just now I don't think that I could."
+
+"It was Elizabeth?" she whispered, softly.
+
+"It was Elizabeth," he admitted.
+
+They said no more then till they reached the hall. She stopped at the
+door and put out her hand timidly.
+
+"I shall see you afterwards?" she ventured.
+
+"Do you mind my coming to the performance?" he asked.
+
+She hesitated.
+
+"A few moments ago," she remarked, smiling, "I was dreading your coming.
+Now I think that you had better. It will be all over at ten o'clock, and
+I shall look for you outside. You are living in Norwich?"
+
+"I shall be here for to-night, at any rate," he answered.
+
+"Very well, then," she said, "afterwards we will have a talk."
+
+Tavernake passed through the scattered knot of loiterers at the door
+and bought a seat for himself in the little music-hall, which,
+notwithstanding the professor's boast, was none too well filled. It was
+a place of the old-fashioned sort, with small tables in the front, and
+waiters hurrying about serving drinks. The people were of the lowest
+order, and the atmosphere of the room was thick with tobacco smoke.
+A young woman in a flaxen wig and boy's clothes was singing a popular
+ditty, marching up and down the stage, and interspersing the words o f
+her song with grimaces and appropriate action. Tavernake sat down with
+a barely-smothered groan. He was beginning to realize the tragedy upon
+which he had stumbled. A comic singer followed, who in a dress suit
+several sizes too large for him gave an imitation of a popular Irish
+comedian. Then the curtain went up and the professor was seen, standing
+in front of the curtain and bowing solemnly to a somewhat unresponsive
+audience. A minute later Beatrice came quietly in and sat by his side.
+There was nothing new about the show. Tavernake had seen the same thing
+before, with the exception that the professor was perhaps a little
+behind the majority of his fellow-craftsmen. The performance was
+finished in dead silence, and after it was over, Beatrice came to the
+front and sang. She was a very unusual figure in such a place, in a
+plain black evening gown, with black gloves and no jewelry, but they
+encored her heartily, and she sang a song from the musical comedy
+in which Tavernake had first seen her. A sudden wave of reminiscence
+stirred within him. His thoughts seemed to go back to the night when
+he had waited for her outside the theatre and they had had supper at
+Imano's, to the day when he had left the boarding-house and entered upon
+his new life. It was more like a dream than ever now.
+
+He rose and quitted the place immediately she had finished, waiting in
+the street until she appeared. She came out in a few minutes.
+
+"Father is going to a supper," she announced, "at the inn where he has a
+room for receiving people. Will you come home with me for an hour? Then
+we can go round and fetch him."
+
+"I should like to," Tavernake answered.
+
+Her lodgings were only a few steps away--a strange little house in a
+narrow street. She opened the front door and ushered him in.
+
+"You understand, of course," she said, smiling, "that we have abandoned
+the haunts of luxury altogether."
+
+He looked around at the tiny room with its struggling fire and horsehair
+sofa, linoleum for carpet, oleographs for pictures, and he shivered,
+not for his own sake but for hers. On the sideboard were some bread and
+cheese and a bottle of ginger beer.
+
+"Please imagine," she begged, taking the pins from her hat, "that you
+are in those dear comfortable rooms of ours down at Chelsea. Draw
+that easy-chair up to what there is of the fire, and listen. You smoke
+still?"
+
+"I have taken to a pipe," he admitted.
+
+"Then light it and listen," she went on, smoothing her hair for a minute
+in front of the looking-glass. "You want to know about Elizabeth, of
+course."
+
+"Yes," he said, "I want to know."
+
+"Elizabeth, on the whole," Beatrice continued, "got out of all her
+troubles very well. Her husband's people were wild with her, but
+Elizabeth was very clever. They were never able to prove that she had
+exercised more than proper control over poor Wenham. He died two months
+after they took him to the asylum. They offered Elizabeth a lump sum to
+waive all claims to his estate, and she accepted it. I think that she is
+now somewhere on the Continent."
+
+"And you?" he asked. "Why did you leave the theatre?"
+
+"It was a matter of looking after my father," she explained. "You see,
+while he was there with Elizabeth he had too much money and nothing to
+do. The consequence was that he was always--well, I suppose I had better
+say it--drinking too much, and he was losing all his desire for work. I
+made him promise that if I could get some engagements he would come away
+with me, so I went to an agent and we have been touring like this for
+quite a long time."
+
+"But what a life for you!" Tavernake exclaimed. "Couldn't you have
+stayed on at the theatre and found him something in London?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"In London," she said, "he would never have got out of his old habits.
+And then," she went on, hesitatingly, "you understand that the public
+want something else besides the hypnotism--"
+
+Tavernake interrupted her ruthlessly.
+
+"Of course I understand," he declared, "I was there to-night. I
+understood at once why you were not very anxious for me to go. The
+people cared nothing at all about your father's performance. They simply
+waited for you. You would get the same money if you went round without
+him."
+
+She nodded, a trifle shamefacedly.
+
+"I am so afraid some one will tell him," she confessed. "They nearly
+always ask me to leave out his part of the performance. They have even
+offered me more money if I would come alone. But you see how it is. He
+believes in himself, he thinks he is very clever and he believes that
+the public like his show. It is the only thing which helps him to keep a
+little self-respect. He thinks that my singing is almost unnecessary."
+
+Tavernake looked into that faint glimmer of miserable fire. He was
+conscious of a curious feeling in his throat. How little he knew of
+life! The pathos of what she had told him, the thought of her bravely
+traveling the country and singing at third-rate music-halls, never
+taking any credit to herself, simply that her father might still believe
+himself a man of talent, appealed to him irresistibly. He suddenly held
+out his hand.
+
+"Poor little Beatrice!" he exclaimed. "Dear little sister!"
+
+The hand he gripped was cold, she avoided his eyes.
+
+"You--you mustn't," she murmured. "Please don't!"
+
+He held out his other hand and half rose, but her lips suddenly ceased
+to quiver and she waved him back.
+
+"No, Leonard," she begged, "please don't do or say anything foolish.
+Since we do meet again, though, like this, I am going to ask you one
+question. What made you come to me and ask me to marry you that day?"
+
+He looked away; something in her eyes accused him.
+
+"Beatrice," he confessed, "I was a thick-headed ignorant fool, without
+understanding. I came to you for safety. I was afraid of Elizabeth, I
+was afraid of what I felt for her. I wanted to escape from it."
+
+She smiled piteously.
+
+"It wasn't a very brave thing to do, was it?" she faltered.
+
+"It was mean," he admitted. "It was worse than that. But, Beatrice," he
+went on, "I was missing you horribly. You did leave a big empty place
+when you went away. I am not going to excuse myself about Elizabeth. I
+lived through a time of the strangest, most marvelous emotions one could
+dream of. Then the thing came to an end and I felt as though the
+bottom had gone out of life. I suppose--I loved her," he continued
+hesitatingly. "I don't know. I only know that she filled every thought
+of my brain, that she lived in every beat of my heart, that I would have
+gone down into Hell to help her. And then I understood. That morning
+she told me something of the truth about herself, not meaning
+to--unconsciously--justifying herself all the time, not realizing that
+every word she said was damnable. And then there didn't seem to be
+anything else left, and I had only one desire. I turned my back upon
+everything and I went back to the place where I was born, a little
+fishing village. For the last thirty miles I walked. I shall never
+forget it. When I got there, what I wanted was work, work with my hands.
+I wanted to build something, to create anything that I could labor upon.
+I became a boat builder--I have been a boatbuilder ever since."
+
+"And now?" she asked.
+
+"Beatrice!"
+
+She turned and faced him. She looked into his eyes very searchingly,
+very wistfully.
+
+"Beatrice," he said, "I ask you once more, only differently. Will you
+marry me now? I'll find some work, I'll make enough money for us. Do you
+remember," he went on, "how I used to talk, how I used to feel that I
+had only to put forth my strength and I could win anything? I'll feel
+like that again, Beatrice, if you'll come to me."
+
+She shook her head slowly. She looked away from him with a sigh. She
+had the air of one who has sought for something which she has failed to
+find.
+
+"You mustn't think of that again, Leonard," she told him. "It would be
+quite impossible. This is the only way I can save my father. We have a
+tour that will take us the best part of another year."
+
+"But you are sacrificing yourself!" he declared. "I will keep your
+father."
+
+"It isn't that only," she replied. "For one thing, I couldn't let you;
+and for another, it isn't only the money, it's the work. As long as
+he's made to think that the public expect him every night, he keeps off
+drinking too much. There is nothing else in the whole world which would
+keep him steady. Don't look as though you didn't understand, Leonard. He
+is my father, you know, and there isn't anything more terrible than to
+see any one who has a claim on us give way to anything like that. You
+mayn't quite approve, but please believe that I am doing what I feel to
+be right."
+
+The little fire had gone out. Beatrice glanced at the clock and put on
+her jacket again.
+
+"I am sorry, Leonard," she said, "but I think I must go and fetch father
+now. You can walk with me there, if you will. It has been very good
+to see you again. For the rest I don't know what to say to you. Do you
+think that it is quite what you were meant for--to build boats?"
+
+"I don't seem to have any other ambition," he answered, wearily. "When
+I read in the paper this morning that you and your father were here,
+things seemed suddenly different. I came at once. I didn't know what I
+wanted until I saw you, but I know now, and it isn't any good."
+
+"No good at all," she declared cheerfully. "It won't be very long,
+Leonard, before something else comes along to stir you. I don't think
+you were meant to build boats all your life."
+
+He rose and took up his hat. She was waiting for him at the door. Again
+they passed down the narrow street.
+
+"Tell, me, Beatrice," he begged, "is it because you don't like me well
+enough that you won't listen to what I ask?"
+
+For a moment she half closed her eyes as though in pain. Then she
+laughed, not perhaps very naturally. They were standing now by the door
+of the public house.
+
+"Leonard," she said, "you are very young in years but you are a baby
+in experience. Mind, there are other reasons why I could not--would not
+dream of marrying you, other reasons which are absolutely sufficient,
+but--do you know that you have asked me twice and you have never once
+said that you cared, that you have never once looked as though you
+cared? No, don't, please," she interrupted, "don't explain anything. You
+see, a woman always knows--too well, sometimes."
+
+She nodded, and passed in through the swinging-doors. Standing out there
+in the narrow, crooked street, Tavernake heard the clapping and applause
+which greeted her entrance, he heard her father's voice. Some one struck
+a note at the piano--she was going to sing. Very slowly he turned away
+and walked down the cobbled hill.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV. PRITCHARD'S GOOD NEWS
+
+
+Late in the afternoon of the following day, Ruth came home from the
+village and found Tavernake hard at work on his boat. She put down her
+basket and stopped by his side.
+
+"So you are back again," she remarked.
+
+"Yes, I am back again."
+
+"And nothing has happened?"
+
+"Nothing has happened," he assented, wearily. "Nothing ever will happen
+now."
+
+She smiled.
+
+"You mean that you will stay here and build boats all your life?"
+
+"That is what I mean to do," he announced.
+
+She laid her hand upon his shoulder.
+
+"Don't believe it, Leonard," she said. "There is other work for you in
+the world somewhere, just as there is for me."
+
+He shook his head and she picked up her basket again, smiling.
+
+"Your time will come as it comes to the rest of us," she declared,
+cheerfully. "You won't want to sit here and bury your talents in the
+sands all your days. Have you heard what is going to happen to me?"
+
+"No! Something good, I hope."
+
+"My father's favorite niece is coming to live with us--there are seven
+of them altogether, and farming doesn't pay like it used to, so Margaret
+is coming here. Father says that if she is as handy as she used to be I
+may go back to the schools almost at once."
+
+Tavernake was silent for a moment. Then he got up and threw down his
+tools.
+
+"Great Heavens!" he exclaimed. "If I am not becoming the most selfish
+brute that ever breathed! Do you know, the first thought I had was that
+I should miss you? You are right, young woman, I must get out of this."
+
+She disappeared into the house, smiling, and Tavernake called out to
+Nicholls, who was sitting on the wall.
+
+"Mr. Nicholls," he asked, "how much notice do you want?"
+
+Matthew Nicholls removed his pipe from his mouth.
+
+"Why, I don't know that I'm particular," he replied, "being as you want
+to go. Between you and me, I'm gettin' fat and lazy since you came.
+There ain't enough work for two, and that's all there is to it, and
+being as you're young and active, why, I've left it to you, and look at
+my arms."
+
+He held them up.
+
+"Used to be all muscle, now they're nothin' but bloomin' pap. And no'
+but two glasses of beer a day extra have I drunk, just to pass the time.
+You can stay if you will, young man, but you can go out fishin' and
+leave me the work, and I'll pay you just the same, for I'm not saying
+that I don't like your company. Or you can go when you please, and
+that's the end of it."
+
+Matthew Nicholls spat upon the stones and replaced his pipe in his
+mouth. Tavernake came in and sat down by his side.
+
+"Look here," he said, "I believe you are right. I'll stay another week
+but I'll take things easy. You get on with the boat now. I'll sit here
+and have a smoke."
+
+Nicholls grunted but obeyed, and for the next few days Tavernake loafed.
+On his return one afternoon from a long walk, he saw a familiar figure
+sitting upon the sea wall in front of the workshop, a familiar figure
+but a strange one in these parts. It was Mr. Pritchard, in an American
+felt hat, and smoking a very black cigar. He leaned over and nodded to
+Tavernake, who was staring at him aghast.
+
+"Hallo, old man!" he called out. "Run you to earth, you see!"
+
+"Yes, I see!" Tavernake exclaimed.
+
+"Come right along up here and let's talk," Pritchard continued.
+
+Tavernake obeyed. Pritchard looked him over approvingly. Tavernake was
+roughly dressed in those days, but as a man he had certainly developed.
+
+"Say, you're looking fine," his visitor remarked. "What wouldn't I give
+for that color and those shoulders!"
+
+"It is a healthy life," Tavernake admitted. "Do you mean that you've
+come down here to see me?"
+
+"That's so," Pritchard announced; "down here to see you, and for no
+other reason. Not but that the scenery isn't all it should be, and that
+sort of thing," he went on, "but I am not putting up any bluff about
+it. It's you I am here to talk to. Are you ready? Shall I go straight
+ahead?"
+
+"If you please," Tavernake said, slowly filling his pipe.
+
+"You dropped out of things pretty sudden," Pritchard continued. "It
+didn't take me much guessing to reckon up why. Between you and me, you
+are not the first man who's been up against it on account of that young
+woman. Don't stop me," he begged. "I know how you've been feeling. It
+was a right good idea of yours to come here. Others before you
+have tried the shady side of New York and Paris, and it's the wrong
+treatment. It's Hell, that's what it is, for them. Now that young
+woman--we got to speak of her--is about the most beautiful and the most
+fascinating of her sex--I'll grant that to start with--but she isn't
+worth the life of a snail, much less the life of a strong man."
+
+"You are, quite right," Tavernake confessed, shortly. "I know I was
+a fool--a fool! If I could think of any adjective that would meet the
+case, I'd use it, but there it is. I chucked things and I came here. You
+haven't come down to tell me your opinion of me, I suppose?"
+
+"Not by any manner of means," Pritchard admitted. "I came down first to
+tell you that you were a fool, if it was necessary. Since you know it,
+it isn't. We'll pass on to the next stage, and that is, what are you
+going to do about it?"
+
+"It is in my mind at the present moment," Tavernake announced, "to leave
+here. The only trouble is, I am not very keen about London."
+
+Pritchard nodded thoughtfully.
+
+"That's all right," he agreed. "London's no place for a man, anyway. You
+don't want to learn the usual tricks of money-making. Money that's made
+in the cities is mostly made with stained fingers. I have a different
+sort of proposal to make."
+
+"Go ahead," Tavernake said. "What is it?"
+
+"A new country," Pritchard declared, altering the angle of his cigar,
+"a virgin land, mountains and valleys, great rivers to be crossed, all
+sorts of cold and heat to be borne with, a land rich with minerals--some
+say gold, but never mind that. There is oil in parts, there's tin,
+there's coal, and there's thousands and thousands of miles of forest.
+You're a surveyor?"
+
+"Passed all my exams," Tavernake agreed tersely.
+
+"You are the man for out yonder," Pritchard insisted. "I've two years'
+vacation--dead sick of this city life I am--and I am going to put you on
+the track of it. You don't know much about prospecting yet, I reckon?"
+
+"Nothing at all!"
+
+"You soon shall," Pritchard went on. "We'll start from Winnipeg. A few
+horses, some guides, and a couple of tents. We'll spend twenty weeks, my
+friend, without seeing a town. What do you think of that?"
+
+"Gorgeous!" Tavernake muttered.
+
+"Twenty weeks we'll strike westward. I know the way to set about the
+whole job. I know one or two of the capitalists, too, and if we don't
+map out some of the grandest estates in British Columbia, why, my name
+ain't Pritchard."
+
+"But I haven't a penny in the world," Tavernake objected.
+
+"That's where you're lying," Pritchard remarked, pulling a newspaper
+from his pocket. "See the advertisement for yourself: 'Leonard
+Tavernake, something to his advantage.' Well, down I went to those
+lawyers--your old lawyer it was--Martin. I told him I was on your track,
+and he said--'For Heaven's sake, send the fellow along!' Say, Tavernake,
+he made me laugh the way he described your bursting in upon him and
+telling him to take your land for his costs, and walking out of the room
+like something almighty. Why, he worked that thing so that they had to
+buy your land, and they took him into partnership. He's made a pot of
+money, and needs no costs from you, and there's the money for your land
+and what he had of yours besides, waiting for you."
+
+Tavernake smoked stolidly at his pipe. His eyes were out seaward, but
+his heart was beating to a new and splendid music. To start life again,
+a man's life, out in the solitudes, out in the great open spaces! It was
+gorgeous, this! He turned round and grasped Pritchard by the shoulder.
+
+"I say," he exclaimed, "why are you doing all this for me, Pritchard?"
+
+Pritchard laughed.
+
+"You did me a good turn," he said, "and you're a man. You've the
+pluck--that's what I like. You knew nothing, you were as green and
+ignorant as a young man from behind the counter of a country shop, but,
+my God! you'd got the right stuff, and I meant getting even with you
+if I could. You'll leave here with me to-morrow, and in three weeks we
+sail."
+
+Ruth came smiling out from the house.
+
+"Won't you bring your friend in to supper, Mr. Tavernake?" she begged.
+"It's good news, I hope?" she added, lowering her voice a little.
+
+"It's the best," Tavernake declared, "the best!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V. BEATRICE REFUSES
+
+
+A week later Tavernake was in London. A visit to his friend Mr. Martin
+had easily proved the truth of Pritchard's words, and he found himself
+in possession of a sum of money at least twice as great as he had
+anticipated. He stayed at a cheap hotel in the Strand and made purchases
+under Pritchard's supervision. For the first few days he was too busy
+for reflection. Then Pritchard let him alone while he ran over to Paris,
+and Tavernake suddenly realized that he was in the city to which he had
+thought never to return. He passed the back of the theatre where he had
+waited for Beatrice, he looked up at the entrance of the Milan Court;
+he lunched alone, and with a curious mixture of feelings, at the little
+restaurant where he had supped with Beatrice. It was over, that part
+of his life, over and finished. Yet, with his natural truthfulness, he
+never attempted to disguise from himself the pain at his heart. Three
+times in one day he found himself, under some pretext or another, in
+Imano's Restaurant. Once, in the middle of the street, he burst into a
+fit of laughter. It was while Pritchard was in London, and he asked him
+a question.
+
+"Pritchard," he remarked, "you area man of experience. Did any one ever
+care for two women at the same time?"
+
+Pritchard removed his cigar from his teeth and stared at his companion.
+
+"Why, my young friend," he replied, "I've found no trouble myself in
+being fond of a dozen."
+
+Tavernake smiled and said no more. Pritchard was one of the good fellows
+of the world, but there were things which were hidden from him.
+Yet Tavernake, who had fallen into a habit, during his solitude, of
+analyzing his sensations, was puzzled by this one circumstance, that
+when he thought of Elizabeth, though his heart never failed to beat
+more quickly, the sense of shame generally stole over him; and when he
+thought of Beatrice, a curious loneliness, a loneliness that brought
+with it a pain, seemed suddenly to make the hours drag and his pleasures
+flavorless. For two days he was puzzled. Then his habit of taking long
+walks helped him toward a solution. In a small outlying music-hall in
+the east-end of London, he saw the same announcement that he had noticed
+in the Norfolk newspaper,--"Professor Franklin" in large type, and "Miss
+Beatrice Franklin" in small.
+
+That night he attended the music-hall. The scene was practically a
+repetition of the one in Norwich, only with additions. The professor's
+bombastic performance met with scarcely any applause. Its termination
+was, indeed, interrupted by catcalls and whistles from the gallery.
+Beatrice's songs, on the other hand, were applauded more vociferously
+than ever. She had hard work to avoid a third encore.
+
+At the end of the performance, Tavernake made his way to the stage-door
+and waited. The neighborhood was an unsavory one, and the building
+itself seemed crowded in among a row of shops of the worst order,
+fish stalls, and a glaring gin palace. Long before Beatrice came out,
+Tavernake could hear the professor's voice down the covered passage, the
+professor's voice apparently raised in anger.
+
+"Undutiful behavior, that's what I call it--undutiful!"
+
+They emerged into the street, the professor very much the same as usual;
+Beatrice paler, with a pathetic droop about her mouth. Tavernake came
+eagerly forward.
+
+"Beatrice!" he cried, holding out his hand.
+
+The professor drew back. Beatrice stood still,--for a moment it seemed
+as though she were about to faint. Tavernake grasped her hands.
+
+"I am so sorry!" he exclaimed, clumsily. "I ought not to have come up
+like that."
+
+She smiled a little wan smile.
+
+"I am quite all right," she replied, "only the heat inside was rather
+trying, and even out here the atmosphere isn't too good, is it? How did
+you find us out?"
+
+"By chance again," Tavernake answered. "I have news. May I walk with you
+a few steps?"
+
+She glanced timidly toward her father. The professor was holding aloof
+in dignified silence.
+
+"Perhaps," Tavernake said quickly, "you would take supper with me? I am
+going abroad, and I should like to say good-bye properly. A bottle of
+champagne and some supper. What do you say, Professor?"
+
+The professor suffered his features to relax.
+
+"A very admirable idea," he declared. "Where shall we go?"
+
+"Is it too late to get to Imano's?" Tavernake suggested.
+
+The professor hesitated.
+
+"A taxicab," he remarked, "would do it, if--"
+
+He paused, and Tavernake smiled.
+
+"A taxicab it shall be," he decided. "I am in funds just for the moment.
+Come along, both of you, and I'll tell you all about it."
+
+He made her take his arm, although her fingers did no more than touch
+his coat sleeve.
+
+"Pritchard came and dug me out," he continued. "I am going abroad with
+him. It's sort of prospecting in some new country at the back of British
+Columbia. We see what we can find and then go to a financier's and start
+companies, mining companies and oil fields--anything. I am off in a
+week."
+
+Beatrice half closed her eyes. They had hailed a passing cab and she
+sank back among the cushions with a sigh of relief.
+
+"Dear Leonard," she murmured, "I am so glad, so very happy for your
+sake. This is the sort of thing which I hoped would happen."
+
+"And now tell me about yourselves," he went on.
+
+There was a sudden silence. Tavernake was conscious that Beatrice's
+clothes were distinctly shabbier, that the professor's hat was shiny.
+The professor cleared his throat.
+
+"I do not wish," he said, "to intrude our private matters upon one who,
+although I will not call him a stranger, is assuredly not one of our
+old friends. At the same time, I admit that a little trouble has arisen
+between Beatrice and myself, and we were discussing it at the moment
+you arrived. I shall appeal to you now. As an unprejudiced member of the
+audience to-night, Mr. Tavernake, you will give me your honest opinion?"
+
+"Certainly," Tavernake promised, with a sinking premonition of what was
+to come.
+
+"What I complain of," the professor began, speaking with elaborate and
+impressive slowness, "is that my performance is hurried over and that
+too long a time is taken up by Beatrice's songs. The management remark
+upon the applause which her efforts occasionally ensure, but, as I would
+point out to you, sir," he continued, "a performance such as mine makes
+too deep an impression for the audience to show their appreciation of it
+by such vulgar methods as hand-clapping and whistling. You follow me, I
+trust, Mr. Tavernake?"
+
+"Why, yes, of course," Tavernake admitted.
+
+"I take a sincere and earnest interest in my work," the professor
+declared, "and I feel that when it has to be scamped that my daughter
+may sing a music-hall ditty, the result is, to say the least of it,
+undignified. For some reason or other, I have been unable to induce the
+management to see entirely with me, but my point is that Beatrice
+should sing one song only, and that the additional ten minutes should be
+occupied by me in either a further exposition of my extraordinary powers
+as a hypnotist, or in a little address to the audience upon the hidden
+sciences. Now I appeal to you, Mr. Tavernake, as a young man of common
+sense. What is your opinion?"
+
+Tavernake, much too honest to be capable in a general way of duplicity,
+was on the point of giving it, but he caught Beatrice's imploring gaze.
+Her lips were moving. He hesitated.
+
+"Of course," he began, slowly, "you have to try and put yourself into
+the position of the major part of the audience, who are exceedingly
+uneducated people. It is very hard to give an opinion, Professor. I
+must say that your entertainment this evening was listened to with rapt
+interest."
+
+The professor turned solemnly towards his daughter.
+
+"You hear that, Beatrice?" he said severely. "You hear what Mr.
+Tavernake says? 'With rapt interest!'"
+
+"At the same time," Tavernake went on, "without a doubt Miss Beatrice's
+songs were also extremely popular. It is rather a pity that the
+management could not give you a little more time."
+
+"Failing that, sir," the professor declared, "my point is, as I
+explained before, that Beatrice should give up one of her songs. What
+you have said this evening more than ever confirms me in my view."
+
+Beatrice smiled thankfully at Tavernake.
+
+"Well," she suggested, "at any rate we will leave it for the present.
+Sometimes I think, though, father, that you frighten them with some of
+your work, and you must remember that they come to be amused."
+
+"That," the professor admitted, "is the most sensible remark you have
+made, Beatrice. There is indeed something terrifying in some of my
+manifestations, terrifying even to myself, who understand so thoroughly
+my subject. However, as you say, we will dismiss the matter for the
+present. The thought of this supper party is a pleasant one. Do you
+remember, Mr. Tavernake, the night when you and I met in the balcony at
+Imano's?"
+
+"Perfectly well," Tavernake answered.
+
+"Now I shall test your memory," the professor continued, with a knowing
+smile. "Can you remember, sir, the brand of champagne which I was then
+drinking, and which I declared, if you recollect, was the one which best
+agreed with me, the one brand worth drinking?"
+
+"I am afraid I don't remember that," Tavernake confessed. "Restaurant
+life is a thing I know so little of, and I have only drunk champagne
+once or twice in my life."
+
+"Dear, dear me!" the professor exclaimed. "You do astonish me, sir.
+Well, that brand was Veuve Clicquot, and you may take my word for it,
+Mr. Tavernake, and you may find this knowledge useful to you when you
+have made a fortune in America and have become a man of pleasure; there
+is no wine equal to it. Veuve Clicquot, sir, if possible of the year
+1899, though the year 1900 is quite drinkable."
+
+"Veuve Clicquot," Tavernake repeated. "I'll remember it for this
+evening."
+
+The professor beamed.
+
+"My dear," he said to Beatrice, "Mr. Tavernake will think that I had a
+purpose in testing his memory."
+
+Beatrice smiled.
+
+"And hadn't you, father?" she asked.
+
+They all laughed together.
+
+"Well, it is pleasant," the professor admitted, "to have one's
+weaknesses ministered to, especially when one is getting on in life,"
+he added, with a ponderous sigh. "Never mind, we will think only of
+pleasant subjects this evening. It will be quite interesting, Mr.
+Tavernake, to hear you order the supper."
+
+"I sha'n't attempt it," Tavernake answered. "I shall pass it on to you."
+
+"This reminds me," the professor declared, "of the old days. I feel sure
+that this is going to be a thoroughly enjoyable evening. We shall think
+of it often, Mr. Tavernake, when you lie sleeping under the stars. Why,
+what a wonderful thing these taxicabs are! You see, we have arrived."
+
+They secured a small table in a corner at Imano's, and Tavernake found
+himself curiously moved as he watched Beatrice take off her worn and
+much mended gloves and look around uneasily at the other guests. Her
+clothes were indeed shabby, and there were hollows now in her cheeks.
+
+Again he felt that pain, a pain for which he could not account. Suddenly
+America seemed so far away, the loneliness of the great continent became
+an actual and appreciable thing. The professor was very much occupied
+ordering the supper. Tavernake leaned across the table.
+
+"Do you remember our first supper here, Beatrice?" he asked.
+
+She nodded, with an attempt at brightness which was a little pitiful.
+
+"Yes," she replied, "I remember it quite well. And now, please, Leonard,
+don't talk to me again until I have had a glass of wine. I am tired and
+worn out, that is all."
+
+Even Tavernake knew that she was struggling against the tears which
+already dimmed her eyes. He filled her glass himself. The professor set
+his own down empty with the satisfied smile of a connoisseur.
+
+"I think," he said, "that you will agree with me about this vintage.
+Beatrice, this is what will bring color into your cheeks. My little
+girl," he continued, turning to Tavernake, "will soon need a holiday. I
+am hoping presently to be able to arrange a short tour by myself, and if
+so, I shall send her to the seaside. Now I want you particularly to try
+the fish salad--the second dish there. Beatrice, let me help you."
+
+Presently the orchestra began to play. The warmth of the room, the wine
+and the food--Tavernake had a horrible idea once that she had eaten
+nothing that day--brought back some of the color to Beatrice's cheeks
+and a little of the light to her eyes. She began to talk something in
+the old fashion. She avoided, however, any mention of that other supper
+they had had together. As time went on, the professor, who had drunk the
+best part of two bottles of wine and was talking now to a friend, became
+almost negligible. Tavernake leaned across the table.
+
+"Beatrice," he whispered, "you are not looking well. I am afraid that
+life is getting harder with you."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"I am doing what I must," she answered. "Please don't sympathize with
+me. I am hysterical, I think, tonight. It will pass off."
+
+"But, Beatrice," he ventured, timidly, "could one do nothing for you?
+I don't like these performances, and between you and me, we know they
+won't stand your father's show much longer. It will certainly come to an
+end soon. Why don't you try and get back your place at the theatre? You
+could still earn enough to keep him."
+
+"Already I have tried," she replied, sorrowfully. "My place is filled
+up. You see," she added, with a forced laugh, "I have lost some of
+my looks, Leonard. I am thinner, too. Of course, I shall be all right
+presently, but it's rather against me at these west-end places."
+
+Again he felt that pain at his heart. He was sure now that he was
+beginning to understand!
+
+"Beatrice," he whispered, "give it up--marry me I will take care of
+him."
+
+The flush of color faded from her cheeks. She shivered a little and
+looked at him piteously.
+
+"Leonard," she pleaded, "you mustn't. I really am not very strong just
+now. We have finished with all that--it distresses me."
+
+"But I mean it," he begged. "Somehow, I have felt all sorts of things
+since we came in here. I think of that night, and I believe--I do
+believe that what came to me before was madness. It was not the same."
+
+She was trembling now.
+
+"Leonard," she implored, "if you care for me at all, be quiet. Father
+will turn round directly and I can't bear it. I shall be your very
+faithful friend; I shall think of you through the long days before we
+meet again, but don't--don't spoil this last evening."
+
+The professor turned round, his face mottled, his eyes moist, a great
+good-humor apparent in his tone.
+
+"Well, I must say," he declared, "that this has been a most delightful
+evening. I feel immensely better, and you, too, I hope, Beatrice?"
+
+She nodded, smiling.
+
+"I trust that when Mr. Tavernake returns," the professor continued,
+"he will give us the opportunity of entertaining him in much the same
+manner. It will give me very much pleasure, also Beatrice. And if, sir,"
+he proceeded, "during your stay in New York you will mention my name at
+the Goat's Club, or the Mosquito Club, you will, I think, find yourself
+received with a hospitality which will surprise you."
+
+Tavernake thanked him and paid the bill. They walked slowly down the
+room, and Tavernake was curiously reluctant to release the little hand
+which clasped his.
+
+"I have kept this to the last," Beatrice said, in a low tone. "Elizabeth
+is in London."
+
+He was curiously unmoved.
+
+"Yes?" he murmured.
+
+"I should like you--I think it would be well for you to go and see her,"
+she went on. "You know, Leonard, you were such a strange person in those
+days. You may imagine things. You may not realize where you are. I think
+that you ought to go and see her now, now that you have lived through
+some suffering, now that you understand things better. Will you?"
+
+"Yes, I will go," Tavernake promised.
+
+Beatrice glanced round towards where her father was standing.
+
+"I don't want him to know," she whispered. "I don't want either him
+or myself to be tempted to take any of her money. She is living at
+Claridge's Hotel. Go there and see her before you leave for your new
+life."
+
+He stood at the door and watched them go down the Strand, the professor,
+flamboyant, walking erect with flying coat-tails, and his big cigar held
+firmly between his teeth; Beatrice, a wan figure in her black clothes,
+clinging to his arm. Tavernake watched them until they disappeared,
+conscious of a curious excitement, a strange pain, a sense of
+revelation. When at last they were out of sight and he turned back for
+his coat and hat, his feet were suddenly leaden. The band was playing
+the last selection--it was the air which Beatrice had sung only that
+night at the east-end music-hall. With a sudden overpowering impulse
+he turned and strode down the Strand in the direction where they had
+vanished. It was too late. There was no sign of them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI. UNDERSTANDING COMES TOO LATE
+
+
+Tavernake's first impression of Elizabeth was that he had never, even
+in his wildest thoughts, done her justice. He had never imagined her so
+wonderfully, so alluringly beautiful. She had received him, after a very
+long delay, in her sitting-room at Claridge's Hotel--a large apartment
+furnished more like a drawing-room. She was standing, when he entered,
+almost in the center of the room, dressed in a long lace cloak and a hat
+with a drooping black feather. She looked at him, as the door opened, as
+though for a moment half puzzled. Then she laughed softly and held out
+her hands.
+
+"Why, of course I remember you!" she exclaimed. "And to think that when
+I had your card I couldn't imagine where I had heard the name before!
+You are my dear estate agent's clerk, who wouldn't take my money, and
+who was so wretchedly rude to me twelve months ago."
+
+Tavernake was quite cool. He found himself wondering whether this was
+a pose, or whether she had indeed forgotten. He decided that it was a
+pose.
+
+"I was also," he reminded her, "one night in your rooms at the Milan
+Court when your husband--"
+
+She stopped him with an imperative gesture.
+
+"Spare me, please," she begged. "Those were such terrible days--so dull,
+too! I remember that you were quite one of the brightest spots. You
+were absolutely different from every one I had ever met before, and you
+interested me immensely."
+
+She looked at him and slowly shook her head.
+
+"You look very nice," she said. "Your clothes fit you and you are most
+becomingly tanned, but you don't look half so awkward and so adorable."
+
+"I am sorry," he replied, shortly.
+
+"And you came to see me!" she went on. "That was really nice of you. You
+were quite fond of me, once, you know. Tell me, has it lasted?"
+
+"That is exactly what I came to find out," he answered deliberately. "So
+far, I am inclined to think that it has not lasted."
+
+She made a little wry face and drew his arm through hers.
+
+"Come and sit down and tell me why," she insisted. "Be honest, now. Is
+it because you think I am looking older?"
+
+"I have thought of you for many hours a day for months," Tavernake said,
+slowly, "and I never imagined you so beautiful as you seem now."
+
+She clapped her hands.
+
+"And you mean it, too!" she exclaimed. "There is just the same
+delightfully convincing note in your tone. I am sure that you mean it.
+Please go on adoring me, Mr. Tavernake. I have no one who interests me
+at all just now. There is an Italian Count who wants to marry me, but he
+is terribly poor; and a young Australian, who follows me everywhere, but
+I am not sure about him. There is an English boy, too, who is going to
+commit suicide if I don't say 'yes' to him this week. On the whole,
+I think I am rather sorry that people know I am a widow. Tell me, Mr.
+Tavernake, are you going to adore me, too?"
+
+"I don't think so," Tavernake answered. "I rather believe that I am
+cured."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders and laughed musically.
+
+"But you say that you still think I am beautiful," she went on, "and I
+am sure my clothes are perfect--they came straight from Paris. I hope
+you appreciate this lace," she added, drawing it through her fingers.
+"My figure is just as good, too, isn't it?"
+
+She stood up and turned slowly round. Then she sat down suddenly, taking
+his hand in hers.
+
+"Please don't say that you think I have grown less attractive," she
+begged.
+
+"As regards your personal attractions," Tavernake replied, "I imagine
+that they are at least as great as ever. If you want the truth, I think
+that the reason I do not adore you any longer is because I saw your
+sister last night."
+
+"Saw Beatrice!" she exclaimed. "Where?"
+
+"She was singing at a miserable east-end music-hall so that her father
+might find some sort of employment," Tavernake said. "The people only
+forbore to hiss her father's turn for her sake. She goes about the
+country with him. Heaven knows what they earn, but it must be little
+enough! Beatrice is shabby and thin and pale. She is devoting the best
+years of her life to what she imagines to be her duty."
+
+"And how does this affect me?" Elizabeth asked, coldly.
+
+"Only in this way," Tavernake answered. "You asked me how it was that I
+could find you as beautiful as ever and adore you no longer. The reason
+is because I know you to be wretchedly selfish. I believed in you
+before. Everything that you did seemed right. That was because I was a
+fool, because you had filled my brain with impossible fancies, because I
+saw you and everything that you did through a distorted mirror."
+
+"Have you come here to be rude?" she asked him.
+
+"Not in the least," he replied. "I came here to see whether I was
+cured."
+
+She began to laugh, very softly at first, but soon she threw herself
+back among the cushions and laid her hand caressingly upon his shoulder.
+
+"Oh, you are just the same!" she cried. "Just the same dear, truthful
+bundle of honesty and awkwardness and ignorance. So you are going to be
+victim of Beatrice's bow and spear, after all."
+
+"I have asked your sister to marry me," Tavernake admitted. "She will
+not."
+
+"She was very wise," Elizabeth declared, wiping the tears from her eyes.
+"As an experience you are delightful. As a husband you would be terribly
+impossible. Are you going to stay and take me out to dinner this
+evening? I'm sure you have a dress suit now."
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+"I am sorry," he said. "I have already an engagement."
+
+She looked at him curiously. Was it really true that he had become
+indifferent? She was not used to men who escaped.
+
+"Tell me," she asked, abruptly, "why did you come? I don't understand.
+You are here, and you pass your time being rude to me. I ask you to take
+me to dinner and you refuse. Do you know that scarcely a man in London
+would not have jumped at such a chance?"
+
+"Very likely," Tavernake answered. "I have no experience in such
+matters. I only know that I am going to do something else."
+
+"Something you want to do very much?" she whispered.
+
+"I am going down to a little music-hall in Whitechapel," Tavernake said,
+"and I am going to meet your sister and I am going to put her in a cab
+and take her to have some supper, and I am going to worry her until she
+promises to be my wife."
+
+"You are certainly a devoted admirer of the family," she laughed.
+"Perhaps you were in love with her all the time."
+
+"Perhaps I was," he admitted.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"I don't believe it," she said. "I think you were quite fond of me once.
+You have such absurdly old-fashioned ideas or I think that you would be
+fond of me now."
+
+Tavernake rose to his feet.
+
+"I am going," he declared. "This will be good-bye. To-morrow I am going
+to British Columbia."
+
+The laughter faded for a moment from her face. She was suddenly serious.
+
+"Don't go," she begged. "Listen. I know I am not good like Beatrice, but
+I do like you--I always did. I suppose it is that wonderful truthfulness
+of yours. You are a different type from the men one meets. I am rather
+a reckless person. It is such a comfort sometimes to meet any one like
+you. You seem such an anchorage. Stay and talk to me for a little time.
+Take me out to-night. You asked me to go with you once, you know, and I
+would not. To-night it is I who ask you."
+
+He shook his head slowly.
+
+"This is good-bye!" he said, firmly. "I suppose, after all, you were not
+unkind to me in those days, but you taught me a very bitter lesson. I
+came to you to-day in fear and trembling. I was afraid, perhaps, that
+the worst was not over, that there was more yet to come. Now I know that
+I am free."
+
+She stamped her foot.
+
+"You shall not go away like that," she declared.
+
+He smiled.
+
+"Do you think I do not understand?" he continued. "It is only because
+I am able to go, because the touch of your fingers, that look in your
+eyes, do not drive me half mad now, that you want me to stay. You would
+like to try your powers once more. I think not. I am satisfied that I am
+cured indeed, but perhaps it is safer to risk nothing."
+
+She pointed to the door.
+
+"Very well, then," she ordered, "you can go."
+
+He bowed, and already his fingers were on the handle. Suddenly she
+called to him.
+
+"Leonard! Leonard!"
+
+He turned round. She was coming towards him with her arms outstretched,
+her eyes were full of tears, there were sobs in her voice.
+
+"I am so lonely," she begged. "I have thought of you so much. Don't go
+away unkindly. Stay with me for this evening, at any rate. You can see
+Beatrice at any time. It is I who need you most now."
+
+He looked around at the splendid apartment; he looked at the woman whose
+fingers, glittering with jewels, rested upon his shoulders. Then he
+thought of Beatrice in her shabby black gown and wan little face, and
+very gently he removed her hands.
+
+"No," he said, "I do not think that you need me any more than I need
+you. This is a caprice of yours. You know it and I know it. Is it worth
+while to play with one another?"
+
+Her hands fell to her sides. She turned half away but she said
+nothing. Tavernake, with a sudden impulse which had in it nothing of
+passion--very little, indeed, of affection--lifted her fingers to his
+lips and passed out of the room. He descended the stairs, filled with
+a wonderful sense of elation, a buoyancy of spirit which he could not
+understand. As he walked blithely to his hotel, however, he began to
+realize how much he had dreaded this interview. He was a free man, after
+all. The spell was broken. He could think of her now as she deserved to
+be thought of, as a consummate woman of the world, selfish, heartless,
+conscienceless. He was well out of her toils. It was nothing to him if
+even he had known that at that moment she was lying upon the sofa to
+which she had staggered as he left the room, weeping bitterly.
+
+For over an hour Tavernake endured the smells and the bad atmosphere of
+that miserable little music-hall, watching eagerly each time the numbers
+were changed. Then at last, towards the end of the program, the manager
+appeared in front.
+
+"Ladies and gentlemen," he announced, "I regret very much to inform
+you that owing to the indisposition of the young lady, Miss Beatrice
+Franklin and her father are unable to appear to-night. I have pleasure
+in announcing an extra turn, namely the Sisters De Vere in their
+wonderful burlesque act."
+
+There was a murmur of disapprobation mingled with some cheering.
+Tavernake left his place and walked around to the back of the hall.
+Presently the manager came out to him.
+
+"I am sorry to trouble you, sir," Tavernake said, "but I heard your
+announcement just now from the front. Can you give me the address of
+Professor Franklin? I am a friend, and I should like to go and see
+them."
+
+The manager pointed to the stage-doorkeeper.
+
+"This man will give it you," he announced, shortly. "It's quite close. I
+shall look in myself after the show to know how the young lady is."
+
+Tavernake procured the address and set out in the taxicab which he had
+kept waiting. The driver listened to the direction doubtfully.
+
+"It's a poor sort of neighborhood, sir," he remarked.
+
+"We've got to go there," Tavernake told him.
+
+They reached it in a few minutes, a miserable street indeed. Tavernake
+knocked at the door of the house to which he was directed, with sinking
+heart. A man, collarless and half dressed, in carpet slippers, opened
+the door after a few moments' waiting.
+
+"Well, what is it?" he asked, gruffly.
+
+"Is Professor Franklin here?" Tavernake inquired.
+
+The man seemed as though he were about to slam the door, but thought
+better of it.
+
+"If you're a friend of the professor's, as he calls himself," he said,
+"and you've any money to shell out, why, you're welcome, but if you're
+only asking out of curiosity, let me tell you that he used to lodge here
+but he's gone, and if I'd had my way he'd have gone a week ago, him and
+his daughter, too."
+
+"I don't understand," Tavernake protested. "I thought the young lady was
+ill."
+
+"She may be ill or she may not," the man replied, sulkily. "All I know
+is that they couldn't pay their rent, couldn't pay their food bill,
+couldn't pay for the drinks the old man was always sending out for. So
+tonight I spoke up and they've gone."
+
+"At least you know where to!" Tavernake exclaimed.
+
+"I ain't no sort of an idea," the man declared. "Take my word for it
+straight, guvnor, I know no more about where they went to than the man
+in the moon, except that I'm well shut of them, and there's a matter of
+eighteen and sixpence, if you care to pay it."
+
+"I'll give you a sovereign," Tavernake promised, "if you will tell me
+where they are now."
+
+"What's the good of making silly conditions like that!" the man
+grumbled. "If I knew where they were, I'd earn the quid soon enough, but
+I don't, and that's the long and the short of it! And if you ain't going
+to pay the eighteen and six, well, I've answered all the questions I
+feel inclined to."
+
+"I'll make it two pounds," Tavernake promised. "I'm going to sail for
+America to-morrow morning early, and I must see them first."
+
+The man leaned forward.
+
+"Look here," he said, "if I knew where they was, a quid would be quite
+good enough for me, but I don't, and that's straight. If you want to
+look for them, I should try one of the doss houses. As likely there as
+anywhere."
+
+He slammed the door and Tavernake turned away. A sudden despair had
+seized him. He looked up and down the street, he looked away beyond and
+thought of the miles and miles of streets, the myriads of chimneys,
+the huge branches of the great city stretching far and wide. At eight
+o'clock the next morning, he must leave for Southampton. Was it too
+late, after all, that he had discovered the truth?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII. IN A VIRGIN COUNTRY
+
+
+One night Tavernake began to laugh. He had grown a long brown beard
+and the hair was over his ears. He was wearing a gray flannel shirt, a
+handkerchief tied around his neck, and a pair of worn riding breeches
+held up by a belt. He had kicked his boots off at the end of a long day,
+and was lying in the moonlight before a fire of pine logs, whose smoke
+went straight to the star-hung sky. No word had been spoken for the last
+hour. Tavernake's fit of mirth came with as little apparent reason as
+the puffs of wind which every now and then stole down from the mountain
+side and made faint music in the virgin forests.
+
+Pritchard turned over on his side and looked at him. Cigars had for many
+weeks been an unknown thing, and he was smoking a corn-cob pipe full of
+coarse tobacco.
+
+"Stumbled across a joke anywhere?" he asked.
+
+"I'm afraid no one but myself would see the humor of it," Tavernake
+answered. "I was thinking of those days in London; I was thinking of
+Beatrice's horror when she discovered that I was wearing ready-made
+clothes, and the amazement of Elizabeth when she found that I hadn't a
+dress suit. It's odd how cramped life gets back there."
+
+Pritchard nodded, pressing the tobacco down into the bowl of his pipe
+with his forefinger.
+
+"You're right, Tavernake," he agreed. "One loses one's sense of
+proportion. Men in the cities are all alike. They go about in disguise."
+
+"I should like," Tavernake said, inconsequently, "to have Mr. Dowling
+out here."
+
+"Amusing fellow?" Pritchard inquired.
+
+Tavernake shook his head, smiling.
+
+"Not in the least," he answered, "only he was a very small man. Out
+here it is difficult to keep small. Don't you feel it, Pritchard? These
+mountains make our hills at home seem like dust-heaps. The skies seem
+loftier. Look down into that valley. It's gigantic, immense."
+
+Pritchard yawned.
+
+"There's a little place in the Bowery," he began,--
+
+"Oh, I don't want to know any more about New York," Tavernake
+interrupted. "Lean back and close your eyes, smell the cinnamon trees,
+listen to that night bird calling every now and then across the ravine.
+There's blackness, if you like; there's depth. It's like a cloak of
+velvet to look into. But you can't see the bottom--no, not in the
+daytime. Listen!"
+
+Pritchard sat up. For a few moments neither spoke. A dozen yards or so
+off, a scattered group--the rest of the party--were playing cards around
+a fire. The green wood crackled, an occasional murmur of voices, a laugh
+or an exclamation, came to their ears, but for the rest, an immense, a
+wonderful silence, a silence which seemed to spread far away over that
+weird, half-invisible world! Tavernake listened reverently.
+
+"Isn't it marvelous!" he exclaimed. "We haven't seen a human being
+except our own party, for three days. There probably isn't one within
+hearing of us now. Very likely no living person has ever set foot in
+this precise spot."
+
+"Oh, it's big," Pritchard admitted, "it's big and it's restful, but it
+isn't satisfying. It does for you for a time because you started life
+wrong and you needed a reaction. But for me--ah, well!" he added, "I
+hear the call right across these thousands of miles of forests and
+valley and swamp. I hear the electric cars and the clash of the overhead
+railway, I see the flaring lights of Broadway and I hear the babel of
+tongues. I am going back to it, Tavernake. There's plenty to go on with.
+We've done more than carry out our program."
+
+"Back to New York!" Tavernake muttered, disconsolately.
+
+"So you're not ready yet?" Pritchard demanded.
+
+"Heavens, no!" Tavernake answered. "Who would be? What is there in New
+York to make up for this?"
+
+Pritchard was silent for a moment.
+
+"Well," he said, "one of us must be getting back near civilization.
+The syndicate will be expecting to hear from us. Besides, we've reports
+enough already. It's time something was decided about that oil country.
+We've done some grand work there, Tavernake."
+
+Tavernake nodded. He was lying on his side and his eyes were fixed
+wistfully southward, over the glimmering moonlit valley, over the great
+wilderness of virgin pine woods which hung from the mountains on the
+other side, away through the cleft in the hills to the plains beyond,
+chaotic, a world unseen.
+
+"If you like to go on for a bit," Pritchard suggested, slowly, "there's
+no reason why you shouldn't take McCleod and Richardson with you, and
+Pete and half the horses, and strike for the tin country on the other
+side of the Yolite Hills. So long as we are here, it's quite worth it,
+if you can stick it out."
+
+Tavernake drew a long breath.
+
+"I'd like to go," he admitted, simply. "I know McCleod is keen about
+prospecting further south. You see, most of our finds so far have been
+among the oil fields."
+
+"Settled," Pritchard declared. "To-morrow, then, we part. I'm for the
+valley, and I reckon I'll strike the railway to Chicago in a week. Gee
+whiz! New York will seem good!"
+
+"You think that the syndicate will be satisfied with what we have done
+so far?" Tavernake asked.
+
+His companion smiled.
+
+"If they aren't, they'll be fools. I reckon there's enough oil fields
+here for seven companies. There'll be a bit for us, too, Tavernake, I
+guess. Don't you want to come back to New York and spend it?"
+
+Tavernake laughed once more, but this time his laugh was not wholly
+natural.
+
+"Spend it!" he repeated. "What is there to spend it on? Uncomfortable
+clothes, false plays, drinks that are bad for you, food that's half
+poisoned, atmosphere that stifles. My God, Pritchard, is there anything
+in the world like this! Stretch out your arms, man. Lie on your back,
+look up at the stars, let that wind blow over your face. Listen."
+
+They listened, and again they heard nothing, yet again there seemed to
+be that peculiar quality about the silence which spoke of the vastness
+of space.
+
+Pritchard rose to his feet.
+
+"New York and the fleshpots for me," he declared. "Keep in touch, and
+good luck old man!"
+
+Next day at dawn they parted, and Tavernake, with his three companions,
+set his face towards an almost undiscovered tract of land. Their
+progress was slow, for they were all the time in a country rich with
+possibilities. For weeks they climbed, climbed till they reached the
+snows and the wind stung their faces and they shivered in their rugs at
+night. They came to a land of sparser vegetation, of fewer and wilder
+animals, where they heard the baying of wolves at night, and saw the
+eyes of strange animals glisten through the thicket as the flames of
+their evening fire shot up toward the sky. Then the long descent began,
+the long descent to the great plain. Now their faces were bronzed with
+a sun ever hotter, ever more powerful. No longer the snow flakes
+beat their cheeks. They came slowly down into a land which seemed to
+Tavernake like the biblical land of Canaan. Three times in ten days they
+had to halt and make a camp, while Tavernake prepared a geographical
+survey of likely-looking land.
+
+McCleod came up to Tavernake one day with a dull-looking lump in his
+hand, glistening in places.
+
+"Copper," he announced, shortly. "It's what I've been looking for all
+the time. No end to it. There's something bigger than oil here."
+
+They spent a month in the locality, and every day McCleod became more
+enthusiastic. After that it was hard work to keep him from heading
+homeward at once.
+
+"I tell you, sir," he explained to Tavernake, "there's millions there,
+millions between those four stakes of yours. What's the good of more
+prospecting? There's enough there in a square acre to pay the expenses
+of our expedition a thousand times over. Let's get back and make
+reports. We can strike the railway in ten days from here--perhaps
+sooner."
+
+"You go," Tavernake said. "Leave me Pete and two of the horses."
+
+The man stared at him in surprise.
+
+"What's the good of going on alone?" he asked. "You're not a mining
+expert or an oil man. You can't go prospecting by yourself."
+
+"I can't help it," Tavernake answered. "It's something in my blood, I
+suppose. I am going on. Think! You'll strike that railway and in a month
+you will be back in New York. Don't you imagine, when you're there, when
+you hear the clatter and turmoil of it, when you see the pale crowds
+chivvying one another about to pick the dollars from each other's
+pockets,--don't you believe you'll long for these solitudes, the big
+empty places, great possibilities, the silence? Think of it, man. What
+is there beyond those mountains, I wonder?"
+
+McCleod sighed.
+
+"You're right," he said. "One may never get so far out again. Our
+fortunes will keep, I suppose, and anyhow we ought to strike a telegraph
+station in about a fortnight. We'll go right ahead, then."
+
+In ten days they dropped ten thousand feet. They came to a land where
+their throats were always dry, where the trees and shrubs seemed like
+property affairs from a theatre, where they plunged their heads into
+every pool that came to wash their noses and mouths from the red dust
+that seemed to choke them up. They found tin and oil and more copper.
+Then, by slow stages, they passed on to a land of great grassy plains,
+of blue grass, miles and miles of it, and suddenly one day they came to
+the telegraph posts, rough pine trees unstripped of their bark, with
+a few sagging wires. Tavernake looked at them as Robinson Crusoe might
+have looked at Man Friday's footsteps. It was the first sign of human
+life which they had seen for months.
+
+"It's a real world we are in, after all!" he sighed. "Somehow or other,
+I thought--I thought we'd escaped."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII. BACK TO CIVILIZATION
+
+
+Pritchard, trim and neat, a New Yorker from the careful arrangement
+of his tie to the tips of his patent boots, gazed with something like
+amazement at the man whom he had come to meet at the Grand Central
+Station. Tavernake looked, indeed, like some splendid bushman whose life
+has been spent in the kingdom of the winds and the sun and the rain.
+He was inches broader round the chest, and carried himself with a new
+freedom. His face was bronzed right down to the neck. His beard was
+fullgrown, his clothes travel-stained and worn. He seemed like a breath
+of real life in the great New York depot, surrounded by streams of
+black-coated, pale-cheeked men.
+
+Pritchard laughed softly as he passed his arm through his friend's.
+
+"Come, my Briton," he said, "my primitive man, I have rooms for you in
+a hotel close here. A bath and a mint julep, then I'll take you to
+a tailor's. What about the big country? It's better than your salt
+marshes, eh? Better than your little fishing village? Better than
+building boats?"
+
+"You know it," Tavernake answered. "I feel as though I'd been drawing
+in life for month after month. Have I got to wear boots like
+yours--patent?"
+
+"Got to be done," Pritchard declared.
+
+"And the hat--oh, my Heavens!" Tavernake groaned. "I'll never become
+civilized again."
+
+"We'll see," Pritchard laughed. "Say, Tavernake, it was a great trip of
+ours. Everything's turning out marvelously. The oil and the copper are
+big, man--big, I tell you. I reckon your five thousand dollars will be
+well on the way to half a million. I'm pretty near there myself."
+
+It was not until later on, when he was alone, that Tavernake realized
+with how little interest he listened to his companion's talk of their
+success. It was so short a time ago since the building up of a fortune
+had been the one aim upon which every nerve of his body was centered.
+Curiously enough, now he seemed to take it as a matter of course.
+
+"On second thoughts, I'll send a tailor round to the hotel," Pritchard
+declared. "I've rooms myself next yours. We can go out and buy boots and
+the other things afterwards."
+
+By nightfall, Tavernake's wardrobe was complete. Even Pritchard regarded
+him with a certain surprise. He seemed, somehow, to have gained a new
+dignity.
+
+"Say, but you look great!" he exclaimed. "They won't believe it at the
+meeting to-morrow that you are the man who crossed the Yolite Mountains
+and swam the Peraneek River. That's a wonderful country you were in,
+Tavernake, after you left the tracks."
+
+They were in Broadway, with the roar of the city in their ears, and
+Tavernake, lifting his face starwards, suddenly seemed to feel the
+silence once more, the perfume of the pine woods, the scent of nature
+herself, freed through all these generations of any presence of man.
+
+"I'll never keep away from it," he said, softly. "I'll have to go back."
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"When your report's in shape and the dollars are being scooped in,
+they'll send you back fast enough--that is, if you still want to go," he
+remarked. "I tell you, Leonard Tavernake, our city men here are out for
+the dollars. Over on your side, a man makes a million or so and he's
+had enough. One fortune here only seems to whet the appetite of a New
+Yorker. By the way," he added, after a moment's hesitation, "does it
+interest you to know that an old friend of yours is in New York?"
+
+Tavernake's head went round swiftly.
+
+"Who is it?" he asked.
+
+"Mrs. Wenham Gardner."
+
+Tavernake set his teeth.
+
+"No," he said, slowly, "I don't know that that interests me."
+
+"Glad of it," Pritchard went on. "I can tell you I don't think things
+have been going extra well with the lady. She's spent most of what she
+got from the Gardner family, and she doesn't seem to have had the best
+of luck with it, either. I came across her by accident. She is staying
+at a flashy hotel, but it's in the wrong quarter--second-rate--quite
+second-rate."
+
+"I wonder whether we shall see anything of her," Tavernake remarked.
+
+"Do you want to?" Pritchard asked. "She'll probably be at Martin's for
+lunch, at the Plaza for tea, and Rector's for supper. She's not exactly
+the lady to remain hidden, you know."
+
+"We'll avoid those places, then, if you are taking me around," Tavernake
+said.
+
+"You're cured, are you?" Pritchard inquired.
+
+"Yes, I am cured," Tavernake answered, "cured of that and a great many
+other things, thanks to you. You found me the right tonic."
+
+"Tonic," Pritchard repeated, meditatively. "That reminds me. This way
+for the best cocktail in New York."...
+
+The night was not to pass, however, without its own especial thrill for
+Tavernake. The two men dined together at Delmonico's and went afterwards
+to a roof garden, a new form of entertainment for Tavernake, and one
+which interested him vastly. They secured one of the outside tables
+near the parapets, and below them New York stretched, a flaming
+phantasmagoria of lights and crude buildings. Down the broad avenues
+with their towering blocks, their street cars striking fire all the time
+like toys below, the people streamed like insects away to the Hudson,
+where the great ferry boats, ablaze with lights, went screaming across
+the dark waters. Tavernake leaned over and forgot. There was so much
+that was amazing in this marvelous city for a man who had only just
+begun to find himself.
+
+The orchestra, stationed within a few yards of him, commenced to play
+a popular waltz, and Pritchard to talk. Tavernake turned his fascinated
+eyes from the prospect below.
+
+"My young friend," Pritchard said, "you are up against it to-night. Take
+a drink of your wine and then brace yourself."
+
+Tavernake did as he was told.
+
+"What is this danger?" he asked. "What's wrong, anyway?"
+
+Pritchard had no need to answer. As Tavernake set his glass down, his
+eyes fell upon the little party who had just taken the table almost next
+to theirs. There were Walter Crease, Major Post, two men whom he had
+never seen before in his life--heavy of cheek, both, dull-eyed, but
+dressed with a rigid observance of the fashion of the city, in short
+dinner coats and black ties. And between them was Elizabeth. Tavernake
+gripped the sides of his chair and looked. Yes, she had altered. Her
+eyebrows were a trifle made up, there was a tinge in her hair which he
+did not recognize, a touch of color in her cheeks which he doubted. Yet
+her figure and her wonderful presence remained, that art of wearing
+her clothes as no other woman could. She was easily the most
+noticeable-looking of her sex among all the people there. Tavernake
+heard the sound of her voice and once more the thrill came and passed.
+She was the same Elizabeth. Thank God, he thought, that he was not the
+same Tavernake!
+
+"Do you wish to go?" Pritchard asked.
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+"Not I!" he answered. "This place is far too fascinating. Can't we have
+some more wine? This is my treat. And, Pritchard, why do you look at
+me like that? You are not supposing for a moment that I am capable of
+making an ass of myself again?"
+
+Pritchard smiled in a relieved fashion.
+
+"My young friend," he said, "I have lived in the world so long and seen
+so many strange things, especially between men and women, that I am
+never surprised at anything. I thought you'd shed your follies as your
+grip upon life had tightened, but one is never sure."
+
+Tavernake sighed.
+
+"Oh, I have shed the worst of my follies!" he answered. "I only wish--"
+
+He never finished his sentence. Elizabeth had suddenly seen him. For a
+moment she leaned forward as though to assure herself that she was not
+mistaken. Then she half sprang to her feet and sat down again. Her lips
+were parted--she was once more bewilderingly beautiful.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she cried, "come and speak to me at once."
+
+Tavernake rose without hesitation, and walked firmly across the few
+yards which separated them. She held out both her hands.
+
+"This is wonderful!" she exclaimed. "You in New York! And I have
+wondered so often what became of you."
+
+Tavernake smiled.
+
+"It is my first night here," he said. "For two years I have been
+prospecting in the far west."
+
+"Then I saw your name in the papers," she declared. "It was for the
+Manhattan Syndicate, wasn't it?"
+
+Tavernake nodded, and one of the men of the party leaned forward with
+interest.
+
+"You're going to make millions and millions," she assured him. "You
+always knew you would, didn't you?"
+
+"I am afraid that I was almost too confident," he answered. "But
+certainly we have been quite fortunate."
+
+One of Elizabeth's companions intervened--he was the one who had pricked
+up his ears at the mention of the Manhattan Syndicate.
+
+"Say, Elizabeth," he remarked, "I'd like to meet your friend."
+
+Elizabeth, with a frown, performed the introduction.
+
+"Mr. Anthony Cruxhall--Mr. Tavernake!"
+
+Mr. Cruxhall held out a fat white hand, on the little finger of which
+glittered a big diamond ring.
+
+"Say, are you the Mr. Tavernake that was surveyor to the prospecting
+party sent out by the Manhattan Syndicate?" he inquired.
+
+"I was," Tavernake admitted, briefly. "I still am, I hope."
+
+"Then you're just the man I was hoping to meet," Mr. Cruxhall declared.
+"Won't you sit down with us right here? I'd like to talk some about that
+trip. I'm interested in the Syndicate."
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+"I've had enough of work for a time," he said. "Besides, I couldn't talk
+about it till after my report to the meeting to-morrow."
+
+"Just a few words," Mr. Cruxhall persisted. "We'll have a bottle of
+champagne, eh?"
+
+"You will excuse me, I am sure," Tavernake replied, "when I tell you
+that it would not be correct on my part to discuss my trip until after I
+have handed in my report to the company. I am very glad to have seen you
+again, Mrs. Gardner."
+
+"But you are not going!" she exclaimed, in dismay.
+
+"I have left Mr. Pritchard alone," Tavernake answered.
+
+Elizabeth smiled, and waved her hand to the solitary figure.
+
+"Our friend Mr. Pritchard again," she remarked. "Well, it is really a
+curious meeting, isn't it? I wonder,"--she lifted her head to his and
+her eyes called him closer to hers--"have you forgotten everything?"
+
+He pointed over the roofs of the houses. His back was to the river and
+he pointed westward.
+
+"I have been in a country where one forgets," he answered. "I think
+that I have thrown the knapsack of my follies away. I think that it
+is buried. There are some things which I do not forget, but they are
+scarcely to be spoken of."
+
+"You are a strange young man," she said. "Was I wrong, or were you not
+once in love with me?"
+
+"I was terribly in love with you," Tavernake confessed.
+
+"Yet you tore up my cheque and flung yourself away when you found out
+that my standard of morals was not quite what you had expected," she
+murmured. "Haven't you got over that quixoticism a little, Leonard?"
+
+He drew a deep sigh.
+
+"I am thankful to say," he declared, earnestly, "that I have not got
+over it, that, if anything, my prejudices are stronger than ever."
+
+She sat for a moment quite still, and her face had become hard and
+expressionless. She was looking past him, past the line of lights, out
+into the blue darkness.
+
+"Somehow," she said, softly, "I always prayed that you might remember.
+You were the one true thing I had ever met, you were in earnest. It is
+past, then?"
+
+"It is past," Tavernake answered, bravely.
+
+The music of a Hungarian waltz came floating down to them. She half
+closed her eyes. Her head moved slowly with the melody. Tavernake looked
+away.
+
+"Will you come and see me just once?" she asked, suddenly. "I am staying
+at the Delvedere, in Forty-Second Street."
+
+"Thank you very much," Tavernake replied. "I do not know how long I
+shall be in New York. If I am here for a few days, I shall take my
+chance at finding you at home."
+
+He bowed, and returned to Pritchard, who welcomed him with a quiet
+smile.
+
+"You're wise, Tavernake," he said, softly. "I could hear no words, but I
+know that you have been wise. Between you and me," he added, in a lower
+tone, "she is going downhill. She is in with the wrong lot here. She
+can't seem to keep away from them. They are on the very fringe
+of Bohemia, a great deal nearer the arm of the law than makes for
+respectable society. The man to whom I saw you introduced is a
+millionaire one day and a thief the next. They're none of them any good.
+Did you notice, too, that she is wearing sham jewelry? That always looks
+bad."
+
+"No, I didn't notice," Tavernake answered.
+
+He was silent for a moment. Then he leaned a little forward.
+
+"I wonder," he asked, "do you know anything about her sister?"
+
+Pritchard finished his wine and knocked the ash from his cigar.
+
+"Not much," he replied. "I believe she had a very hard time. She took
+on the father, you know, the old professor, and did her best to keep him
+straight. He died about a year ago and Miss Beatrice tried to get back
+into the theatre, but she'd missed her chance. Theatrical business has
+been shocking in London. I heard she'd come out here. Wherever she is,
+she keeps right away from that sort of set," he wound up, moving his
+head towards Elizabeth's friends.
+
+"I wonder if she is in New York," Tavernake said, with a strange thrill
+at his heart.
+
+Pritchard made no reply. His eyes were fixed upon the little group at
+the next table. Elizabeth was leaning back in her chair. She seemed
+to have abandoned the conversation. Her eyes were always seeking
+Tavernake's. Pritchard rose to his feet abruptly.
+
+"It's time we were in bed," he declared. "Remember the meeting
+to-morrow."
+
+Tavernake rose to his feet. As they passed the next table, Elizabeth
+leaned over to him. Her eyes pleaded with his almost passionately.
+
+"Dear Leonard," she whispered, "you must--you must come and see me.
+I shall stay in between four and six every evening this week. The
+Delvedere, remember."
+
+"Thank you very much," Tavernake answered. "I shall not forget."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX. FOR ALWAYS
+
+
+Once again it seemed to Beatrice that history was repeating itself.
+The dingy, oblong dining-room, with its mosquito netting, stained
+tablecloth, and hard cane chairs, expanded until she fancied herself
+in the drawing-room of Blenheim House. Between the landladies there
+was little enough to choose. Mrs. Raithby Lawrence, notwithstanding her
+caustic tongue and suspicious nature, had at least made some pretense
+at gentility. The woman who faced her now--hard-featured, with narrow,
+suspicious eyes and a mass of florid hair--was unmistakably and brutally
+vulgar.
+
+"What's the good of your keeping on saying you hope to get an engagement
+next week?" she demanded, with a sneer. "Who's likely to engage you?
+Why, you've lost your color and your looks and your weight since you
+came to stay here. They don't want such as you in the chorus. And for
+the rest, you're too high and mighty, that's my opinion of you. Take
+what you can get, and how you can get it, and be thankful,--that's my
+motto. Day after day you tramp about the streets with your head in the
+air, and won't take this and won't take that, and meanwhile my bill gets
+bigger and bigger. Now where have you been to this morning, I should
+like to know?"
+
+Beatrice, who was faint and tired, shaking in every limb, tried to pass
+out of the room, but her questioner barred the way.
+
+"I have been up town," she answered, nervously.
+
+"Hear of anything?"
+
+Beatrice shook her head.
+
+"Not yet. Please let me go upstairs and lie down. I am tired and I need
+to rest."
+
+"And I need my money," Mrs. Selina P. Watkins declared, without quitting
+her position, "and it's no good your going up to your room because the
+door's locked."
+
+"What do you mean?" Beatrice faltered.
+
+"I mean that I've done with you," the lodging-house keeper announced.
+"Your room's locked up and the key's in my pocket, and the sooner you
+get out of this, the better I shall be pleased."
+
+"But my box--my clothes," Beatrice cried.
+
+"I'll keep 'em a week for you," the woman answered. "Bring me the
+money by then and you shall have them. If I don't hear anything of you,
+they'll go to the auction mart."
+
+Something of her old spirit fired the girl for a moment. She was angry,
+and she forgot that her knees were trembling with fatigue, that she was
+weak and aching with hunger.
+
+"How dare you talk like that!" she exclaimed. "You shall have your money
+shortly, but I must have my clothes. I cannot go anywhere without them."
+
+The woman laughed harshly.
+
+"Look here, my young lady," she said, "you'll see your box again when
+I see the color of your money, and not before. And now out you go,
+please,--out you go! If you're going to make any trouble, Solly will
+have to show you the way down the steps."
+
+The woman had opened the door, and a colored servant, half dressed, with
+a broom in her hand, came slouching down the passage. Beatrice turned
+and fled out of the greasy, noisome atmosphere, down the wooden, uneven
+steps, out into the ugly street. She turned toward the nearest elevated
+as though by instinct, but when she came to the bottom of the stairs she
+stopped short with a little groan. She knew very well that she had not
+a nickel to pay the fare. Her pockets were empty. All day she had eaten
+nothing, and her last coin had gone for the car which had brought her
+back from Broadway. And here she was on the other side of New York, in
+the region of low-class lodging houses, with the Bowery between her and
+Broadway. She had neither the strength nor the courage to walk. With
+a half-stifled sob she took off her one remaining ornament, a cheap
+enameled brooch, and entered a pawnbroker's shop close to where she had
+been standing.
+
+"Will you give me something on this, please?" she asked, desperately.
+
+A man who seemed to be sorting a pile of ready-made coats, paused in
+his task for a moment, took the ornament into his hand, and threw it
+contemptuously upon the counter.
+
+"Not worth anything," he answered.
+
+"But it must be worth something," Beatrice protested. "I only want a
+very little."
+
+Something in her voice compelled the man's attention. He looked at her
+white face.
+
+"What's the trouble?" he inquired.
+
+"I must get up to Fifth Avenue somehow," she declared. "I can't walk and
+I haven't a nickel."
+
+He pushed the brooch back to her and threw a dime upon the counter.
+
+"Well," he said, "you don't look fit to walk, and that's a fact, but the
+brooch isn't worth entering up. There's a dime for you. Now git, please,
+I'm busy."
+
+Beatrice clutched the coin and, almost forgetting to thank him, found
+her way up the iron stairs on to the platform of the elevated. Soon she
+was seated in the train, rattling and shaking on its way through the
+slums into the heart of the wonderful city. There was only one thing
+left for her to try, a thing which she had had in her mind for days. Yet
+she found herself, even now she was committed to it, thinking of
+what lay before her with something like black horror. It was her last
+resource, indeed. Strong though she was, she knew by many small
+signs that her strength was almost at an end. The days and weeks of
+disappointments, the long fruitless trudges from office to office, the
+heart-sickness of constant refusals, poor food, the long fasts, had all
+told their tale. She was attractive enough still. Her pallor seemed to
+have given her a wonderful delicacy. The curve of her lips and the soft
+light in her gray eyes, were still as potent as ever. When she thought,
+though, what a poor asset her appearance had been, the color flamed in
+her cheeks.
+
+In Broadway she made her way to a very magnificent block of buildings,
+and passing inside took the lift to the seventh floor. Here she got out
+and knocked timidly at a glass-paneled door, on which was inscribed the
+name of Mr. Anthony Cruxhall. A very superior young man bade her enter
+and inquired her business.
+
+"I wish to see Mr. Cruxhall for a moment, privately," she said. "I
+shall not detain him for more than a minute. My name is Franklin--Miss
+Beatrice Franklin."
+
+The young man's lips seemed about to shape themselves into a whistle,
+but something in the girl's face made him change his mind.
+
+"I guess the boss is in," he admitted. "He's just got back from a big
+meeting, but I am not sure about his seeing any one to-day. However,
+I'll tell him that you're here."
+
+He disappeared into an inner room. Presently he came out again and held
+the door open.
+
+"Will you walk right in, Miss Franklin?" he invited.
+
+Beatrice went in bravely enough, but her knees began to tremble when
+she found herself in the presence of the man she had come to visit. Mr.
+Anthony Cruxhall was not a pleasant-looking person. His cheeks were fat
+and puffy, he wore a diamond ring upon the finger of his too-white hand,
+and a diamond pin in his somewhat flashily arranged necktie. He was
+smoking a black cigar, which he omitted to remove from between his teeth
+as he welcomed his visitor.
+
+"So you've come to see me at last, little Miss Beatrice!" he said, with
+a particularly unpleasant smile. "Come and sit down here by the side of
+me. That's right, eh? Now what can I do for you?"
+
+Beatrice was trembling all over. The man's eyes were hateful, his smile
+was hideous.
+
+"I have not a cent in the world, Mr. Cruxhall," she faltered, "I cannot
+get an engagement, I have been turned out of my rooms, and I am hungry.
+My father always told me that you would be a friend if at any time it
+happened that I needed help. I am very sorry to have to come and beg,
+yet that is what I am doing. Will you lend or give me ten or twenty
+dollars, so that I can go on for a little longer? Or will you help me to
+get a place among some of your theatrical people?"
+
+Mr. Cruxhall puffed steadily at his cigar for a moment, and leaning back
+in his chair thrust his hand into his trousers' pocket.
+
+"So bad as that, is it?" he remarked. "So bad as that, eh?"
+
+"It is very bad indeed," she answered, looking at him quietly, "or you
+know that I should not have come to you."
+
+Mr. Cruxhall smiled.
+
+"I remember the last time we talked together," he said, "we didn't
+get on very well. Too high and mighty in those days, weren't you,
+Miss Beatrice? Wouldn't have anything to say to a bad lot like Anthony
+Cruxhall. You're having to come to it, eh?"
+
+She began to tremble again, but she held herself in.
+
+"I must live," she murmured. "Give me a little money and let me go
+away."
+
+He laughed.
+
+"Oh, I'll do better than that for you," he answered, thrusting his hand
+into his waistcoat pocket and drawing out a pile of dollar bills. "Let's
+look at you. Gee whiz! Yes, you're shabby, aren't you? Take this," he
+went on, slamming some notes down before her. "Go and get yourself a
+new frock and a hat fit to wear, and meet me at the Madison Square roof
+garden at eight o'clock. We'll have some dinner and I guess we can fix
+matters up."
+
+Then he smiled at her again, and Beatrice, whose hand was already upon
+the bills, suddenly felt her knees shake. A great black horror was upon
+her. She turned and fled out of the room, past the astonished clerk,
+into the lift, and was downstairs on the main floor before she
+remembered where she was, what she had done. The clerk, after gazing at
+her retreating form, hurried into the inner office.
+
+"Young woman hasn't bolted with anything, eh?" he asked.
+
+Mr. Cruxhall smiled wickedly.
+
+"Why, no," he replied, "I guess she'll come back!"
+
+Tavernake left the meeting on that same afternoon with his future
+practically assured for life. He had been appointed surveyor to the
+company at a salary of ten thousand dollars a year, and the mine in
+which his savings were invested was likely to return him his small
+capital a hundredfold. Very kind things had been said of him and to him.
+
+Pritchard and he had left the place together. When they had reached the
+street, they paused for a moment.
+
+"I am going to make a call near here," Pritchard said. "Don't forget
+that we are dining together, unless you find something better to do,
+and in the meantime"--he took a card from his pocket and handed it to
+Tavernake--"I don't know whether I am a fool or not to give you this,"
+he added. "However, there it is. Do as you choose about it."
+
+He walked away a little abruptly. Tavernake glanced at the address upon
+the card: 1134, East Third Street. For a moment he was puzzled. Then the
+light broke in upon him suddenly. His heart gave a leap. He turned back
+into the place to ask for some directions and once more stopped short.
+Down the stone corridor, like one who flies from some hideous fate, came
+a slim black figure, with white face and set, horrified stare. Tavernake
+held out his hands and she came to him with a great wondering sob.
+
+"Leonard!" she cried. "Leonard!"
+
+"There's no doubt about me," he answered, quickly. "Am I such a very
+terrifying object?"
+
+She stood quite still and struggled hard. By and by the giddiness
+passed.
+
+"Leonard," she murmured, "I am ill."
+
+Then she began to smile.
+
+"It is too absurd," she faltered, "but you've got to do it all over
+again."'
+
+"What do you mean?" he asked.
+
+"Get me something to eat at once," she begged. "I am starving. Somewhere
+where it's cool. Leonard, how wonderful! I never even knew that you were
+in New York."
+
+He called a carriage and took her off to a roof garden. There, as it was
+early, they got a seat near the parapet. Tavernake talked clumsily about
+himself most of the time. There was a lump in his throat. He felt all
+the while that tragedy was very near. By degrees, though, as she ate and
+drank, the color came back to her cheeks, the fear of a breakdown seemed
+to pass away. She became even cheerful.
+
+"We are really the most amazing people, Leonard," she declared. "You
+stumbled into my life once before when I was on the point of being
+turned out of my rooms. You've come into it again and you find me once
+more homeless. Don't spend too much money upon our dinner, for I warn
+you that I am going to borrow from you."
+
+He laughed.
+
+"That's good news," he remarked, "but I'm not sure that I'm going to
+lend anything."
+
+He leaned across the table. Their dinner had taken long in preparing and
+the dusk was falling now. Over them were the stars, the band was playing
+soft music, the hubbub of the streets lay far below. Almost they were in
+a little world by themselves.
+
+"Dear Beatrice," he said, "three times I asked you to marry me and you
+would not, and I asked you because I was a selfish brute, and because
+I knew that it was good for me and that it would save me from things of
+which I was afraid. And now I am asking you the same thing again, but I
+have a bigger reason, Beatrice. I have been alone most of the last two
+years, I have lived the sort of life which brings a man face to face
+with the truth, helps him to know himself and others, and I have found
+out something."
+
+"Yes?" she faltered. "Tell me, Leonard."
+
+"I found out that it was you I cared for always," he continued, "and
+that is why I am asking you to marry me now, Beatrice, only this time I
+ask you because I love you, and because no one else in the world could
+ever take your place or be anything at all to me."
+
+"Leonard!" she murmured.
+
+"You are not sorry that I have said this?" he begged.
+
+She opened her eyes again.
+
+"I always prayed that I might hear you say it," she answered, "but it
+seems--oh, it seems so one-sided! Here am I starving and penniless,
+and you--you, I suppose, are well on the way towards the success you
+worshiped."
+
+"I am well on the way," he said, earnestly, "towards something greater,
+Beatrice. I am well on the way towards understanding what success
+really is, what things count and what don't. I have even found out," he
+whispered, "the thing which counts for more than anything else in the
+world, and now that I have found it out, I shall never let it go again."
+
+He pressed her hand and she looked across the table at him with swimming
+eyes. The waiter, who had been approaching, turned discreetly away. The
+band started to play a fresh tune. From down in the streets came the
+clanging of the cars. A curious, cosmopolitan murmur of sounds, but
+between those two there was the wonderful silence.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Tempting of Tavernake, by E. Phillips Oppenheim
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE TEMPTING OF TAVERNAKE ***
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Tempting of Tavernake, by E. Phillips Oppenheim
+(#12 in our series by E. Phillips Oppenheim)
+
+Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the
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+Title: The Tempting of Tavernake
+
+Author: E. Phillips Oppenheim
+
+Release Date: February, 2004  [EBook #5091]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on April 24, 2002]
+
+Edition: 10
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+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE TEMPTING OF TAVERNAKE ***
+
+
+
+
+This eBook was produced by Polly Stratton.
+
+
+
+THE TEMPTING OF TAVERNAKE BY E. PHILLIPS OPPENHEIM
+
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK ONE
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+
+DESPAIR AND INTEREST
+
+They stood upon the roof of a London boarding-house in the
+neighborhood of Russell Square--one of those grim shelters, the
+refuge of Transatlantic curiosity and British penury.  The girl
+--she represented the former race was leaning against the frail
+palisading, with gloomy expression and eyes set as though in
+fixed contemplation of the uninspiring panorama.  The young man
+--unmistakably, uncompromisingly English--stood with his back to
+the chimney a few feet away, watching his companion.  The silence
+between them was as yet unbroken, had lasted, indeed, since she
+had stolen away from the shabby drawingroom below, where a florid
+lady with a raucous voice had been shouting a music-hall ditty.
+Close upon her heels, but without speech of any sort, he had
+followed.  They were almost strangers, except for the occasional
+word or two of greeting which the etiquette of the establishment
+demanded.  Yet she had accepted his espionage without any protest
+of word or look.  He had followed her with a very definite
+object.  Had she surmised it, he wondered?   She had not turned
+her head or vouchsafed even a single question or remark to him
+since he had pushed his way through the trap-door almost at her
+heels and stepped out on to the leads.  Yet it seemed to him that
+she must guess.
+
+Below them, what seemed to be the phantasm of a painted city, a
+wilderness of housetops, of smoke-wreathed spires and chimneys,
+stretched away to a murky, blood-red horizon.  Even as they stood
+there, a deeper color stained the sky, an angry sun began to sink
+into the piled up masses of thick, vaporous clouds.  The girl
+watched with an air of sullen yet absorbed interest.  Her
+companion's eyes were still fixed wholly and critically upon her.
+Who was she, he wondered?   Why had she left her own country to
+come to a city where she seemed to have no friends, no manner of
+interest?   In that caravansary of the world's stricken ones she
+had been an almost unnoticed figure, silent, indisposed for
+conversation, not in any obvious manner attractive.  Her clothes,
+notwithstanding their air of having come from a first-class
+dressmaker, were shabby and out of fashion, their extreme
+neatness in itself pathetic.  She was thin, yet not without a
+certain buoyant lightness of movement always at variance with her
+tired eyes, her ceaseless air of dejection.  And withal she was a
+rebel.  It was written in her attitude, it was evident in her
+lowering, militant expression, the smouldering fire in her eyes
+proclaimed it.  Her long, rather narrow face was gripped between
+her hands; her elbows rested upon the brick parapet.  She gazed
+at that world of blood-red mists, of unshapely, grotesque
+buildings, of strange, tawdry colors; she listened to the medley
+of sounds--crude, shrill, insistent, something like the groaning
+of a world stripped naked--and she had all the time the air of
+one who hates the thing she looks upon.
+
+Tavernake, whose curiosity concerning his companion remained
+unappeased, decided that the moment for speech had arrived.  He
+took a step forward upon the soft, pulpy leads.  Even then he
+hesitated before he finally committed himself.  About his
+appearance little was remarkable save the general air of
+determination which gave character to his undistinguished
+features.  He was something above the medium height, broad-set,
+and with rather more thick black hair than he knew how to arrange
+advantageously.  He wore a shirt which was somewhat frayed, and
+an indifferent tie; his boots were heavy and clumsy; he wore also
+a suit of ready-made clothes with the air of one who knew that
+they were ready-made and was satisfied with them.  People of a
+nervous or sensitive disposition would, without doubt, have found
+him irritating but for a certain nameless gift--an almost
+Napoleonic concentration upon the things of the passing moment,
+which was in itself impressive and which somehow disarmed
+criticism.
+
+"About that bracelet!" he said at last.
+
+She moved her head and looked at him.  A young man of less
+assurance would have turned and fled.  Not so Tavernake.  Once
+sure of his ground he was immovable.  There was murder in her
+eyes but he was not even disturbed.
+
+"I saw you take it from the little table by the piano, you know,"
+he continued.  "It was rather a rash thing to do.  Mrs.
+Fitzgerald was looking for it before I reached the stairs.  I
+expect she has called the police in by now."
+
+Slowly her hand stole into the depths of her pocket and emerged.
+Something flashed for a moment high over her head.  The young man
+caught her wrist just in time, caught it in a veritable grip of
+iron.  Then, indeed, the evil fires flashed from her eyes, her
+teeth gleamed white, her bosom rose and fell in a storm of angry,
+unuttered sobs.  She was dry-eyed and still speechless, but for
+all that she was a tigress.  A strangely-cut silhouette they
+formed there upon the housetops, with a background of empty sky,
+their feet sinking in the warm leads.
+
+"I think I had better take it," he said.  "Let go."
+
+Her fingers yielded the bracelet--a tawdry, ill-designed affair
+of rubies and diamonds.  He looked at it disapprovingly.
+
+"That's an ugly thing to go to prison for," he remarked, slipping
+it into his pocket.  "It was a stupid thing to do, anyhow, you
+know.  You couldn't have got away with it--unless," he added,
+looking over the parapet as though struck with a sudden idea,
+"unless you had a confederate below."
+
+He heard the rush of her skirts and he was only just in time.
+Nothing, in fact, but a considerable amount of presence of mind
+and the full exercise of a strength which was continually
+providing surprises for his acquaintances, was sufficient to save
+her.  Their struggles upon the very edge of the roof dislodged a
+brick from the palisading, which went hurtling down into the
+street.  They both paused to watch it, his arms still gripping
+her and one foot pressed against an iron rod.  It was immediately
+after they had seen it pitch harmlessly into the road that a new
+sensation came to this phlegmatic young man.  For the first time
+in his life, he realized that it was possible to feel a certain
+pleasurable emotion in the close grasp of a being of the opposite
+sex.  Consequently, although she had now ceased to struggle, he
+kept his arms locked around her, looking into her face with an
+interest intense enough, but more analytical than emotional, as
+though seeking to discover the meaning of this curious throbbing
+of his pulses.  She herself, as though exhausted, remained quite
+passive, shivering a little in his grasp and breathing like a
+hunted animal whose last hour has come.  Their eyes met; then she
+tore herself away.
+
+"You are a hateful person," she said deliberately, "a hateful,
+interfering person.  I detest you."
+
+"I think that we will go down now," he replied.
+
+He raised the trap-door and glanced at her significantly.  She
+held her skirts closely together and passed through it without
+looking at him.  She stepped lightly down the ladder and without
+hesitation descended also a flight of uncarpeted attic stairs.
+Here, however, upon the landing, she awaited him with obvious
+reluctance.
+
+"Are you going to send for the police?" she asked without looking
+at him.
+
+"No," he answered.
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"If I had meant to give you away I should have told Mrs.
+Fitzgerald at once that I had seen you take her bracelet, instead
+of following you out on to the roof."
+
+"Do you mind telling me what you do propose to do, then?" she
+continued still without looking at him, still without the
+slightest note of appeal in her tone.
+
+He withdrew the bracelet from his pocket and balanced it upon his
+finger.
+
+"I am going to say that I took it for a joke," he declared.
+
+She hesitated.
+
+"Mrs. Fitzgerald's sense of humor is not elastic," she warned
+him.
+
+"She will be very angry, of course," he assented, "but she will
+not believe that I meant to steal it."
+
+The girl moved slowly a few steps away.
+
+"I suppose that I ought to thank you," she said, still with
+averted face and sullen manner.  "You have really been very
+decent.  I am much obliged."
+
+"Are you not coming down?" he asked.
+
+"Not at present," she answered.  "I am going to my room."
+
+He looked around the landing on which they stood, at the
+miserable, uncarpeted floor, the ill-painted doors on which the
+long-forgotten varnish stood out in blisters, the jumble of
+dilapidated hot-water cans, a mop, and a medley of brooms and
+rags all thrown down together in a corner.
+
+"But these are the servants' quarters, surely," he remarked.
+
+"They are good enough for me; my room is here," she told him,
+turning the handle of one of the doors and disappearing.  The
+prompt turning of the key sounded, he thought, a little
+ungracious.
+
+With the bracelet in his hand, Tavernake descended three more
+flights of stairs and entered the drawing-room of the private
+hotel conducted by Mrs. Raithby Lawrence, whose husband, one
+learned from her frequent reiteration of the fact, had once
+occupied a distinguished post in the Merchant Service of his
+country.  The disturbance following upon the disappearance of the
+bracelet was evidently at its height.  There were at least a
+dozen people in the room, most of whom were standing up.  The
+central figure of them all was Mrs. Fitzgerald, large and florid,
+whose yellow hair with its varied shades frankly admitted its
+indebtedness to peroxide; a lady of the dashing type, who had
+once made her mark in the music-halls, but was now happily
+married to a commercial traveler who was seldom visible.  Mrs.
+Fitzgerald was talking.
+
+"In respectable boarding-houses, Mrs. Lawrence," she declared
+with great emphasis, "thefts may sometimes take place, I will
+admit, in the servants' quarters, and with all their temptations,
+poor things, it's not so much to be wondered at.  But no such
+thing as this has ever happened to me before--to have jewelry
+taken almost from my person in the drawing-room of what should be
+a well-conducted establishment.  Not a servant in the room,
+remember, from the moment I took it off until I got up from the
+piano and found it missing.  It's your guests you've got to look
+after, Mrs. Lawrence, sorry to say it though I am."
+
+Mrs. Lawrence managed here, through sheer loss of breath on the
+part of her assailant, to interpose a tearful protest.
+
+"I am quite sure," she protested feebly, "that there is not a
+person in this house who would dream of stealing anything,
+however valuable it was.  I am most particular always about
+references."
+
+"Valuable, indeed!" Mrs. Fitzgerald continued with increased
+volubility.  "I'd have you understand that I am not one of those
+who wear trumpery jewelry.  Thirty-five guineas that bracelet
+cost me if it cost a penny, and if my husband were only at home I
+could show you the receipt."
+
+Then there came an interruption of almost tragical interest.
+Mrs. Fitzgerald, her mouth still open, her stream of eloquence
+suddenly arrested, stood with her artificially darkened eyes
+riveted upon the stolid, self-composed figure in the doorway.
+Every one else was gazing in the same direction.  Tavernake was
+holding the bracelet in the palm of his hand.
+
+"Thirty-five guineas!" he repeated.  "If I had known that it was
+worth as much as that, I do not think that I should have dared to
+touch it."
+
+"You--you took it!" Mrs. Fitzgerald gasped.
+
+"I am afraid," he admitted, "that it was rather a clumsy joke.  I
+apologize, Mrs. Fitzgerald.  I hope you did not really imagine
+that it had been stolen."
+
+One was conscious of the little thrill of emotion which marked
+the termination of the episode.  Most of the people not directly
+concerned were disappointed; they were being robbed of their
+excitement, their hopes of a tragical denouement were frustrated.
+Mrs. Lawrence's worn face plainly showed her relief.  The lady
+with the yellow hair, on the other hand, who had now succeeded in
+working herself up into a towering rage, snatched the bracelet
+from the young man's fingers and with a purple flush in her
+cheeks was obviously struggling with an intense desire to box his
+ears.
+
+"That's not good enough for a tale!" she exclaimed harshly.  "I
+tell you I don't believe a word of it.  Took it for a joke,
+indeed!  I only wish my husband were here; he'd know what to do."
+
+"Your husband couldn't do much more than get your bracelet back,
+ma'am," Mrs. Lawrence replied with acerbity.  "Such a fuss and
+calling every one thieves, too!  I'd be ashamed to be so
+suspicious."
+
+Mrs. Fitzgerald glared haughtily at her hostess.
+
+"It's all very well for those that don't possess any jewelry and
+don't know the value of it, to talk," she declared, with her eyes
+fixed upon a black jet ornament which hung from the other woman's
+neck.  "What I say is this, and you may just as well hear it from
+me now as later.  I don't believe this cock-and-bull story of Mr.
+Tavernake's.  Them as took my bracelet from that table meant
+keeping it, only they hadn't the courage.  And I'm not referring
+to you, Mr. Tavernake," the lady continued vigorously, "because I
+don't believe you took it, for all your talk about a joke.  And
+whom you may be shielding it wouldn't take me two guesses to
+name, and your motive must be clear to every one.  The common
+hussy!"
+
+"You are exciting yourself unnecessarily, Mrs. Fitzgerald,"
+Tavernake remarked.  "Let me assure you that it was I who took
+your bracelet from that table."
+
+Mrs. Fitzgerald regarded him scornfully.
+
+"Do you expect me to believe a tale like that?" she demanded.
+
+"Why not?" Tavernake replied.  "It is the truth.  I am sorry that
+you have been so upset--"
+
+"It is not the truth!"
+
+More sensation!  Another unexpected entrance!  Once more interest
+in the affair was revived.  After all, the lookers-on felt that
+they were not to be robbed of their tragedy.  An old lady with
+yellow cheeks and jet black eyes leaned forward with her hand to
+her ear, anxious not to miss a syllable of what was coming.
+Tavernake bit his lip; it was the girl from the roof who had
+entered the room.
+
+"I have no doubt," she continued in a cool, clear tone, "that
+Mrs. Fitzgerald's first guess would have been correct.  I took
+the bracelet.  I did not take it for a joke, I did not take it
+because I admire it--I think it is hideously ugly.  I took it
+because I had no money."
+
+She paused and looked around at them all, quietly, yet with
+something in her face from which they all shrank.  She stood
+where the light fell full upon her shabby black gown and
+dejected-looking hat.  The hollows in her pale cheeks, and the
+faint rims under her eyes, were clearly manifest; but
+notwithstanding her fragile appearance, she held herself with
+composure and even dignity.  Twenty--thirty seconds must have
+passed whilst she stood there, slowly finishing the buttoning of
+her gloves.  No one attempted to break the silence.  She
+dominated them all--they felt that she had something more to say.
+Even Mrs. Fitzgerald felt a weight upon her tongue.
+
+"It was a clumsy attempt," she went on.  "I should have had no
+idea where to raise money upon the thing, but I apologize to you,
+nevertheless, Mrs. Fitzgerald, for the anxiety which my removal
+of your valuable property must have caused you," she added,
+turning to the owner of the bracelet, whose cheeks were once more
+hot with anger at the contempt in the girl's tone.  "I suppose I
+ought to thank you, Mr. Tavernake, also, for your well-meant
+effort to preserve my character.  In future, that shall be my
+sole charge.  Has any one anything more to say to me before I
+go?"
+
+Somehow or other, no one had.  Mrs. Fitzgerald was irritated and
+fuming, but she contented herself with a snort.  Her speech was
+ready enough as a rule, but there was a look in this girl's eyes
+from which she was glad enough to turn away.  Mrs. Lawrence made
+a weak attempt at a farewell.
+
+"I am sure," she began, "we are all sorry for what's occurred and
+that you must go--not that perhaps it isn't better, under the
+circumstances," she added hastily.  "As regards--"
+
+"There is nothing owing to you," the girl interrupted calmly.
+"You may congratulate yourself upon that, for if there were you
+would not get it.  Nor have I stolen anything else."
+
+"About your luggage?" Mrs. Lawrence asked.
+
+"When I need it, I will send for it," the girl replied.
+
+She turned her back upon them and before they realized it she was
+gone.  She had, indeed, something of the grand manner.  She had
+come to plead guilty to a theft and she had left them all feeling
+a little like snubbed children.  Mrs. Fitzgerald, as soon as the
+spell of the girl's presence was removed, was one of the first to
+recover herself.  She felt herself beginning to grow hot with
+renewed indignation.
+
+"A thief!" she exclaimed looking around the room.  "Just an
+ordinary self-convicted thief!  That's what I call her, and
+nothing else.  And here we all stood like a lot of ninnies.  Why,
+if I'd done my duty I'd have locked the door and sent for a
+policeman."
+
+"Too late now, anyway," Mrs. Lawrence declared.  "She's gone for
+good, and no mistake.  Walked right out of the house.  I heard
+her slam the front door."
+
+"And a good job, too," Mrs. Fitzgerald armed.  "We don't want any
+of her sort here--not those who've got things of value about
+them.  I bet she didn't leave America for nothing."
+
+A little gray-haired lady, who had not as yet spoken, and who
+very seldom took part in any discussion at all, looked up from
+her knitting.  She was desperately poor but she had charitable
+instincts.
+
+"I wonder what made her want to steal," she remarked quietly.
+
+"A born thief," Mrs. Fitzgerald declared with conviction,--"a
+real bad lot.  One of your sly-looking ones, I call her."
+
+The little lady sighed.
+
+"When I was better off," she continued, "I used to help at a soup
+kitchen in Poplar.  I have never forgotten a certain look we used
+to see occasionally in the faces of some of the men and women.  I
+found out what it meant--it was hunger.  Once or twice lately I
+have passed the girl who has just gone out, upon the stairs, and
+she almost frightened me.  She had just the same look in her
+eyes.  I noticed it yesterday--it was just before dinner, too
+-- but she never came down."
+
+"She paid so much for her room and extra for meals," Mrs.
+Lawrence said thoughtfully.  "She never would have a meal unless
+she paid for it at the time.  To tell you the truth, I was
+feeling a bit uneasy about her.  She hasn't been in the
+diningroom for two days, and from what they tell me there's no
+signs of her having eaten anything in her room.  As for getting
+anything out, why should she?   It would be cheaper for her here
+than anywhere, if she'd got any money at all."
+
+There was an uncomfortable silence.  The little old lady with the
+knitting looked down the street into the sultry darkness which
+had swallowed up the girl.
+
+"I wonder whether Mr. Tavernake knows anything about her," some
+one suggested.
+
+But Tavernake was not in the room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+A TETE-A-TETE SUPPER
+
+Tavernake caught her up in New Oxford Street and fell at once
+into step with her.  He wasted no time whatever upon
+preliminaries.
+
+"I should be glad," he said, "if you would tell me your name."
+
+Her first glance at him was fierce enough to have terrified a
+different sort of man.  Upon Tavernake it had absolutely no
+effect.
+
+"You need not unless you like, of course," he went on, "but I
+wish to talk to you for a few moments and I thought that it would
+be more convenient if I addressed you by name.  I do not remember
+to have heard it mentioned at Blenheim House, and Mrs. Lawrence,
+as you know, does not introduce her guests."
+
+By this time they had walked a score or so of paces together.
+The girl, after her first furious glance, had taken absolutely no
+notice of him except to quicken her pace a little.  Tavernake
+remained by her side, however, showing not the slightest sense of
+embarrassment or annoyance.  He seemed perfectly content to wait
+and he had not in the least the appearance of a man who could be
+easily shaken off.  From a fit of furious anger she passed
+suddenly and without warning to a state of half hysterical
+amusement.
+
+"You are a foolish, absurd person," she declared.  "Please go
+away.  I do not wish you to walk with me."
+
+Tavernake remained imperturbable.  She remembered suddenly his
+intervention on her behalf.
+
+"If you insist upon knowing," she said, "my name at Blenheim
+House was Beatrice Burnay.  I am much obliged to you for what you
+did for me there, but that is finished.  I do not wish to have
+any conversation with you, and I absolutely object to your
+company.  Please leave me at once."
+
+"I am sorry," he answered, "but that is not possible."
+
+"Not possible?" she repeated, wonderingly.
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"You have no money, you have eaten no dinner, and I do not
+believe that you have any idea where you are going," he declared,
+deliberately.
+
+Her face was once more dark with anger.
+
+"Even if that were the truth," she insisted, "tell me what
+concern it is of yours?   Your reminding me of these facts is
+simply an impertinence."
+
+"I am sorry that you look upon it in that light," he remarked,
+still without the least sign of discomposure.  "We will, if you
+do not mind, waive the discussion for the moment.  Do you prefer
+a small restaurant or a corner in a big one?   There is music at
+Frascati's but there are not so many people in the smaller ones."
+
+She turned half around upon the pavement and looked at him
+steadfastly.  His personality was at last beginning to interest
+her.  His square jaw and measured speech were indices of a
+character at least unusual.  She recognized certain invincible
+qualities under an exterior absolutely commonplace.
+
+"Are you as persistent about everything in life?" she asked him.
+
+"Why not?" he replied.  "I try always to be consistent."
+
+"What is your name?"
+
+"Leonard Tavernake," he answered, promptly.
+
+"Are you well off--I mean moderately well off?"
+
+"I have a quite sufficient income."
+
+"Have you any one dependent upon you?"
+
+"Not a soul," he declared.  "I am my own master in every sense of
+the word."
+
+She laughed in an odd sort of way.
+
+"Then you shall pay for your persistence," she said, ---"I mean
+that I may as well rob you of a sovereign as the restaurant
+people."
+
+"You must tell me now where you would like to go to," he
+insisted.  "It is getting late."
+
+"I do not like these foreign places," she replied.  "I should
+prefer to go to the grill-room of a good restaurant."
+
+"We will take a taxicab," he announced.  "You have no objection?"
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"If you have the money and don't mind spending it," she said, "I
+will admit that I have had all the walking I want.  Besides, the
+toe of my boot is worn through and I find it painful.  Yesterday
+I tramped ten miles trying to find a man who was getting up a
+concert party for the provinces."
+
+"And did you find him?" he asked, hailing a cab.
+
+"Yes, I found him," she answered, indifferently.  "We went
+through the usual programme.  He heard me sing, tried to kiss me
+and promised to let me know.  Nobody ever refuses anything in my
+profession, you see.  They promise to let you know."
+
+"Are you a singer, then, or an actress?"
+
+"I am neither," she told him.  "I said 'my profession' because it
+is the only one to which I have ever tried to belong.  I have
+never succeeded in obtaining an engagement in this country.  I do
+not suppose that even if I had persevered I should ever have had
+one."
+
+"You have given up the idea, then," he remarked.
+
+"I have given it up," she admitted, a little curtly.  "Please do
+not think, because I am allowing you to be my companion for a
+short time, that you may ask me questions.  How fast these taxies
+go!"
+
+They drew up at their destination--a well-known restaurant in
+Regent Street.  He paid the cabman and they descended a flight of
+stairs into the grill-room.
+
+"I hope that this place will suit you," he said.  "I have not
+much experience of restaurants."
+
+She looked around and nodded.
+
+"Yes," she replied, "I think that it will do."
+
+She was very shabbily dressed, and he, although his appearance
+was by no means ordinary, was certainly not of the type which
+inspires immediate respect in even the grill-room of a
+fashionable restaurant.  Nevertheless, they received prompt and
+almost ofcious service.  Tavernake, as he watched his companion's
+air, her manner of seating herself and accepting the attentions
+of the head waiter, felt that nameless impulse which was
+responsible for his having followed her from Blenheim House and
+which he could only call curiosity, becoming stronger.  An
+exceedingly matter-of-fact person, he was also by instinct and
+habit observant.  He never doubted but that she belonged to a
+class of society from which the guests at the boarding-house
+where they had both lived were seldom recruited, and of which he
+himself knew little.  He was not in the least a snob, this young
+man, but he found the fact interesting.  Life with him was
+already very much the same as a ledger account--a matter of
+debits and credits, and he had never failed to include among the
+latter that curious gift of breeding for which he himself, denied
+it by heritage, had somehow substituted a complete and
+exceedingly rare naturalness.
+
+"I should like," she announced, laying down the carte, "a fried
+sole, some cutlets, an ice, and black coffee."
+
+The waiter bowed.
+
+"And for Monsieur?"
+
+Tavernake glanced at his watch; it was already ten o'clock.
+
+"I will take the same," he declared.
+
+"And to drink?"
+
+She seemed indifferent.
+
+"Any light wine," she answered, carelessly, "white or red."
+
+Tavernake took up the wine list and ordered sauterne.  They were
+left alone in their corner for a few minutes, almost the only
+occupants of the place.
+
+"You are sure that you can afford this?" she asked, looking at
+him critically.  "It may cost you a sovereign or thirty
+shillings."
+
+He studied the prices on the menu.
+
+"I can afford it quite well and I have plenty of money with me,"
+he assured her, "but I do not think that it will cost more than
+eighteen shillings.  While we are waiting for the sole, shall we
+talk?   I can tell you, if you choose to hear, why I followed you
+from the boardinghouse."
+
+"I don't mind listening to you," she told him, "or I will talk
+with you about anything you like.  There is only one subject
+which I cannot discuss; that subject is myself and my own
+doings."
+
+Tavernake was silent for a moment.
+
+"That makes conversation a bit difficult," he remarked.  She
+leaned back in her chair.
+
+"After this evening," she said, "I go out of your life as
+completely and finally as though I had never existed.  I have a
+fancy to take my poor secrets with me.  If you wish to talk, tell
+me about yourself.  You have gone out of your way to be kind to
+me.  I wonder why.  It doesn't seem to be your role."
+
+He smiled slowly.  His face was fashioned upon broad lines and
+the relaxing of his lips lightened it wonderfully.  He had good
+teeth, clear gray eyes, and coarse black hair which he wore a
+trifle long; his forehead was too massive for good looks.
+
+"No," he admitted, "I do not think that benevolence is one of my
+characteristics."
+
+Her dark eyes were turned full upon him; her red lips, redder
+than ever they seemed against the pallor of her cheeks and her
+deep brown hair, curled slightly.  There was something almost
+insolent in her tone.
+
+"You understand, I hope," she continued, "that you have nothing
+whatever to look for from me in return for this sum which you
+propose to expend for my entertainment?"
+
+"I understand that," he replied.
+
+"Not even gratitude," she persisted.  "I really do not feel
+grateful to you.  You are probably doing this to gratify some
+selfish interest or curiosity.  I warn you that I am quite
+incapable of any of the proper sentiments of life."
+
+"Your gratitude would be of no value to me whatever," he assured
+her.
+
+She was still not wholly satisfied.  His complete stolidity
+frustrated every effort she made to penetrate beneath the
+surface.
+
+"If I believed," she went on, "that you were one of those men--
+the world is full of them, you know--who will help a woman with a
+reasonable appearance so long as it does not seriously interfere
+with their own comfort--"
+
+"Your sex has nothing whatever to do with it," he interrupted.
+"As to your appearance, I have not even considered it.  I could
+not tell you whether you are beautiful or ugly--I am no judge of
+these matters.  What I have done, I have done because it pleased
+me to do it."
+
+"Do you always do what pleases you?" she asked.
+
+"Nearly always."
+
+She looked him over again attentively, with an interest obviously
+impersonal, a trifle supercilious.
+
+"I suppose," she remarked, "you consider yourself one of the
+strong people of the world?"
+
+"I do not know about that," he answered.  "I do not often think
+about myself."
+
+"I mean," she explained, "that you are one of those people who
+struggle hard to get just what they want in life."
+
+His jaw suddenly tightened and she saw the likeness to Napoleon.
+
+"I do more than struggle," he affirmed, "I succeed.  If I make up
+my mind to do a thing, I do it; if I make up my mind to get a
+thing, I get it.  It means hard work sometimes, but that is all."
+
+For the first time, a really natural interest shone out of her
+eyes.  The half sulky contempt with which she had received his
+advances passed away.  She became at that moment a human being,
+self-forgetting, the heritage of her charms--for she really had a
+curious but very poignant attractiveness--suddenly evident.  It
+was only a momentary lapse and it was entirely wasted.  Not even
+one of the waiters happened to be looking that way, and Tavernake
+was thinking wholly of himself.
+
+"It is a good deal to say--that," she remarked, reflectively.
+
+"It is a good deal but it is not too much," he declared.  "Every
+man who takes life seriously should say it."
+
+Then she laughed--actually laughed--and he had a vision of
+flashing white teeth, of a mouth breaking into pleasant curves,
+of dark mirth-lit eyes, lustreless no longer, provocative,
+inspiring.  A vague impression as of something pleasant warmed
+his blood.  It was a rare thing for him to be so stirred, but
+even then it was not sufficient to disturb the focus of his
+thoughts.
+
+"Tell me," she demanded, "what do you do?   What is your
+profession or work?"
+
+"I am with a firm of auctioneers and estate agents," he answered
+readily,--"Messrs. Dowling, Spence & Company the name is.  Our
+offices are in Waterloo Place."
+
+"You find it interesting?"
+
+"Of course," he answered.  "Interesting?  Why not?  I work at
+it."
+
+"Are you a partner?"
+
+"No," he admitted.  "Six years ago I was a carpenter; then I
+became an errand boy in Mr. Dowling's office I had to learn the
+business, you see.  To-day I am a sort of manager.  In eighteen
+months' time--perhaps before that if they do not offer me a
+partnership--I shall start for myself."
+
+Once more the subtlest of smiles flickered at the corners of her
+lips.
+
+"Do they know yet?" she asked, with faint irony.
+
+"Not yet," he replied, with absolute seriousness.  "They might
+tell me to go, and I have a few things to learn yet.  I would
+rather make experiments for some one else than for myself.  I can
+use the results later; they will help me to make money."
+
+She laughed softly and wiped the tears out of her eyes.  They
+were really very beautiful eyes notwithstanding the dark rims
+encircling them.
+
+"If only I had met you before!" she murmured.
+
+"Why?" he asked.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"Don't ask me," she begged.  "It would not be good for your
+conceit, if you have any, to tell you."
+
+"I have no conceit and I am not inquisitive," he said, "but I do
+not see why you laughed."
+
+Their period of waiting came to an end at this point.  The fish
+was brought and their conversation became disjointed.  In the
+silence which followed, the old shadow crept over her face.  Once
+only it lifted.  It was while they were waiting for the cutlets.
+She leaned towards him, her elbows upon the tablecloth, her face
+supported by her fingers.
+
+"I think that it is time we left these generalities," she
+insisted, "and you told me something rather more personal,
+something which I am very anxious to know.  Tell me exactly why
+so self-centered a person as yourself should interest himself in
+a fellow-creature at all.  It seems odd to me."
+
+"It is odd," he admitted, frankly.  "I will try to explain it to
+you but it will sound very bald, and I do not think that you will
+understand.  I watched you a few nights ago out on the roof at
+Blenheim House.  You were looking across the house-tops and you
+didn't seem to be seeing anything at all really, and yet all the
+time I knew that you were seeing things I couldn't, you were
+understanding and appreciating something which I knew nothing of,
+and it worried me.  I tried to talk to you that evening, but you
+were rude."
+
+"You really are a curious person," she remarked.  "Are you always
+worried, then, if you find that some one else is seeing things or
+understanding things which are outside your comprehension?"
+
+"Always," he replied promptly.
+
+"You are too far-reaching," she affirmed.  "You want to gather
+everything into your life.  You cannot.  You will only be unhappy
+if you try.  No man can do it.  You must learn your limitations
+or suffer all your days."
+
+"Limitations!" He repeated the words with measureless scorn.  "If
+I learn them at all," he declared, with unexpected force, "it
+will be with scars and bruises, for nothing else will content
+me."
+
+"We are, I should say, almost the same age," she remarked slowly.
+
+"I am twenty-five," he told her.
+
+"I am twenty-two," she said.  "It seems strange that two people
+whose ideas of life are as far apart as the Poles should have
+come together like this even for a moment.  I do not understand
+it at all.  Did you expect that I should tell you just what I saw
+in the clouds that night?"
+
+"No," he answered, "not exactly.  I have spoken of my first
+interest in you only.  There are other things.  I told a lie
+about the bracelet and I followed you out of the boarding-house
+and I brought you here, for some other for quite a different
+reason."
+
+"Tell me what it was," she demanded.
+
+"I do not know it myself," he declared solemnly.  "I really and
+honestly do not know it.  It is because I hoped that it might
+come to me while we were together, that I am here with you at
+this moment.  I do not like impulses which I do not understand."
+
+She laughed at him a little scornfully.
+
+"After all," she said, "although it may not have dawned upon you
+yet, it is probably the same wretched reason.  You are a man and
+you have the poison somewhere in your blood.  I am really not
+bad-looking, you know."
+
+He looked at her critically.  She was a little over-slim,
+perhaps, but she was certainly wonderfully graceful.  Even the
+poise of her head, the manner in which she leaned back in her
+chair, had its individuality.  Her features, too, were good,
+though her mouth had grown a trifle hard.  For the first time the
+dead pallor of her cheeks was relieved by a touch of color.  Even
+Tavernake realized that there were great possibilities about her.
+Nevertheless, he shook his head.
+
+"I do not agree with you in the least," he asserted firmly.
+"Your looks have nothing to do with it.  I am sure that it is not
+that."
+
+"Let me cross-examine you," she suggested.  "Think carefully now.
+Does it give you no pleasure at all to be sitting here alone with
+me?"
+
+He answered her deliberately; it was obvious that he was speaking
+the truth.
+
+"I am not conscious that it does," he declared.  "The only
+feeling I am aware of at the present moment in connection with
+you, is the curiosity of which I have already spoken."
+
+She leaned a little towards him, extending her very shapely
+fingers.  Once more the smile at her lips transformed her face.
+
+"Look at my hand," she said.  "Tell me--wouldn't you like to hold
+it just for a minute, if I gave it you?"
+
+Her eyes challenged his, softly and yet imperiously.  His whole
+attention, however, seemed to be absorbed by her finger-nails.
+It seemed strange to him that a girl in her straits should have
+devoted so much care to her hands.
+
+"No," he answered deliberately, "I have no wish to hold your
+hand.  Why should I?"
+
+"Look at me," she insisted.
+
+He did so without embarrassment or hesitation,--it was more than
+ever apparent that he was entirely truthful.  She leaned back in
+her chair, laughing softly to herself.
+
+"Oh, my friend Mr. Leonard Tavernake," she exclaimed, "if you
+were not so crudely, so adorably, so miraculously truthful, what
+a prig, prig, prig, you would be!  The cutlets at last, thank
+goodness!  Your cross-examination is over.  I pronounce you 'Not
+Guilty!"'
+
+During the progress of the rest of the meal, they talked very
+little.  At its conclusion, Tavernake discharged the bill, having
+carefully checked each item and tipped the waiter the exact
+amount which the man had the right to expect.  They ascended the
+stairs together to the street, the girl lingering a few steps
+behind.  On the pavement her fingers touched his arm.
+
+"I wonder, would you mind driving me down to the Embankment?" she
+asked almost humbly.  "It was so close down there and I want some
+air."
+
+This was an extravagance which he had scarcely contemplated, but
+he did not hesitate.  He called a taxicab and seated himself by
+her side.  Her manner seemed to have grown quieter and more
+subdued, her tone was no longer semi-belligerent.
+
+"I will not keep you much longer," she promised.  "I suppose I am
+not so strong as I used to be.  I have had scarcely anything to
+eat for two days and conversation has become an unknown luxury.
+I think--it seems absurd--but I think that I am feeling a little
+faint."
+
+"The air will soon revive you," he said.  "As to our
+conversation, I am disappointed.  I think that you are very
+foolish not to tell me more about yourself."
+
+She closed her eyes, ignoring his remark.  They turned presently
+into a narrower thoroughfare.  She leaned towards him.
+
+"You have been very good to me," she admitted almost timidly,
+"and I am afraid that I have not been very gracious.  We shall
+not see one another again after this evening.  I wonder--would
+you care to kiss me?"
+
+He opened his lips and closed them again.  He sat quite still,
+his eyes fixed upon the road ahead, until he had strangled
+something absolutely absurd, something unrecognizable.
+
+"I would rather not," he decided quietly.  "I know you mean to be
+kind but that sort of thing--well, I don't think I understand it.
+Besides," he added with a sudden na�ve relief, as he clutched at
+a fugitive but plausible thought, "if I did you would not believe
+the things which I have been telling you."
+
+He had a curious idea that she was disappointed as she turned her
+head away, but she said nothing.  Arrived at the Embankment, the
+cab came slowly to a standstill.  The girl descended.  There was
+something new in her manner; she looked away from him when she
+spoke.
+
+"You had better leave me here," she said.  "I am going to sit
+upon that seat."
+
+Then came those few seconds' hesitation which were to count for a
+great deal in his life.  The impulse which bade him stay with her
+was unaccountable but it conquered.
+
+"If you do not object," he remarked with some stiffness, "I
+should like to sit here with you for a little time.  There is
+certainly a breeze."
+
+She made no comment but walked on.  He paid the man and followed
+her to the empty seat.  Opposite, some illuminated advertisements
+blazed their unsightly message across the murky sky.  Between the
+two curving rows of yellow lights the river flowed--black,
+turgid, hopeless.  Even here, though they had escaped from its
+absolute thrall, the far-away roar of the city beat upon their
+ears.  She listened to it for a moment and then pressed her hands
+to the side of her head.
+
+"Oh, how I hate it!" she moaned.  "The voices, always the voices,
+calling, threatening, beating you away!  Take my hands, Leonard
+Tavernake,--hold me."
+
+He did as she bade him, clumsily, as yet without comprehension.
+
+"You are not well," he muttered.
+
+Her eyes opened and a flash of her old manner returned.  She
+smiled at him, feebly but derisively.
+
+"You foolish boy!" she cried.  "Can't you see that I am dying?
+Hold my hands tightly and watch--watch!  Here is one more thing
+you can see--that you cannot understand."
+
+He saw the empty phial slip from her sleeve and fall on to the
+pavement.  With a cry he sprang up and, carrying her in his arms,
+rushed out into the road.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+AN UNPLEASANT MEETING
+
+It was a quarter past eleven and the theatres were disgorging
+their usual nightly crowds.  The most human thoroughfare in any
+of the world's great cities was at its best and brightest.
+Everywhere commissionaires were blowing their whistles, the
+streets were thronged with slowly-moving vehicles, the pavements
+were stirring with life.  The little crowd which had gathered in
+front of the chemist's shop was swept away.  After all, none of
+them knew exactly what they had been waiting for.  There was a
+rumor that a woman had fainted or had met with an accident.
+Certainly she had been carried into the shop and into the inner
+room, the door of which was still closed.  A few passers-by had
+gathered together and stared and waited for a few minutes, but
+had finally lost interest and melted away.  A human thoroughfare,
+this, indeed, one of the pulses of the great city beating time
+night and day to the tragedies of life.  The chemist's assistant,
+with impassive features, was serving a couple of casual customers
+from behind the counter.  Only a few yards away, beyond the
+closed door, the chemist himself and a hastily summoned doctor
+fought with Death for the body of the girl who lay upon the
+floor, faint moans coming every now and then from her blue lips.
+
+Tavernake, whose forced inaction during that terrible struggle
+had become a burden to him, slipped softly from the room as soon
+as the doctor had whispered that the acute crisis was over, and
+passed through the shop out into the street, a solemn, dazed
+figure among the light-hearted crowd.  Even in those grim
+moments, the man's individualism spoke up to him.  He was puzzled
+at his own action, He asked himself a question--not, indeed, with
+regret, but with something more than curiosity and actual
+selfprobing--as though, by concentrating his mind upon his recent
+course of action, he would be able to understand the motives
+which had influenced him.  Why had he chosen to burden himself
+with the care of this desperate young woman?  Supposing she
+lived, what was to become of her?  He had acquired a certain
+definite responsibility with regard to her future, for whatever
+the doctor and his assistant might do, it was his own promptitude
+and presence of mind which had given her the first chance of
+life.  Without a doubt, he had behaved foolishly.  Why not vanish
+into the crowd and have done with it?  What was it to him, after
+all, whether this girl lived or died?  He had done his duty
+-- more than his duty.  Why not disappear now and let her take
+her chance?  His common sense spoke to him loudly; such thoughts
+as these beat upon his brain.
+
+Just for once in his life, however, his common sense exercised an
+altogether subordinate position.  He knew very well, even while
+he listened to these voices, that he was only counting the
+minutes until he could return.  Having absolutely decided that
+the only reasonable course left for him to pursue was to return
+home and leave the girl to her fate, he found himself back inside
+the shop within a quarter of an hour.  The chemist had just come
+out from the inner room, and looked up at his entrance.
+
+"She'll do now," he announced.
+
+Tavernake nodded.  He was amazed at his own sense of relief.
+
+"I am glad," he declared.
+
+The doctor joined them, his black bag in his hand, prepared for
+departure.  He addressed himself to Tavernake as the responsible
+person.
+
+"The young lady will be all right now," he said, "but she may be
+rather queer for a day or two.  Fortunately, she made the usual
+mistake of people who are ignorant of medicine and its effects --
+she took enough poison to kill a whole household.  You had better
+take care of her, young man," he added dryly.  "She'll be getting
+into trouble if she tries this sort of thing again."
+
+"Will she need any special attention during the next few days?"
+Tavernake asked.  "The circumstances under which I brought her
+here are a little unusual, and I am not quite sure--"
+
+"Take her home to bed," the doctor interrupted, "and you'll find
+she'll sleep it off.  She seems to have a splendid constitution,
+although she has let herself run down.  If you need any further
+advice and your own medical man is not available, I will come and
+see her if you send for me.  Camden, my name is; telephone number
+734 Gerrard."
+
+"I should be glad to know the amount of your fee, if you please,"
+Tavernake said.
+
+"My fee is two guineas," the doctor answered.
+
+Tavernake paid him and he went away.  Already the shadow of the
+tragedy was passing.  The chemist had joined his assistant and
+was busy dispensing drugs behind his counter.
+
+"You can go in to the young lady, if you like," he remarked to
+Tavernake.  "I dare say she'll feel better to have some one with
+her."
+
+Tavernake passed slowly into the inner room, closing the door
+behind him.  He was scarcely prepared for so piteous a sight.
+The girl's face was white and drawn as she lay upon the couch to
+which they had lifted her.  The fighting spirit was dead; she was
+in a state of absolute and complete collapse.  She opened her
+eyes at his coning, but closed them again almost immediately
+-- less, it seemed, from any consciousness of his presence than
+from sheer exhaustion.
+
+"I am glad that you are better," he whispered crossing the room
+to her side.
+
+"Thank you," she murmured almost inaudibly.
+
+Tavernake stood looking down upon her, and his sense of
+perplexity increased.  Stretched on the hard horsehair couch she
+seemed, indeed, pitifully thin and younger than her years.  The
+scowl, which had passed from her face, had served in some measure
+as a disguise.
+
+"We shall have to leave here in a few minutes," he said, softly.
+"They will want to close the shop."
+
+"I am so sorry," she faltered, "to have given you all this
+trouble.  You must send me to a hospital or the workhouse
+-- anywhere."
+
+"You are sure that there are no friends to whom I can send?" he
+asked.
+
+"There is no one!"
+
+She closed her eyes and Tavernake sat quite still on the end of
+her couch, his elbow upon his knee, his head resting upon his
+hand.  Presently, the rush of customers having ceased, the
+chemist came in.
+
+"I think, if I were you, I should take her home now," he
+remarked.  "She'll probably drop off to sleep very soon and wake
+up much stronger.  I have made up a prescription here in case of
+exhaustion."
+
+Tavernake stared at the man.  Take her home!  His sense of humor
+was faint enough but he found himself trying to imagine the faces
+of Mrs. Lawrence or Mrs. Fitzgerald if he should return with her
+to the boardinghouse at such an hour.
+
+"I suppose you know where she lives?" the chemist inquired
+curiously.
+
+"Of course," Tavernake assented.  "You are quite right.  I dare
+say she is strong enough now to walk as far as the pavement."
+
+He paid the bill for the medicines, and they lifted her from the
+couch.  Between them she walked slowly into the outer shop.  Then
+she began to drag on their arms and she looked up at the chemist
+a little piteously.
+
+"May I sit down for a moment?" she begged.  "I feel faint."
+
+They placed her in one of the cane chairs facing the door.  The
+chemist mixed her some sal volatile.
+
+"I am sorry," she murmured, "so sorry.  In a few minutes--I shall
+be better."
+
+Outside, the throng of pedestrians had grown less, but from the
+great restaurant opposite a constant stream of motor-cars and
+carriages was slowly bringing away the supper guests.  Tavernake
+stood at the door, watching them idly.  The traffic was
+momentarily blocked and almost opposite to him a motor-car, the
+simple magnificence of which filled him with wonder, had come to
+a standstill.  The chauffeur and footman both wore livery which
+was almost white.  Inside a swinging vase of flowers was
+suspended from the roof.  A man and a woman leaned back in
+luxurious easy-chairs.  The man was dark and had the look of a
+foreigner.  The woman was very fair.  She wore a long ermine
+cloak and a tiara of pearls.
+
+Tavernake, whose interest in the passing throngs was entirely
+superficial, found himself for some reason curiously attracted by
+this glimpse into a world of luxury of which he knew nothing;
+attracted, too, by the woman's delicate face with its uncommon
+type of beauty.  Their eyes met as he stood there, stolid and
+motionless, framed in the doorway.  Tavernake continued to stare,
+unmindful, perhaps unconscious, of the rudeness of his action.
+The woman, after a moment, glanced away at the shopwindow.  A
+sudden thought seemed to strike her.  She spoke through the tube
+at her side and turned to her companion.  Meanwhile, the footman,
+leaning from his place, held out his arm in warning and the car
+was slowly backed to the side of the pavement.  The lady felt for
+a moment in a bag of white satin which lay upon the round table
+in front of her, and handed a slip of paper through the open
+window to the servant who had already descended and was standing
+waiting.  He came at once towards the shop, passing Tavernake,
+who remained in the door-way.
+
+"Will you make this up at once, please?" he directed, handing the
+paper across to the chemist.
+
+The chemist took it in his hand and turned away mechanically
+toward the dispensing room.  Suddenly he paused, and, looking
+back, shook his head.
+
+"For whom is this prescription required?" he asked.
+
+"For my mistress," the man answered.  "Her name is there."
+
+"Where is she?"
+
+"Outside; she is waiting for it."
+
+"If she really wants this made up to-night," the chemist
+declared, "she must come in and sign the book."
+
+The footman looked across the counter, for a moment, a little
+blankly.
+
+"Am I to tell her that?" he inquired.  "It's only a sleeping
+draught.  Her regular chemist makes it up all right."
+
+"That may be," the man behind the counter replied, "but, you see,
+I am not her regular chemist.  You had better go and tell her
+so."
+
+The footman departed upon his errand without a glance at the girl
+who was sitting within a few feet of him.
+
+"I am very sorry, madam," he announced to his mistress, "that the
+chemist declines to make up the prescription unless you sign the
+book."
+
+"Very well, then, I will come," she declared.
+
+The woman, handed from the automobile by her servant, lifted her
+white satin skirts in both hands and stepped lightly across the
+pavement.  Tavernake stood on one side to let her pass.  She
+seemed to him to be, indeed, a creature of that other world of
+which he knew nothing.  Her slow, graceful movements, the shimmer
+of her skirt, her silk stockings, the flashing of the diamond
+buckles upon her shoes, the faint perfume from her clothes, the
+soft touch of her ermine as she swept by--all these things were
+indeed strange to him.  His eyes followed her with rapt interest
+as she approached the counter.
+
+"You wish me to sign for my prescription?" she asked the chemist.
+"I will do so, with pleasure, if it is necessary, only you must
+not keep me waiting long."
+
+Her voice was very low and very musical; the slight smile which
+had parted her tired lips, was almost pathetic.  Even the chemist
+felt himself to be a human being.  He turned at once to his
+shelves and began to prepare the drug.
+
+"I am sorry, madam, that it should have been necessary to fetch
+you in," he said, apologetically.  "My assistant will give you
+the book if you will kindly sign it."
+
+The assistant dived beneath the counter, reappearing almost
+immediately with a black volume and a pen and ink.  The chemist
+was engrossed upon his task; Tavernake's eyes were still riveted
+upon this woman, who seemed to him the most beautiful thing he
+had ever seen in life.  No one was watching the girl.  The
+chemist was the first to see her face, and that only in a looking
+glass.  He stopped in the act of mixing his drug and turned
+slowly round.  His expression was such that they all followed his
+eyes.  The girl was sitting up in her chair, with a sudden spot
+of color burning in her cheeks, her fingers gripping the counter
+as though for support, her eyes dilated, unnatural, burning in
+their white setting with an unholy fire.  The lady was the last
+to turn her head, and the bottle of eau-de-cologne which she had
+taken up from the counter, slipped with a crash to the floor.
+All expression seemed to pass from her face; the very life seemed
+drawn from it.  Those who were watching her saw suddenly an old
+woman looking at something of which she was afraid.
+
+The girl seemed to find an unnatural strength.  She dragged
+herself up and turned wildly to Tavernake.
+
+"Take me away," she cried, in a low voice.  "Take me away at
+once."
+
+The woman at the counter did not speak.  Tavernake stepped
+quickly forward and then hesitated.  The girl was on her feet now
+and she clutched at his arms.  Her eyes besought him.
+
+"You must take me away, please," she begged, hoarsely.  "I am
+well now--quite well.  I can walk."
+
+Tavernake's lack of imagination stood him in good stead then.  He
+simply did what he was told, did it in perfectly mechanical
+fashion, without asking any questions.  With the girl leaning
+heavily upon his arm, he stepped into the street and almost
+immediately into a passing taxicab which he had hailed from the
+threshold of the shop.  As he closed the door, he glanced behind
+him.  The woman was standing there, half turned towards him,
+still with that strange, stony look upon her lifeless face.  The
+chemist was bending across the counter towards her, wondering,
+perhaps, if another incident were to be drawn into his night's
+work.  The eau-de-cologne was running in a little stream across
+the floor.
+
+"Where to, sir?" the taxicab driver asked Tavernake.
+
+"Where to?" Tavernake repeated.
+
+The girl was clinging to his arm.
+
+"Tell him to drive away from here," she whispered, "to drive
+anywhere, but away from here."
+
+"Drive straight on," Tavernake directed, "along Fleet Street and
+up Holborn.  I will give you the address later on."
+
+The man changed his speed and their pace increased.  Tavernake
+sat quite still, dumfounded by these amazing happenings.  The
+girl by his side was clutching his arm, sobbing a little
+hysterically, holding him all the time as though in terror.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+BREAKFAST WITH BEATRICE
+
+
+The girl, awakened, perhaps, by the passing of some heavy cart
+along the street below, or by the touch of the sunbeam which lay
+across her pillow, first opened her eyes and then, after a
+preliminary stare around, sat up in bed.  The events of the
+previous night slowly shaped themselves in her mind.  She
+remembered everything up to the commencement of that drive in the
+taxicab.  Sometime after that she must have fainted.  And now
+-- what had become of her?  Where was she?
+
+She looked around her in ever-increasing surprise.  Certainly it
+was the strangest room she had ever been in.  The floor was dusty
+and innocent of any carpet; the window was bare and uncurtained.
+The walls were unpapered but covered here and there with strange-
+looking plans, one of them taking up nearly the whole side of the
+room--a very rough piece of work with little dabs of blue paint
+here and there, and shadings and diagrams which were absolutely
+unintelligible.  She herself was lying upon a battered iron
+bedstead, and she was wearing a very coarse nightdress.  Her own
+clothes were folded up and lay upon a piece of brown paper on the
+floor by the side of the bed.  To all appearance, the room was
+entirely unfurnished, except that in the middle of it was a
+hideous papier mache screen.
+
+After her first bewildered inspection of her surroundings, it was
+upon this screen that her attention was naturally directed.
+Obviously it must be there to conceal something.  Very carefully
+she leaned out of bed until she was able to see around the corner
+of it.  Then her heart gave a little jump and she was only just
+able to stifle an exclamation of fear.  Some one was sitting
+there--a man--sitting on a battered cane chair, bending over a
+roll of papers which were stretched upon a rude deal table.  She
+felt her cheeks grow hot.  It must be Tavernake!  Where had he
+brought her?  What did his presence in the room mean?
+
+The bed creaked heavily as she regained her former position.  A
+voice came to her from behind the screen.  She knew it at once.
+It was Tavernake's.
+
+"Are you awake?" he asked.
+
+"Yes," she answered,--"yes, I am awake.  Is that Mr. Tavernake?
+Where am I, please?"
+
+"First of all, are you better?" he inquired.
+
+"I am better," she assured him, sitting up in bed and pulling the
+clothes to her chin.  "I am quite well now.  Tell me at once
+where I am and what you are doing over there."
+
+"There is nothing to be terrified about," Tavernake answered.
+"To all effects and purposes, I am in another room.  When I move
+to the door, as I shall do directly, I shall drag the screen with
+me.  I can promise you--"
+
+"Please explain everything," she begged, "quickly.  I am most
+-- uncomfortable."
+
+"At half-past twelve this morning," Tavernake said, "I found
+myself alone in a taxicab with you, without any luggage or any
+idea where to go to.  To make matters worse, you fainted.  I
+tried two hotels but they refused to take you in; they were
+probably afraid that you were going to be ill.  Then I thought of
+this room.  I am employed, as you know, by a firm of estate
+agents.  I do a great deal of work on my own account, however,
+which I prefer to do in secret, and unknown to any one.  For that
+reason, I hired this room a year ago and I come here most
+evenings to work.  Sometimes I stay late, so last month I bought
+a small bedstead and had it fixed up here.  There is a woman who
+comes in to clean the room.  I went to her house last night and
+persuaded her to come here.  She undressed you and put you to
+bed.  I am sorry that my presence here distresses you, but it is
+a large building and quite empty at night-time.  I thought you
+might wake up and be frightened, so I borrowed this screen from
+the woman and have been sitting here."
+
+"What, all night?" she gasped.
+
+"Certainly," he answered.  "The woman could not stop herself and
+this is not a residential building at all.  All the lower floors
+are let for offices and warehouses, and there is no one else in
+the place until eight o'clock."
+
+She put her hands to her head and sat quite still for a moment or
+two.  It was really hard to take everything in.
+
+"Aren't you very sleepy?" she asked, irrelevantly.
+
+"Not very," he replied.  I dozed for an hour, a little time ago.
+Since then I have been looking through some plans which interest
+me very much."
+
+"Can I get up?" she inquired, timidly.
+
+"If you feel strong enough, please do," he answered, with
+manifest relief.  "I shall move towards the door, dragging the
+screen in front of me.  You will find a brush and comb and some
+hairpins on your clothes.  I could not think of anything else to
+get for you, but, if you will dress, we will walk to London
+Bridge Station, which is just across the way, and while I order
+some breakfast you can go into the ladies' room and do your hair
+properly.  I did my best to get hold of a looking-glass, but it
+was quite impossible."
+
+The girl's sense of humor was suddenly awake.  She had hard work
+not to scream.  He had evidently thought out all these details in
+painstaking fashion, one by one.
+
+"Thank you," she said.  "I will get up immediately, if you will
+do as you say."
+
+He clutched the screen from the inside and dragged it towards the
+door.  On the threshold, he spoke to her once more.
+
+"I shall sit upon the stairs just outside," he announced.
+
+"I sha'n't be more than five minutes," she assured him.
+
+She sprang out of bed and dressed quickly.  There was nothing
+beyond where the screen had been except a table covered with
+plans, and a particularly hard cane chair which she dragged over
+for her own use.  As she dressed, she began to realize how much
+this matter-of-fact, unimpressionable young man had done for her
+during the last few hours.  The reflection affected her in a
+curious manner.  She became afflicted with a shyness which she
+bad not felt when he was in the room.  When at last she had
+finished her toilette and opened the door, she was almost
+tongue-tied.  He was sitting on the top step, with his back
+against the landing, and his eyes were closed.  He opened them
+with a little start, however, as soon as he heard her approach.
+
+"I am glad you have not been long," he remarked.  "I want to be
+at my office at nine o'clock and I must go and have a bath
+somewhere.  These stairs are rather steep.  Please walk
+carefully."
+
+She followed him in silence down three flights of stone steps.
+On each landing there were names upon the doors--two firms of hop
+merchants, a solicitor, and a commission agent.  The ground floor
+was some sort of warehouse, from which came a strong smell of
+leather.
+
+Tavernake opened the outside door with a small key and they
+passed into the street.
+
+"London Bridge Station is just across the way," he said.  "The
+refreshment room will be open and we can get some breakfast at
+once."
+
+"What time is it?" she asked.
+
+"About half-past seven."
+
+She walked by his side quite meekly, and although there were many
+things which she was longing to say, she remained absolutely
+without the power of speech.  Except that he was looking a little
+crumpled, there was nothing whatever in his appearance to
+indicate that he had been up all night.  He looked exactly as he
+had done on the previous day, he seemed even quite unconscious
+that there was anything unusual in their relations.  As soon as
+they arrived at the station, he pointed to the ladies'
+waiting-room.
+
+"If you will go in and arrange your hair there," he said, "I will
+go and order breakfast and have a shave.  I will be back here in
+about twenty minutes.  You had better take this."
+
+He offered her a shilling and she accepted it without hesitation.
+As soon as he had gone, however, she looked at the coin in her
+hand in blank wonder.  She had accepted it from him with perfect
+naturalness and without even saying "Thank you!"  With a queer
+little laugh, she pushed open the swinging doors and made her way
+into the waiting-room.
+
+In hardly more than a quarter of an hour she emerged, to find
+Tavernake waiting for her.  He had retied his tie, bought a fresh
+collar, had been shaved.  She, too, had improved her appearance.
+
+"Breakfast is waiting this way," he announced.
+
+She followed him obediently and they sat down at a small table in
+the station refreshment-room.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she asked, suddenly, "I must ask you something.
+Has anything like this ever happened to you before?"
+
+"Nothing," he assured her, with some emphasis.
+
+"You seem to take everything so much as a matter of course," she
+protested.
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know," she replied, a little feebly.  "Only -"
+
+She found relief in a sudden and perfectly natural laugh.
+
+"Come," he said, "that is better.  I am glad that you feel like
+laughing."
+
+"As a matter of fact," she declared, "I feel much more like
+crying.  Don't you know that you were very foolish last night?
+You ought to have left me alone.  Why didn't you?  You would have
+saved yourself a great deal of trouble."
+
+He nodded, as though that point of view did, in some degree,
+commend itself to him.
+
+"Yes," he admitted, "I suppose I should.  I do not, even now,
+understand why I interfered.  I can only remember that it didn't
+seem possible not to at the time.  I suppose one must have
+impulses," he added, with a little frown.
+
+"The reflection," she remarked, helping herself to another roll,
+"seems to annoy you."
+
+"It does," he confessed.  "I do not like to feel impelled to do
+anything the reason for which is not apparent.  I like to do just
+the things which seem likely to work out best for myself."
+
+"How you must hate me!" she murmured.
+
+"No, I do not hate you," he replied, "but, on the other hand, you
+have certainly been a trouble to me.  First of all, I told a
+falsehood at the boarding-house, and I prefer always to tell the
+truth when I can.  Then I followed you out of the house, which I
+disliked doing very much, and I seem to have spent a considerable
+portion of the time since, in your company, under somewhat
+extraordinary circumstances.  I do not understand why I have done
+this."
+
+"I suppose it is because you are a very good-hearted person," she
+remarked.
+
+"But I am not," he assured her, calmly.  "I am nothing of the
+sort.  I have very little sympathy with good-hearted people.  I
+think the world goes very much better when every one looks after
+himself, and the people who are not competent to do so go to the
+wall."
+
+"It sounds a trifle selfish," she murmured.
+
+"Perhaps it is.  I have an idea that if I could phrase it
+differently it would become philosophy."
+
+"Perhaps," she suggested, smiling across the table at him, "you
+have really done all this because you like me."
+
+"I am quite sure that it is not that," he declared.  "I feel an
+interest in you for which I cannot account, but it does not seem
+to me to be a personal one.  Last night," he continued, "when I
+was sitting there waiting, I tried to puzzle it all out.  I came
+to the conclusion that it was because you represent something
+which I do not understand.  I am very curious and it always
+interests me to learn.  I believe that must be the secret of my
+interest in you."
+
+"You are very complimentary," she told him, mockingly.  "I wonder
+what there is in the world which I could teach so superior a
+person as Mr. Tavernake?"
+
+He took her question quite seriously.
+
+"I wonder what there is myself," he answered.  "And yet, in a
+way, I think I know."
+
+"Your imagination should come to the rescue," she remarked.
+
+"I have no imagination," he declared, gloomily.
+
+They were silent for several minutes; she was still studying him.
+
+"I wonder you don't ask me any questions about myself," she said,
+abruptly.
+
+"There is only one thing," he answered, "concerning which I am in
+the least curious.  Last night in the chemist's shop--"
+
+"Don't!" she begged him, with suddenly whitening face.  "Don't
+speak of that!"
+
+"Very well," he replied, indifferently.  "I thought that you were
+rather inviting my questions.  You need not be afraid of any
+more.  I really am not curious about personal matters; I find
+that my own life absorbs all my interests."
+
+They had finished breakfast and he paid the bill.  She began to
+put on her gloves.
+
+"Whatever happens to me," she said, "I shall never forget that
+you have been very kind."
+
+She hesitated for a moment and then she seemed to realize more
+completely how really kind he had been.  There had been a certain
+crude delicacy about his actions which she had under-appreciated.
+She leaned towards him.  There was nothing left this morning of
+that disfiguring sullenness.  Her mouth was soft; her eyes were
+bright, almost appealing.  If Tavernake had been a judge of
+woman's looks, he must certainly have found her attractive.
+
+"I am very, very grateful to you," she continued, holding out her
+hand.  "I shall always remember how kind you were.  Good-bye!"
+
+"You are not going?" he asked.
+
+She laughed.
+
+"Why, you didn't imagine that you had taken the care of me upon
+your shoulders for the rest of your life?" she demanded.
+
+"No, I didn't imagine that," he answered.  "At the same time,
+what plans have you made?  Where are you going?"
+
+"Oh!  I shall think of something," she declared, indifferently.
+
+He caught the gleam in her eyes, the sudden hopelessness which
+fell like a cloud upon her face.  He spoke promptly and with
+decision.
+
+"As a matter of fact," he remarked, "you do not know yourself.
+You are just going to drift out of this place and very likely
+find your way to a seat on the Embankment again."
+
+Her lips quivered.  She had tried to be brave but it was hard.
+
+"Not necessarily," she replied.  "Something may turn up."
+
+He leaned a little across the table towards her.
+
+"Listen," he said, deliberately, "I will make a proposition to
+you.  It has come to me during the last few minutes.  I am tired
+of the boarding-house and I wish to leave it.  The work which I
+do at night is becoming more and more important.  I should like
+to take two rooms somewhere.  If I take a third, would you care
+to call yourself what I called you to the charwoman last night
+-- my sister?  I should expect you to look after the meals and my
+clothes, and help me in certain other ways.  I cannot give you
+much of a salary," he continued, "but you would have an
+opportunity during the daytime of looking out for some work, if
+that is what you want, and you would at least have a roof and
+plenty to eat and drink."
+
+She looked at him in blank amazement.  It was obvious that his
+proposition was entirely honest.
+
+"But, Mr. Tavernake," she protested, "you forget that I am not
+really your sister."
+
+"Does that matter?" he asked, without flinching.  "I think you
+understand the sort of person I am.  You would have nothing to
+fear from any admiration on my part--or anything of that sort,"
+he added, with some show of clumsiness.  "Those things do not
+come in my life.  I am ambitious to get on, to succeed and become
+wealthy.  Other things I do not even think about."
+
+She was speechless.  After a short pause, he went on.
+
+"I am proposing this arrangement as much for my own sake as for
+yours.  I am very well read and I know most of what there is to
+be known in my profession.  But there are other things concerning
+which I am ignorant.  Some of these things I believe you could
+teach me."
+
+Still speechless, she sat and looked at him for several moments.
+Outside, the station now was filled with a hurrying throng on
+their way to the day's work.  Engines were shrieking, bells
+ringing, the press of footsteps was unceasing.  In the dark, ill-
+ventilated room itself there was the rattle of crockery, the
+yawning of discontented-looking young women behind the bar, young
+women with their hair still in curl-papers, as yet unprepared for
+their weak little assaults upon the good-nature or susceptibility
+of their customers.  A queer corner of life it seemed.  She
+looked at her companion and realized how fragmentary was her
+knowledge of him.  There was nothing to be gathered from his
+face.  He seemed to have no expression.  He was simply waiting
+for her reply, with his thoughts already half engrossed upon the
+business of the day.
+
+"Really," she began, "I--"
+
+He came back from his momentary wandering and looked at her.  She
+suddenly altered the manner of her speech.  It was a strange
+proposition, perhaps, but this was one of the strangest of men.
+
+"I am quite willing to try it," she decided.  "Will you tell me
+where I can meet you later on?"
+
+"I have an hour and a half for luncheon at one o'clock," he said.
+"Meet me exactly at the southeast corner of Trafalgar Square.
+Would you like a little money?" he added, rising.
+
+"I have plenty, thank you," she answered.
+
+He laid half-a-crown upon the table and made an entry in a small
+memorandum book which he drew from his pocket.
+
+"You had better keep this," he said, "in case you want it.  I am
+going to leave you alone here.  You can find your way anywhere, I
+am sure, and I am in a hurry.  At one o'clock, remember.  I hope
+you will still be feeling better."
+
+He put on his hat and went away without a backward glance.
+Beatrice sat in her chair and watched him out of sight.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+INTRODUCING Mrs. WENHAM GARDNER
+
+
+A very distinguished client was engaging the attention of Mr.
+Dowling, Senior, of Messrs. Dowling, Spence & Company,
+auctioneers and estate agents, whose offices were situated in
+Waterloo Place, Pall Mall.  Mr. Dowling was a fussy little man of
+between fifty and sixty years, who spent most of his time playing
+golf, and who, although he studiously contrived to ignore the
+fact, had long since lost touch with the details of his business.
+Consequently, in the absence of Mr. Dowling, Junior, who had
+developed a marked partiality for a certain bar in the locality,
+Tavernake was hastily summoned to the rescue from another part of
+the building, by a small boy violently out of breath.
+
+"Never see the governor in such a fuss," the latter declared,
+confidentially, "She's asking no end of questions and he don't
+know a thing."
+
+"Who is the lady?" Tavernake asked, on the way downstairs.
+
+"Didn't hear her name," the boy replied.  "She's all right,
+though, I can tell you--a regular slap-up beauty.  Such a
+motor-car, too!  Flowers and tables and all sorts of things
+inside.  By Jove, won't the governor tear his hair if she goes
+before you get there!"
+
+Tavernake quickened his steps and in a few moments knocked at the
+door of the private office and entered.
+
+His chief welcomed him with a gesture of relief.  The
+distinguished client of the firm, whose attention he was
+endeavoring to engage, had glanced toward the newcomer, at his
+first appearance, with an air of somewhat bored unconcern.  Her
+eyes, however, did not immediately leave his face.  On the
+contrary, from the moment of his entrance she watched him
+steadfastly.  Tavernake, stolid, unruffled, at that time without
+comprehension, approached the desk.
+
+"This is--er--Mr. Tavernake, our manager," Mr. Dowling announced,
+obsequiously.  "In the absence of my son, he is in charge of the
+letting department.  I have no doubt that he will be able to
+suggest something suitable.  Tavernake," he continued, "this
+lady,"--he glanced at a card in front of him--"Mrs. Wenham
+Gardner of New York, is looking for a town house, and has been
+kind enough to favor us with an inquiry."
+
+Tavernake made no immediate reply.  Mr. Dowling was shortsighted,
+and in any case it would never have occurred to him to associate
+nervousness, or any form of emotion, with his responsible
+manager.  The beautiful lady leaned back in her chair.  Her lips
+were parted in a slight but very curious smile, her fingers
+supported her cheek, her eyelids were contracted as she looked
+into his face.  Tavernake felt that their recognition was mutual.
+Once more he was back again in the tragic atmosphere of that
+chemist's shop, with Beatrice, half fainting, in his arms, the
+beautiful lady turned to stone.  It was an odd tableau, that, so
+vividly imprinted upon his memory that it was there before him at
+this very moment.  There was mystery in this woman's eyes,
+mystery and something else.
+
+"I don't seem to have come across anything down here which--er
+-- particularly attracts Mrs.--Mrs. Wenham Gardner," Mr. Dowling
+went on, taking up a little sheaf of papers from the desk.  "I
+thought, perhaps, that the Bryanston Square house might have
+suited, but it seems that it is too small, far too small.  Mrs.
+Gardner is used to entertaining, and has explained to me that she
+has a great many friends always coming and going from the other
+side of the water.  She requires, apparently, twelve bedrooms,
+besides servants' quarters."
+
+"Your list is scarcely up to date, sir," Tavernake reminded him.
+"If the rent is of no particular object, there is Grantham
+House."
+
+Mr. Dowling's face was suddenly illuminated.
+
+"Grantham House!" he exclaimed.  "Precisely!  Now I declare that
+it had absolutely slipped my memory for the moment--only for the
+moment, mind--that we have just had placed upon our books one of
+the most desirable mansions in the west end of London.  A most
+valued client, too, one whom we are most anxious to oblige. Dear,
+dear me!  It is very fortunate--very fortunate indeed that I
+happened to think of it, especially as it seems that no one had
+had the sense to place it upon my list.  Tavernake, get the plans
+at once and show them to--er--to Mrs. Gardner."
+
+Tavernake crossed the room in silence, opened a drawer, and
+returned with a stiff roll of papers, which he spread carefully
+out in front of this unexpected client.  She spoke then for the
+first time since he had entered the room.  Her voice was low and
+marvelously sweet.  There was very little of the American accent
+about it, but something in the intonation, especially toward the
+end of her sentences, was just a trifle un-English.
+
+"Where is this Grantham House?" she inquired.
+
+"Within a stone's throw of Grosvenor Square," Tavernake answered,
+briskly.  "It is really one of the most central spots in the west
+end.  If you will allow me!"
+
+For the next few minutes he was very fluent indeed.  With pencil
+in hand, he explained the plans, dwelt on the advantages of the
+location, and from the very reserve of his praise created an
+impression that the house he was describing was the one
+absolutely perfect domicile in the whole of London.
+
+"Can I look over the place?" she asked, when he had finished.
+
+"By all means," Mr. Dowling declared, "by all means.  I was on
+the point of suggesting it.  It will be by far the most
+satisfactory proceeding.  You will not be disappointed, my dear
+madam, I can assure you."
+
+"I should like to do so, if I may, without delay," she said.
+
+"There is no opportunity like the present," Mr. Dowling replied.
+"If you will permit me," he added, rising, "it will give me the
+greatest pleasure to escort you personally.  My engagements for
+the rest of the day happen to be unimportant.  Tavernake, let me
+have the keys of the rooms that are locked up.  The caretaker, of
+course, is there in possession."
+
+The beautiful visitor rose to her feet, and even that slight
+movement was accomplished with a grace unlike anything which
+Tavernake had ever seen before.
+
+"I could not think of troubling you so far, Mr. Dowling," she
+protested.  "It is not in the least necessary for you to come
+yourself.  Your manager can, perhaps, spare me a few minutes.  He
+seems to be so thoroughly posted in all the details," she added,
+apologetically, as she noticed the cloud on Mr. Dowling's brow.
+
+"Just as you like, of course," he declared.  "Mr. Tavernake can
+go, by all means.  Now I come to think of it, it certainly would
+be inconvenient for me to be away from the office for more than a
+few minutes.  Mr. Tavernake has all the details at his fingers'
+ends, and I only hope, Mrs. Gardner, that he will be able to
+persuade you to take the house.  Our client," he added, with a
+bow, "would, I am sure, be delighted to hear that we had secured
+for him so distinguished a tenant."
+
+She smiled at him, a delightful mixture of graciousness and
+condescension.
+
+"You are very good," she answered.  "The house sounds rather
+large for me but it depends so much upon circumstances.  If you
+are ready, Mr.--"
+
+"Tavernake," he told her.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she continued, "my car is waiting outside and we
+might go on at once."
+
+He bowed and held open the door for her, an office which he
+performed a little awkwardly.  Mr. Dowling himself escorted her
+out on to the pavement.  Tavernake stopped behind to get his hat,
+and passing out a moment afterwards, would have seated himself in
+front beside the chauffeur but that she held the door of the car
+open and beckoned to him.
+
+"Will you come inside, please?" she insisted.  "There are one or
+two questions which I might ask you as we go along.  Please
+direct the chauffeur."
+
+He obeyed without a word; the car glided off.  As they swung
+round the first corner, she leaned forward from among the
+cushions of her seat and looked at him.  Then Tavernake was
+conscious of new things.  As though by inspiration, he knew that
+her visit to the office of Messrs.  Dowling, Spence & Company had
+been no chance one.
+
+She remembered him, remembered him as the companion of Beatrice
+during that strange, brief meeting.  It was an incomprehensible
+world, this, into which he had wandered.  The woman's face had
+lost her languid, gracious expression.  There was something there
+almost akin to tragedy.  Her fingers fell upon his arm and her
+touch was no light one.  She was gripping him almost fiercely.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she said, "I have a memory for faces which
+seldom fails me.  I have seen you before quite lately.  You
+remember where, of course.  Tell me the truth quickly, please."
+
+The words seemed to leap from her lips.  Beautiful and young
+though she undoubtedly was, her intense seriousness had suddenly
+aged her face.  Tavernake was bewildered.  He, too, was conscious
+of a curious emotional disturbance.
+
+"The truth?  What truth do you mean?" he demanded.
+
+"It was you whom I saw with Beatrice!"
+
+"You saw me one night about three weeks ago," he admitted slowly.
+"I was in a chemist's shop in the Strand.  You were signing his
+book for a sleeping draught, I think."
+
+She shivered all over.
+
+"Yes, yes!" she cried.  "Of course, I remember all about it.  The
+young lady who was with you--what was she doing there?  Where is
+she now?"
+
+"The young lady was my sister," Tavernake answered stiffly.
+
+Mrs. Wenham Gardner looked, for a moment, as though she would
+have struck him.
+
+"You need not lie to me!" she exclaimed.  "It is not worth while.
+Tell me where you met her, why you were with her at all in that
+intimate fashion, and where she is now!"
+
+Tavernake realized at once that so far as this woman was
+concerned, the fable of his relationship with Beatrice was
+hopeless.  She knew!
+
+"Madam," he replied, "I made the acquaintance of the young lady
+with whom I was that evening, at the boarding-house where we both
+lived."
+
+"What were you doing in the chemist's shop?" she demanded.
+
+"The young lady had been ill," he proceeded deliberately,
+wondering how much to tell.  "She had been taken very ill indeed.
+She was just recovering when you entered."
+
+"Where is she now?" the woman asked eagerly.  "Is she still at
+that boarding-house of which you spoke?"
+
+"No," he answered.
+
+Her fingers gripped his arm once more.
+
+"Why do you answer me always in monosyllables?  Don't you
+understand that you must tell me everything that you know about
+her.  You must tell me where I can find her, at once."
+
+Tavernake remained silent.  The woman's voice had still that note
+of wonderful sweetness, but she had altogether lost her air of
+complete and aristocratic indifferenoe.  She was a very altered
+person now from the distinguished client who had first enlisted
+his services.  For some reason or other, he knew that she was
+suffering from a terrible anxiety.
+
+"I am not sure," he said at last, "whether I can do as you ask."
+
+"What do you mean?" she exclaimed sharply.
+
+"The young lady," he continued, "seemed, on the occasion to which
+you have referred, to be particularly anxious to avoid
+recognition.  She hurried out of the place without speaking to
+you, and she has avoided the subject ever since.  I do not know
+what her motives may have been, but I think that I should like to
+ask her first before I tell you where she is to be found."
+
+Mrs. Wenham Gardner leaned towards him.  It was certainly the
+first time that a woman in her apparent rank of life had looked
+upon Tavernake in such a manner.  Her forehead was a little
+wrinkled, her lips were parted, her eyes were pathetically,
+delightfully eloquent.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake, you must not--you must not refuse me," she
+pleaded.  "If you only knew the importance of it, you would not
+hesitate for a moment.  This is no idle curiosity on my part.  I
+have reasons, very serious reasons indeed, for wishing to
+discover that poor girl's whereabouts at once.  There is a
+possible danger of which she must be warned.  No one can do it
+except myself."
+
+"Are you her friend or her enemy?" Tavernake asked.
+
+"Why do you ask such a question?" she demanded.
+
+"I am only going by her expression when she saw you come into the
+chemist's shop," Tavernake persisted doggedly.
+
+"It is a cruel suggestion, that," the woman cried.  "I wish to be
+her friend, I am her friend.  If I could only tell you
+everything, you would understand at once what a terrible
+situation, what a hideous quandary I am in."
+
+Once more Tavernake paused for a few moments.  He was never a
+quick thinker and the situation was certainly an embarrassing one
+for him.
+
+"Madam," he replied at length, "I beg that you will tell me
+nothing.  The young lady of whom you have spoken permits me to
+call myself her friend, and what she has not told me herself I do
+not wish to learn from others.  I will tell her of this meeting
+with you, and if it is her desire, I will bring you her address
+myself within a few hours.  I cannot do more than that."
+
+Her face was suddenly cold and hard.
+
+"You mean that you will not!" she exclaimed angrily.  "You are
+obstinate.  I do not know how you dare to refuse what I ask."
+
+The car had come to a standstill.  He stepped out on to the
+pavement.
+
+"This is Grantham House, madam," he announced.  "Will you
+descend?"
+
+He heard her draw a quick breath between her teeth and he caught
+a gleam in her eyes which made him feel vaguely uneasy.  She was
+very angry indeed.
+
+"I do not think that it is necessary for me to do so," she said
+frigidly.  "I do not like the look of the house at all.  I do not
+believe that it will suit me."
+
+"At least, now that you are here," he protested, "you will, if
+you please, go over it.  I should like you to see the ballroom.
+The decorations are supposed to be quite exceptional."
+
+She hesitated for a moment and then, with a slight shrug of the
+shoulders, she yielded.  There was a note in his tone not exactly
+insistent, and yet dominant, a note which she obeyed although
+secretly she wondered at herself for doing so.  They passed
+inside the house and she followed him from room to room, leaving
+him to do all the talking.  She seemed very little interested but
+every now and then she asked a languid question.
+
+"I do not think that it is in the least likely to suit me," she
+decided at last.  "It is all very magnificent, of course, but I
+consider that the rent is exorbitant."
+
+Tavernake regarded her thoughtfully.
+
+"I believe," he said, " that our client might be disposed to
+consider some reduction, in the event of your seriously
+entertaining taking the house.  If you like, I will see him on
+the subject.  I feel sure that the amount I have mentioned could
+be reduced, if the other conditions were satisfactory."
+
+"There would be no harm in your doing so," she assented.  "How
+soon can you come and let me know'"
+
+"I might be able to ring you up this evening; certainly to-morrow
+morning," he answered.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"I will not speak upon the telephone," she declared.  "I only
+allow it in my rooms under protest.  You must come and tell me
+what your client says.  When can you see him?"
+
+"It is doubtful whether I shall be able to find him this
+evening," he replied.  "It would probably be to-morrow morning."
+
+"You might go and try at once," she suggested.
+
+He was a little surprised.
+
+"You are really interested in the matter, then?" he inquired.
+
+"Yes, yes," she told him, "of course I am interested.  I want you
+to come and see me directly you have heard.  It is important.
+Supposing you are able to find your client to-night, shall you
+have seen the young lady before then?"
+
+"I am afraid not," he answered.
+
+"You must try," she begged, laying her fingers upon his shoulder.
+"Mr. Tavernake, do please try.  You can't realize what all this
+anxiety means to me.  I am not at all well and I am seriously
+worried about -about that young lady.  I tell you that I must
+have an interview with her.  It is not for my sake so much as
+hers.  She must be warned."
+
+"Warned?" Tavernake repeated.  "I really don't understand."
+
+"Of course you don't!" she exclaimed impatiently.  "Why should
+you understand?  I don't want to offend you, Mr. Tavernake," she
+went on hurriedly.  "I would like to treat you quite frankly.  It
+really isn't your place to make difficulties like this.  What is
+this young lady to you that you should presume to consider
+yourself her guardian?"
+
+"She is a boarding-house acquaintance," Tavernake confessed,
+"nothing more."
+
+"Then why did you tell me, only a moment ago, that she was your
+sister?" Mrs. Gardner demanded.
+
+Tavernake threw open the door before which they had been
+standing.
+
+"This," he said, "is the famous dancing gallery.  Lord Clumber is
+quite willing to allow the pictures to remain, and I may tell you
+that they are insured for over sixty thousand pounds.  There is
+no finer dancing room than this in all London."
+
+Her eyes swept around it carelessly.
+
+"I have no doubt," she admitted coldly, "that it is very
+beautiful.  I prefer to continue our discussion."
+
+"The dining-room," he went on, "is almost as large.  Lord Clumber
+tells us that he has frequently entertained eighty guests for
+dinner.  The system of ventilation in this room is, as you see,
+entirely modern."
+
+She took him by the arm and led him to a seat at the further end
+of the apartment.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she said, making an obvious attempt to control
+her temper, "you seem like a very sensible young man, if you will
+allow me to say so, and I want to convince you that it is your
+duty to answer my questions.  In the first place--don't be
+offended, will you?--but I cannot possibly see what interest you
+and that young lady can have in one another.  You belong, to put
+it baldly, to altogether different social stations, and it is not
+easy to imagine what you could have in common."
+
+She paused, but Tavernake had nothing to say.  His gift of
+silence amounted sometimes almost to genius.  She leaned so close
+to him while she waited in vain for his reply, that the ermine
+about her neck brushed his cheek.  The perfume of her clothes and
+hair, the pleading of her deep violet-blue eyes, all helped to
+keep him tongue-tied.  Nothing of this sort had ever happened to
+him before.  He did not in the least understand what it could
+possibly mean.
+
+"I am speaking to you now, Mr. Tavernake," she continued
+earnestly, "for your own good.  When you tell the young lady, as
+you have promised to this evening, that you have seen me, and
+that I am very, very anxious to find out where she is, she will
+very likely go down on her knees and beg you to give me no
+information whatever about her.  She will do her best to make you
+promise to keep us apart.  And yet that is all because she does
+not understand.  Believe me, it is better that you should tell me
+the truth.  You cannot know her very well, Mr. Tavernake, but she
+is not very wise, that young lady.  She is very obstinate, and
+she has some strange ideas.  It is not well for her that she
+should be left in the world alone.  You must see that for
+yourself, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+"She seems a very sensible young lady," he declared slowly.  "I
+should have thought that she would have been old enough to know
+for herself what she wanted and what was best for her."
+
+The woman at his side wrung her hands with a little gesture of
+despair.
+
+"Oh, why can't I make you understand!" she exclaimed, the emotion
+once more quivering in her tone.  "How can I--how can I possibly
+make you believe me?  Listen.  Something has happened of which
+she does not know--something terrible.  It is absolutely
+necessary, in her own interests as well as mine, that I see her,
+and that very shortly."
+
+"I shall tell her exactly what you say," Tavernake answered
+apparently unmoved.  "Perhaps it would be as well now if we went
+on to view the sleeping apartments."
+
+"Never mind about the sleeping apartments!" she cried quickly.
+"You must do more than tell her.  You can't believe that I want
+to bring harm upon any one.  Do I look like it?  Have I the
+appearance of a person of evil disposition?  You can be that
+young lady's best friend, Mr. Tavernake, if you will.  Take me to
+her now, this minute.  Believe me, if you do that, you will never
+regret it as long as you live."
+
+Tavernake studied the pattern of the parquet floor for several
+moments.  It was a difficult problem, this.  Putting his own
+extraordinary sensations into the background, he was face to face
+with something which he did not comprehend, and he disliked the
+position intensely.  After all, delay seemed safest.
+
+"Madam," he protested, "a few hours more or less can make but
+little difference."
+
+"That is for me to judge!" she exclaimed.  "You say that because
+you do not understand.  A few hours may make all the difference
+in the world."
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"I will tell you exactly what is in my mind," he said,
+deliberately.  "The young lady was terrified when she saw you
+that night accidentally in the chemist's shop.  She almost
+dragged me away, and although she was almost fainting when we
+reached the taxicab, her greatest and chief anxiety was that we
+should get away before you could follow us.  I cannot forget
+this.  Until I have received her permission, therefore, to
+disclose her whereabouts, we will, if you please, speak of
+something else."
+
+He rose to his feet and glancing around was just in time to see
+the change in the face of his companion.  That eloquently
+pleading smile had died away from her lips, her teeth were
+clenched.  She looked like a woman struggling hard to control
+some overwhelming passion.  Without the smile her lips seemed
+hard, even cruel.  There were evil things shining out of her
+eyes.  Tavernake felt chilled, almost afraid.
+
+"We will see the rest of the house," she declared coldly.
+
+They went on from room to room.  Tavernake, recovering himself
+rapidly, master of his subject, was fluent and practical.  The
+woman listened, with only a terse remark here and there.  Once
+more they stood in the hall.
+
+"Is there anything else you would like to see?" he asked.
+
+"Nothing," she replied, "but there is one thing more I have to
+say."
+
+He waited in stolid silence.
+
+"Only a week ago," she went on, looking him in the face, "I told
+a man who is what you call, I think, an inquiry agent, that I
+would give a hundred pounds if he could discover that young woman
+for me within twenty-four hours."
+
+Tavernake started, and the smile came back to the lips of Mrs.
+Wenham Gardner.  After all, perhaps she had found the way!
+
+"A hundred pounds is a great deal of money," he said
+thoughtfully.
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"Not so very much," she replied.  "About a fortnight's rent of
+this house, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+"Is the offer still open?" he asked.
+
+She looked into his eyes, and her face had once more the
+beautiful ingenuousness of a child.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she said, "the offer is still open.  Get into
+the car with me and drive back to my rooms at the Milan Court,
+and I will give you a cheque for a hundred pounds at once.  It
+will be very easily earned and you may just as well take it, for
+now I know where you are employed, I could have you followed day
+by day until I discover for myself what you are so foolishly
+concealing.  Be reasonable, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+Tavernake stood quite still.  His arms were folded, he was
+looking out of the hall window at the smoky vista of roofs and
+chimneys.  From the soles of his ready-made boots to his
+ill-brushed hair, he was a commonplace young man.  A hundred
+pounds was to him a vast sum of money.  It represented a year's
+strenuous savings, perhaps more.  The woman who watched him
+imagined that he was hesitating.  Tavernake, however, had no such
+thought in his mind.  He stood there instead, wondering what
+strange thing had come to him that the mention of a hundred
+pounds, delightful sum though it was, never tempted him for a
+single second.  What this woman had said might be true.  She
+would probably be able to discover the address easily enough
+without his help.  Yet no such reflection seemed to make the
+least difference.  From the days of his earliest boyhood, from
+the time when he had flung himself into the struggle, money had
+always meant much to him, money not for its own sake but as the
+key to those things which he coveted in life.  Yet at that moment
+something stronger seemed to have asserted itself.
+
+"You will come?" she whispered, passing her arm through his.  "We
+will be there in less than five minutes, and I will write you the
+cheque before you tell me anything."
+
+He moved towards the door indeed, but he drew a little away from
+her.
+
+"Madam," he said, "I am sorry to seem so obstinate, but I thought
+I had made you understand some time ago.  I do not feel at
+liberty to tell you anything without that young lady's
+permission."
+
+"You refuse?" she cried, incredulously.  "You refuse a hundred
+pounds?"
+
+He opened the door of the car.  He seemed scarcely to have heard
+her.
+
+"At about eleven o'clock to-morrow morning," he announced, "I
+shall have the pleasure of calling upon you.  I trust that you
+will have decided to take the house."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
+
+
+Tavernake sat a few hours later at his evening meal in the tiny
+sitting-room of an apartment house in Chelsea.  He wore a black
+tie, and although he had not yet aspired to a dinner coat, the
+details of his person and toilet showed signs of a new attention.
+Opposite to him was Beatrice.
+
+"Tell me," she asked, as soon as the small maid-servant who
+brought in their first dish had disappeared, "what have you been
+doing all day?  Have you been letting houses or surveying land or
+book-keeping, or have you been out to Marston Rise?"
+
+It was her customary question, this.  She really took an interest
+in his work.
+
+"I have been attending a rich American client," he announced, "a
+compatriot of your own.  I went with her to Grantham House in her
+own motor-car.  I believe she thinks of taking it."
+
+"American!" Beatrice remarked.  "What was her name? "
+
+Tavernake looked up from his plate across the little table,
+across the bowl of simple flowers which was its sole decoration.
+
+"She called herself Mrs. Wenham Garner!"
+
+Away like a flash went the new-found peace in the girl's face.
+She caught at her breath, her fingers gripped the table in front
+of her.  Once more she was as he had known her first--pale, with
+great terrified eyes shining out of a haggard face.
+
+"She has been to you," Beatrice gasped, "for a house?  You are
+sure?"
+
+"I am quite sure," Tavernake declared, calmly.
+
+"You recognized her?"
+
+He assented gravely.
+
+"It was the woman who stood in the chemist's shop that night,
+signing her name in a book," he said.
+
+He did not apologize in any way for the shock he had given her.
+He had done it deliberately.  From that very first morning, when
+they had breakfasted together at London Bridge, he had felt that
+he deserved her confidence, and in a sense it was a grievance
+with him that she had withheld it.
+
+"Did she recognize you?"
+
+"Yes," he admitted.  "I was sent for into the office and found
+her there with the chief.  I felt sure that she recognized me
+from the first, and when she agreed to look at Grantham House,
+she insisted upon it that I should accompany her.  While we were
+in the motor-car, she asked me about you.  She wished for your
+address."
+
+"Did you give it to her?" the girl cried, breathlessly.
+
+"No; I said that I must consult you first."
+
+She drew a little sigh of relief.  Nevertheless, she was looking
+white and shaken.
+
+"Did she say what she wanted me for?"
+
+"She was very mysterious," Tavernake answered.  "She spoke of
+some danger of which you knew nothing.  Before I came away, she
+offered me a hundred pounds to let her know where you were."
+
+Beatrice laughed softly.
+
+"That is just like Elizabeth," she declared.  "You must have made
+her very angry.  When she wants anything, she wants it very badly
+indeed, and she will never believe that every person has not his
+price.  Money means everything to her.  If she had it, she would
+buy, buy, buy all the time."
+
+"On the face of it," Tavernake remarked, soberly, "her offer
+seemed rather an absurd one.  If she is in earnest, if she is
+really so anxious to discover your whereabouts, she will
+certainly be able to do so without my help."
+
+"I am not so sure," Beatrice replied.  "London is a great hiding
+place."
+
+"A private detective," he began,--
+
+Beatrice shook her head.
+
+"I do not think," she said, "that Elizabeth will care to employ a
+private detective.  Tell me, have you to see her upon this
+business again?"
+
+"I am going to her flat at the Milan Court to-morrow morning at
+eleven o'clock."
+
+Beatrice leaned back in her chair.  Presently she recommenced her
+dinner.  She had the air of one to whom a respite has been
+granted.  Tavernake, in a way, began to resent this continued
+silence of hers.  He had certainly hoped that she would at least
+have gone so far as to explain her anxiety to keep her
+whereabouts secret.
+
+"You must remember," he went on, after a short pause, "that I am
+in a somewhat peculiar position with regard to you, Beatrice.  I
+know so little that I do not even know how to answer in your
+interests such questions as Mrs. Wenham Gardner asked me.  I am
+not complaining, but is this state of absolute ignorance
+necessary?"
+
+A new thought seemed to come to Beatrice.  She looked at her
+companion curiously.
+
+"Tell me," she asked, "what did you think of Mrs. Wenham
+Gardner?"
+
+Tavernake answered deliberately, and after a moment's reflection.
+
+"I thought her," he said, "one of the most beautiful women I have
+ever seen in my life.  That is not saying very much, perhaps, but
+to me it meant a good deal.  She was exceedingly gracious and her
+interest in you seemed quite real and even affectionate.  I do
+not understand why you should wish to hide from such a woman."
+
+"You found her attractive?" Beatrice persisted.
+
+"I found her very attractive indeed," Tavernake admitted, without
+hesitation.  "She had an air with her.  She was quite different
+from all the women I have ever met at the boarding-house or
+anywhere else.  She has a face which reminded me somehow of the
+Madonnas you took me to see in the National Gallery the other
+day."
+
+Beatrice shivered slightly.  For some reason, his remark seemed
+to have distressed her.
+
+"I am very, very sorry," she declared, "that Elizabeth ever came
+to your office.  I want you to promise me, Leonard, that you will
+be careful whenever you are with her."
+
+Tavernake laughed.
+
+"Careful!" he repeated.  "She isn't likely to be even civil to me
+tomorrow when I tell her that I have seen you and I refuse to
+give her your address.  Careful, indeed!  What has a poor clerk
+in a house-agent's office to fear from such a personage?"
+
+The servant had reappeared with their second and last course.
+For a few moments they spoke of casual subjects.  Afterwards,
+however, Tavernake asked a question.
+
+"By the way," he said, "we are hoping to let Grantham House to
+Mrs. Wenham Gardner.  I suppose she must be very wealthy?"
+
+Beatrice looked at him curiously.
+
+"Why do you come to me for information?" she demanded.  "I
+suppose that she brought you references?"
+
+"We haven't quite got to that stage yet," he answered.  "Somehow
+or other, from her manner of talking and general appearance, I do
+not think that either Mr. Dowling or I doubted her financial
+position."
+
+"I should never have thought you so credulous a person," remarked
+Beatrice, with a smile.
+
+Tavernake was genuinely disturbed.  His business instincts were
+aroused.
+
+"Do you really mean that this Mrs. Wenham Gardner is not a person
+of substance?" he inquired.
+
+Beatrice shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"She is the wife of a man who had the reputation of being very
+wealthy," she replied.  "She has no money of her own, I am sure."
+
+"She still lives with her husband, I suppose?" Tavernake asked.
+
+Beatrice closed her eyes.
+
+"I know very little about her," she declared.  "Last time I
+heard, he had disappeared, gone away, or something of the sort."
+
+"And she has no money," Tavernake persisted, "except what she
+gets from him?  No settlement, even, or anything of that sort?"
+
+"Nothing at all," Beatrice answered.
+
+"This is very bad news," Tavernake remarked, thinking gloomily of
+his wasted day.  "It will be a great disappointment to Mr.
+Dowling.  Why, her motor-car was magnificent, and she talked as
+though money were no object at all.  I suppose you are quite sure
+of what you are saying?"
+
+Beatrice shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"I ought to know," she answered, grimly, "for she is my sister."
+
+Tavernake remained quite motionless for a minute, without speech;
+it was his way of showing surprise.  When he was sure that he had
+grasped the import of her words, he spoke again.
+
+"Your sister!" he repeated.  "There is a likeness, of course.
+You are dark and she is fair, but there is a likeness.  That
+would account," he continued, "for her anxiety to find you."
+
+"It also accounts," Beatrice replied, with a little break of the
+lips, "for my anxiety that she should not find me.  Leonard," she
+added, touching his hand for a moment with hers, "I wish that I
+could tell you everything, but there are things behind, things so
+terrible, that even to you, my dear brother, I could not speak of
+them."
+
+Tavernake rose to his feet and lit a cigarette--a new habit with
+him, while Beatrice busied herself with a small coffee-making
+machine.  He sat in an easy-chair and smoked slowly.  He was
+still wearing his ready-made clothes, but his collar was of the
+fashionable shape, his tie well chosen and neatly adjusted.  He
+seemed somehow to have developed.
+
+"Beatrice," he asked, "what am I to tell your sister to-morrow?"
+
+She shivered as she set his coffee-cup down by his side.
+
+"Tell her, if you will, that I am well and not in want," she
+answered.  "Tell her, too, that I refuse to send my address.
+Tell her that the one aim of my life is to keep the knowledge of
+my whereabouts a secret from her."
+
+Tavernake relapsed into silence.  He was thinking.  Mysteries had
+no attraction for him--he loathed them.  Against this one
+especially he felt a distinct grudge.  Nevertheless, some
+instinct forbade his questioning the girl.
+
+"Apart from more personal matters, then," he asked after some
+time, "you would not advise me to enter into any business
+negotiations with this lady?"
+
+"You must not think of it," Beatrice replied, firmly.  "So far as
+money is concerned, Elizabeth has no conscience whatever.  The
+things she wants in life she will have somehow, but it is all the
+time at other people's expense.  Some day she will have to pay
+for it."
+
+Tavernake sighed.
+
+"It is very unfortunate," he declared.  "The commission on the
+letting of Grantham House would have been worth having."
+
+"After all, it is only your firm's loss," she reminded him.
+
+"It does not appeal to me like that," he continued.  "So long as
+I am manager for Dowling & Spence, I feel these things
+personally.  However, that does not matter.  I am afraid it is a
+disagreeable subject for you, and we will not talk about it any
+longer."
+
+She lit a cigarette with a little gesture of relief.  She came
+once more to his side.
+
+"Leonard," she said, "I know that I am treating you badly in
+telling you nothing, but it is simply because I do not want to
+descend to half truths.  I should like to tell you all or
+nothing.  At present I cannot tell you all."
+
+"Very well," he replied, "I am quite content to leave it with you
+to do as you think best."
+
+"Leonard," she continued, "of course you think me unreasonable.
+I can't help it.  There are things between my sister and myself
+the knowledge of which is a constant nightmare to me.  During the
+last few months of my life it has grown to be a perfect terror.
+It sent me into hiding at Blenheim House, it reconciled me even
+to the decision I came to that night on the Embankment.  I had
+decided that sooner than go back, sooner than ask help from her
+or any one connected with her, I would do what I tried to do the
+time when you saved my life."
+
+Tavernake looked at her wonderingly.  She was, indeed, under the
+spell of some deep emotion.  Her memory seemed to have carried
+her back into another world, somewhere far away from this dingy
+little sitting-room which they two were sharing together, back
+into a world where life and death were matters of small moment,
+where the great passions were unchained, and men and women moved
+among the naked things of life.  Almost he felt the thrill of it.
+It was something new to him, the touch of a magic finger upon his
+eyelids.  Then the moment passed and he was himself again,
+matter-of-fact, prosaic.
+
+"Let us dismiss the subject finally," he said.  "I must see your
+sister on business to-morrow, but it shall be for the last time."
+
+"I think," she murmured, "that you will be wise."
+
+He crossed the room and returned with a newspaper.
+
+"I saw your music in the hall as I came in," he remarked.  "Are
+you singing to-night?"
+
+The question was entirely in his ordinary tone.  It brought her
+back to the world of every-day things as nothing else could have
+done.
+
+"Yes; isn't it luck?" she told him.  "Three in one week.  I only
+heard an hour ago."
+
+"A city dinner?" he inquired.
+
+"Something of the sort," she replied.  "I am to be at the
+Whitehall Rooms at ten o'clock.  If you are tired, Leonard,
+please let me go alone.  I really do not mind.  I can get a 'bus
+to the door, there and back again."
+
+"I am not tired," he declared.  "To tell you the truth, I
+scarcely know what it is to be tired.  I shall go with you, of
+course."
+
+She looked at him with a momentary admiration of his powerful
+frame, his strong, forceful face.
+
+"It seems too bad," she remarked, "after a long day's work to
+drag you out again."
+
+He smiled.
+
+"I really like to come," he assured her.  "Besides," he added,
+after a moment's pause, "I like to hear you sing."
+
+"I wonder if you mean that?" she asked, looking at him curiously.
+"I have watched you once or twice when I have been singing to
+you.  Do you really care for it?"
+
+"Certainly I do.  How can you doubt it?  I do not," he continued,
+slowly, "understand music, or anything of that sort, of course,
+any more than I do the pictures you take me to see, and some of
+the books you talk about.  There are lots of things I can't get
+the hang of entirely, but they all leave a sort of pleasure
+behind.  One feels it even if one only half appreciates."
+
+She came over to his chair.
+
+"I am glad," she said, a little wistfully, "that there is one
+thing I do which you like."
+
+He looked at her reprovingly.
+
+"My dear Beatrice," he said, "I often wish I could make you
+understand how extraordinarily helpful and useful to me you have
+been."
+
+"Tell me in what way?" she begged.
+
+"You have given me," he assured her, "an insight into many things
+in life which I had found most perplexing.  You see, you have
+traveled and I haven't.  You have mixed with all classes of
+people, and I have gone steadily on in one groove.  You have told
+me many things which I shall find very useful indeed later on."
+
+"Dear me," she laughed, "you are making me quite conceited!"
+
+"Anyhow," he replied, "I don't want you to look upon me,
+Beatrice, in any way as a benefactor.  I am much more comfortable
+here than at the boarding-house and it is costing no more money,
+especially since you began to get those singing engagements.  By
+the way, hadn't you better go and get ready?"
+
+She smothered a sigh as she turned away and went slowly upstairs.
+To all appearance, no person who ever breathed was more ordinary
+than this strong-featured, self-centered young man who had put
+out his arm and snatched her from the Maelstrom.  Yet it seemed
+to her that there was something almost unnatural about his
+unapproachability.  She was convinced that he was entirely
+honest, not only with regard to his actual relations toward her,
+but with regard to all his purposes.  Her sex did not even seem
+to exist for him.  The fact that she was good-looking, and with
+her renewed health daily becoming more so, seemed to be of no
+account to him whatever.  He showed interest in her appearance
+sometimes, but it was interest of an entirely impersonal sort.
+He simply expressed himself as satisfied or dissatisfied, as a
+matter of taste.  It came to her at that moment that she had
+never seen him really relax.  Only when he sat opposite to that
+great map which hung now in the further room, and wandered about
+from section to section with a pencil in one hand and a piece of
+rubber in another, did he show anything which in any way
+approached enthusiasm, and even then it was always the
+unmistakable enthusiasm born of dead things.  Suddenly she
+laughed at herself in the little mirror, laughed softly but
+heartily.  This was the guardian whom Fate had sent for her!  If
+Elizabeth had only understood!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+Mr. PRITCHARD OF NEW YORK
+
+
+Later in the evening, Beatrice and Tavernake traveled together in
+a motor omnibus from their rooms at Chelsea to Northumberland
+Avenue.  Tavernake was getting quite used to the programme by
+now.  They sat in a dimly-lit waiting-room until the time came
+for Beatrice to sing.  Every now and then an excitable little
+person who was the secretary to some institution or other would
+run in and offer them refreshments, and tell them in what order
+they were to appear.  To-night there was no departure from the
+ordinary course of things, except that there was slightly more
+stir.  The dinner was a larger one than usual.  It came to
+Beatrice's turn very soon after their arrival, and Tavernake,
+squeezing his way a few steps into the dining-room, stood with
+the waiters against the wall.  He looked with curious eyes upon a
+scene with which he had no manner of sympathy.
+
+A hundred or so of men had dined together in the cause of some
+charity.  The odor of their dinner, mingled with the more
+aromatic perfume of the tobacco smoke which was already ascending
+in little blue clouds from the various tables, hung about the
+over-heated room, seeming, indeed, the fitting atmosphere for the
+long rows of guests.  The majority of them were in a state of
+expansiveness.  Their faces were redder than when they had sat
+down; a certain stiffness had departed from their shirt-fronts
+and their manners; their faces were flushed, their eyes watery.
+There were a few exceptions--paler-faced men who sat there with
+the air of endeavoring to bring themselves into accord with
+surroundings in which they had no real concern.  Two of these
+looked up with interest at the first note of Beatrice's song.
+The one was sitting within a few places of the chairman, and he
+was too far away for his little start to be noticed by either
+Tavernake or Beatrice.  The nearer one, however, Tavernake
+happened to be watching, and he saw the change in his expression.
+The man was, in his way, ugly.  His face was certainly not a good
+one, although he did not appear to share the immediate weaknesses
+of his neighbors.  To every note of the song he listened
+intently.  When it was over, he rose and came toward Tavernake.
+
+"I beg your pardon," he said, "but did I not see you come in with
+the young lady who has just been singing?"
+
+"You may have," Tavernake answered.  "I certainly did come with
+her."
+
+"May I ask if you are related to her?"
+
+Tavernake had got over his hesitation in replying to such
+questions, by now.  He answered promptly.
+
+"I am her brother," he declared.
+
+The man produced a card.
+
+"Please introduce me to her," he begged, laconically.
+
+"Why should I?" Tavernake asked.  "I have no reason to suppose
+that she desires to know you."
+
+The man stared at him for a moment, and then laughed.
+
+"Well," he said, "you had better show your sister my card.  She
+is, I presume, a professional, as she is singing here.  My desire
+to make her acquaintance is purely actuated by business motives."
+
+Tavernake moved away toward the waiting-room.
+
+The man, who according to his card was Mr. Sidney Grier, would
+have followed him in, but Tavernake stopped him.
+
+"If you will wait here," he suggested, "I will see whether my
+sister desires to meet you."
+
+Once more Mr. Sidney Grier looked surprised, but after a second
+glance at Tavernake he accepted his suggestion and remained
+outside.  Tavernake took the card to Beatrice.
+
+"Beatrice," he announced, "there is a man outside who has heard
+you sing and who wants to be introduced."
+
+She took the card and her eyes opened wide.
+
+"Do you know who he is?" Tavernake asked.
+
+"Of course," she answered.  "He is a great producer of musical
+comedies.  Let me think."
+
+She stood with the card in her hand.  Some one else was singing
+now--an ordinary modern ballad of love and roses, rapture and
+despair.  They heard the rising and falling of the woman's voice;
+the clatter of the dinner had ceased.  Beatrice stood still
+thinking, her fingers clinching the card of Mr. Sidney Grier.
+
+"You must bring him in," she said to Tavernake finally.
+
+Tavernake went outside.
+
+"My sister will see you," he remarked, with the air of one who
+brings good news.
+
+Mr. Sidney Grier grunted.  He was not used to being kept waiting,
+even for a second.  Tavernake ushered him into the retiring room,
+and the other two musicians who were there stared at him as at a
+god.
+
+"This is the gentleman whose card you have, Beatrice," Tavernake
+announced.  "Mr. Sidney Grier--Miss Tavernake!"
+
+The man smiled.
+
+"Your brother seems to be suspicious of me," he declared.  "I
+found it quite difficult to persuade him that you might find it
+interesting to talk to me for a few minutes."
+
+"He does not quite understand," Beatrice answered.  "He has not
+much experience of musical affairs or the stage, and your name
+would not have any significance for him."
+
+Tavernake went outside and listened idly to the song which was
+proceeding.  It was a class of music which secretly he preferred
+to the stranger and more haunting notes of Beatrice's melodies.
+Apparently the audience was of his opinion, for they received it
+with a vociferous encore, to which the young lady generously
+replied with a music-hall song about "A French lady from over the
+water."  Towards the close of the applause which marked the
+conclusion of this effort, Tavernake felt himself touched lightly
+upon the arm.  He turned round.  By his side was standing the
+other dinner guest who had shown some interest in Beatrice.  He
+was a man apparently of about forty years of age, tall and
+broad-shouldered, with black moustache, and dark, piercing eyes.
+Unlike most of the guests, he wore a short dinner-coat and black
+tie, from which, and his slight accent, Tavernake concluded that
+he was probably an American.
+
+"Say, you'll forgive my speaking to you," he said, touching
+Tavernake on the arm.  "My name is Pritchard.  I saw you come in
+with the young lady who was singing a few minutes ago, and if you
+won't consider it a liberty, I'll be very glad indeed if you'll
+answer me one question."
+
+Tavernake stiffened insensibly.
+
+"It depends upon the question," he replied, shortly.
+
+"Well, it's about the young lady, and that's a fact," Mr.
+Pritchard admitted.  "I see that her name upon the programme is
+given as Miss Tavernake.  I was seated at the other end of the
+room but she seemed to me remarkably like a young lady from the
+other side of the Atlantic, whom I am very anxious to meet."
+
+"Perhaps you will kindly put your question in plain words,"
+Tavernake said.
+
+"Why, that's easy," Mr. Pritchard declared.  "Is Miss Tavernake
+really her name, or an assumed one?  I expect it's the same over
+here as in my country--a singer very often sings under another
+name than her own, you know," he added, noting Tavernake's
+gathering frown.
+
+"The young lady in question is my sister, and I do not care to
+discuss her with strangers," Tavernake announced.
+
+Mr. Pritchard nodded pleasantly.
+
+"Why, of course, that ends the matter," he remarked.  "Sorry to
+have troubled you, anyway."
+
+He strolled off back to his seat and Tavernake returned
+thoughtfully to the dressing-room.  He found Beatrice alone and
+waiting for him.
+
+"You've got rid of that fellow, then?" he inquired.
+
+Beatrice assented.
+
+"Yes; he didn't stay very long," she replied.
+
+"Who was he?" Tavernake asked, curiously.
+
+"From a musical comedy point of view," she said, "he was the most
+important person in London.  He is the emperor of stage-land.  He
+can make the fortune of any girl in London who is reasonably
+good-looking and who can sing and dance ever so little."
+
+"What did he want with you?" Tavernake demanded, suspiciously.
+
+"He asked me whether I would like to go upon the stage.  What do
+you think about it, Leonard?"
+
+Tavernake, for some reason or other, was displeased.
+
+"Would you earn much more money than by singing at these
+dinners?" he asked.
+
+"Very, very much more," she assured him.
+
+"And you would like the life?"
+
+She laughed softly.
+
+"Why not?  It isn't so bad.  I was on the stage in New York for
+some time under much worse conditions."
+
+He remained silent for a few minutes.  They had made their way
+into the street now and were waiting for an omnibus.
+
+"What did you tell him?" he asked, abruptly.
+
+She was looking down toward the Embankment, her eyes filled once
+more with the things which he could not understand.
+
+"I have told him nothing yet," she murmured.
+
+"You would like to accept?"
+
+She nodded.
+
+"I am not sure," she replied.  "If only - I dared!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+WOMAN'S WILES
+
+
+At eleven o'clock the next morning, Tavernake presented himself
+at the Milan Court and inquired for Mrs. Wenham Gardner.  He was
+sent at once to her apartments in charge of a page.  She was
+lying upon a sofa piled up with cushions, wrapped in a wonderful
+blue garment which seemed somehow to deepen the color of her
+eyes.  By her side was a small table on which was some chocolate,
+a bowl of roses, and a roll of newspapers.  She held out her hand
+toward Tavernake, but did not rise.  There was something almost
+spiritual about her pallor, the delicate outline of her figure,
+so imperfectly concealed by the thin silk dressing-gown, the
+faint, tired smile with which she welcomed him.
+
+"You will forgive my receiving you like this, Mr. Tavernake?" she
+begged.  "To-day I have a headache.  I have been anxious for your
+coming.  You must sit by my side, please, and tell me at once
+whether you have seen Beatrice."
+
+Tavernake did exactly as he was bidden.  The chair toward which
+she had pointed was quite close to the sofa, but there was no
+other unoccupied in the room.  She raised herself a little on the
+couch and turned towards him.  Her eyes were fixed anxiously upon
+his, her forehead slightly wrinkled, her voice tremulous with
+eagerness.
+
+"You have seen her?"
+
+"I have," he admitted, looking steadily into the lining of his
+hat.
+
+"She has been cruel," Elizabeth declared.  "I can tell it from
+your face.  You have bad news for me."
+
+"I do not know," Tavernake replied, "whether she has been cruel
+or not.  She refuses to allow me to tell you her address.  She
+begged me, indeed, to keep away from you altogether."
+
+"Why?  Did she tell you why?"
+
+"She says that you are her sister, that you have no money of your
+own and that your husband has left you," Tavernake answered,
+deliberately.
+
+"Is that all?"
+
+"No, it is not all," he continued.  "As to the rest, she told me
+nothing definite.  It is quite clear, however, that she is very
+anxious to keep away from you."
+
+"But her reason?" Elizabeth persisted.  "Did she give you no
+reason?"
+
+Tavernake looked her in the face.
+
+"She gave me no reason," he said.
+
+"Do you believe that she is justified in treating me like this?"
+Elizabeth asked, playing nervously with a pendant which hung from
+her smooth, bare neck.
+
+"Of course I do," he replied.  "I am quite sure that she would
+not feel as she does unless you had been guilty of something very
+terrible indeed."
+
+The woman on the couch winced as though some one had struck her.
+A more susceptible man than Tavernake must have felt a little
+remorseful at the tears which dimmed for a moment her beautiful
+eyes.  Tavernake, however, although be felt a moment's
+uneasiness, although he felt himself assailed all the time by a
+curious new emotion which he utterly failed to understand, was
+nevertheless still immune.  The things which were to happen to
+him had not yet, arrived.
+
+"Of course," he continued, "I was very much disappointed to hear
+this, because I had hoped that we might have been able to let
+Grantham House to you.  We cannot consider the matter at all now
+unless you pay for everything in advance."
+
+She uncovered her eyes and looked at him.  People so direct of
+speech as this had come very seldom into her life.  She was
+conscious of a thrill of interest.  The study of men was a
+passion with her.  Here was indeed a new type!
+
+"So you think that I am an adventuress," she murmured.
+
+He reflected for a moment.
+
+"I suppose," he admitted, "that it comes to that.  I should not
+have returned at all if I had not promised.  If there is any
+message which you wish me to give your sister, I will take it,
+but I cannot tell you her address."
+
+She laid her hand suddenly upon his, and raising herself a little
+on the couch, leaned towards him.  Her eyes and her lips both
+pleaded with him.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she said slowly, "Beatrice is such a dear,
+obstinate creature, but she does not quite appreciate my
+position.  Do me a favor, please.  If you have promised not to
+give me her address let me at least know some way or some place
+in which I could come across her.  I am sure she will be glad
+afterwards, and I--I shall be very grateful."
+
+Tavernake felt that he was enveloped by something which he did
+not understand, but his lack of experience was so great that he
+did not even wonder at his insensibility.
+
+"I shall keep my word to your sister," he announced, "in the
+spirit as well as the letter.  It is quite useless to ask me to
+do otherwise."
+
+Elizabeth was at first amazed, then angry, how angry she scarcely
+knew even herself.  She had been a spoilt child, she had grown
+into a spoilt woman.  Men, at least, had been ready enough to do
+her bidding all her life.  Her beauty was of that peculiar kind,
+half seductive, half pathetic, wholly irresistible.  And now
+there had come this strange, almost impossible person, against
+the armor of whose indifference she had spent herself in vain.
+Her eyes filled with tears once more as she looked at him, and
+Tavernake became uneasy.  He glanced at the clock and again
+toward the door.
+
+"I think, if you will excuse me," he began,--
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she interrupted, "you are very unkind to me,
+very unkind indeed."
+
+"I cannot help it," he answered.
+
+"If you knew everything," she continued, "you would not be so
+obstinate.  If Beatrice herself were here, if I could whisper
+something in her ear, she would be only too thankful that I had
+found her out.  Beatrice has always misunderstood me, Mr.
+Tavernake.  It is a little hard upon me, for we are both so far
+away from home, from our friends."
+
+"You can send her any message you like by me," Tavernake
+declared.  "If you like, I will wait while you write a letter.
+If you really have anything to say to her which might change her
+opinion, you can write it, can't you?"
+
+She looked down at her hands--very beautiful and well-kept hands
+--and sighed.  This young man, with his unusual imperturbability
+and hateful common sense, was getting on her nerves.
+
+"It is so hard to write things, Mr. Tavernake," she said, "but,
+of course, it is something to know that if the worst happens I
+can send her a letter.  I shall think about that for a short
+time.  Meanwhile, there is so much about her I would love to have
+you tell me.  She has no money, has she?  How does she support
+herself?"
+
+"She sings occasionally at concerts," Tavernake replied after a
+moment's pause.  "I suppose there is no harm in telling you
+that."
+
+Elizabeth leaned towards him.  She was very loth indeed to
+acknowledge defeat.  Once more her voice was deliciously soft,
+her forehead delicately wrinkled, her blue eyes filled with
+alluring light.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she murmured, "do you know that you are not in
+the least kind to me?  Beatrice and I are sisters, after all.
+Even she has admitted that.  She left me most unkindly at a
+critical time in my life; she misunderstood things; if I were to
+see her, I could explain everything.  I feel it very much that
+she is living apart from me in this city where we are both
+strangers.  I am anxious about her, Mr. Tavernake.  Does she want
+money?  If so, will you take her some from me?  Can't you suggest
+any way in which I could help her?  Do be my friend, please, and
+advise me."
+
+Life was certainly opening out for Tavernake.  The atmosphere by
+which he was surrounded, which she was deliberately creating
+around him, was the atmosphere of an unknown world.  It was a
+position, this, entirely novel to him.  Nevertheless, he did his
+best to cope with it intelligently.  He reflected carefully
+before he made any reply, he refused absolutely to listen to the
+strange voices singing in his ears, and he delivered his decision
+with his usual air of finality.
+
+"I am afraid," he said, "that since Beatrice refuses even to let
+you know her whereabouts, she would not wish to accept anything
+from you.  It seems a pity," he went on, the instincts of the
+money-saver stirring within him; "she is certainly none too well
+off."
+
+The lady on the couch sighed.
+
+"Beatrice has at least a friend," she murmured.  "It is a great
+deal to have a friend.  It is more than I have.  We are both so
+far from home here.  Often I am sorry that we ever left America.
+England is not a hospitable country, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+Again this painfully literal young man spoke out what was in his
+mind.
+
+"There was a gentleman in the motor-car with you the other
+night," he reminded her.
+
+She bit her lip.
+
+"He was just an acquaintance," she answered, "a man whom I used
+to know in New York, passing through London.  He called on me and
+asked me to go to the theatre and supper.  Why not?  I have had a
+terrible time during the last few months, Mr. Tavernake, and I am
+very lonely--lonelier than ever since my sister deserted me."
+
+Tavernake began to feel, ridiculous though it seemed, that in
+some subtle and inexplicable fashion he was in danger.  At any
+rate, he was hopelessly bewildered.  He did not understand why
+this very beautiful lady should look at him as though they were
+old friends, why her eyes should appeal to him so often for
+sympathy, why her fingers, which a moment ago were resting
+lightly upon his hand, and which she had drawn away with
+reluctance, should have burned him like pin-pricks of fire.  The
+woman who wishes to allure may be as subtle as possible in her
+methods, but a sense of her purpose, however vague it may be, is
+generally communicated to her wouldbe victim.  Tavernake was
+becoming distinctly uneasy.  He had no vanity.  He knew from the
+first that this beautiful creature belonged to a world far
+removed from any of which he had any knowledge.  The only
+solution of the situation which presented itself to him was that
+she might be thinking of borrowing money from him!
+
+"There was never a time in my life," she continued softly, "when
+I felt that I needed a friend more.  I am afraid that my sister
+has prejudiced you against me, Mr. Tavernake.  Beatrice is very
+young, and the young are not always sympathetic, you know.  They
+do not make allowances, they do not understand."
+
+"Why did you tell Mr. Dowling things which were not true?" he
+asked bluntly.
+
+She sighed, and looked down at the handkerchief with which she
+had been toying.
+
+"It was a very silly piece of conceit," she admitted, "but, you
+see, I had to tell him something."
+
+"Why did you come to the office at all?" he continued.
+
+"Do you really want to know that?" she whispered softly.
+
+"Well,--"
+
+"I will tell you," she went on suddenly.  "It sounds foolish, in
+a way, and yet it wasn't really, because, you see,"--she smiled
+at him--" I was anxious about Beatrice.  I saw you come out of
+the office that morning, and I recognized you at once.  I knew
+that it was you who had been with Beatrice.  I made an excuse
+about the house to come and see whether I could find you out."
+
+Tavernake, in whom the vanity was not yet born, missed wholly the
+significance of her smile, her trifling hesitation.
+
+"All that," he declared, "is no reason why you should have told
+Mr. Dowling that your husband was a millionaire and had given you
+carte blanche about taking a house."
+
+"Did I mention--my husband?"
+
+"Distinctly," he assured her.
+
+For the first time she had faltered in her speech.  Tavernake
+felt that she herself was shaken by some emotion.  Her eyes for a
+moment were strangely-lit; something had come into her face which
+he did not understand.  Then it passed.  The delightful smile,
+half deprecating, half appealing, once more parted her lips; the
+gleam of horror no longer shone in her blue eyes.
+
+"I am always so foolish about money," she declared, "so ignorant
+that I never know how I stand, but really I think that I have
+plenty, and a hundred or two more or less for rent didn't seem to
+matter much."
+
+It was a point of view, this, which Tavernake utterly failed to
+comprehend.  He looked at her in surprise.
+
+"I suppose," he protested, "you know how much a year you have to
+live on?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"It seems to vary all the time," she sighed.  "There are so many
+complications."
+
+He looked at her in amazement.
+
+"After all," he admitted, "you don't look as though you had much
+of a head for figures."
+
+"If only I had some one to help me!" she murmured.
+
+Tavernake moved uneasily in his chair.  His sense of danger was
+growing.
+
+"If you will excuse me now," he said, "I think that I must be
+getting back.  I am an employee at Dowling, Spence & Company's,
+you know, and my time is not quite my own.  I only came because I
+promised to."
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she begged, looking at him full out of those
+wonderful blue eyes, "please do me a great favor."
+
+"What is it?" he asked with clumsy ungraciousness.
+
+"Come and see me, every now and then, and let me know how my
+sister is.  Perhaps you may be able to suggest some way in which
+I can help her."
+
+Tavernake considered the question for a moment.  He was angry
+with himself for the unaccountable sense of pleasure which her
+suggestion had given him.
+
+"I am not quite sure," he said, "whether I had better come.
+Beatrice seemed quite anxious that I should not talk about her to
+you at all.  She did not like my coming to-day."
+
+"You seem to know a great deal about my sister," Elizabeth
+declared reflectively.  "You call her by her Christian name and
+you appear to see her frequently.  Perhaps, even, you are fond of
+her."
+
+Tavernake met his questioner's inquiring gaze blankly.  He was
+almost indignant.
+
+"Fond of her!" he exclaimed.  "I have never been fond of any one
+in my life, or anything--except my work," he added.
+
+She looked at him a little bewildered at first.
+
+"Oh, you strange person!" she cried, her lips breaking into a
+delightful smile.  "Don't you know that you haven't begun to live
+at all yet?  You don't even know anything about life, and at the
+back of it all you have capacity.  Yes," she went on, "I think
+that you have the capacity for living."
+
+Her hand fell upon his with a little gesture which was half a
+caress.  He looked around him as though seeking for escape.  He
+was on his feet now and he clutched at his hat.
+
+"I must go," he insisted almost roughly.
+
+"Am I keeping you?" she asked innocently.  "Well, you shall go as
+soon as you please, only you must promise me one thing.  You must
+come back, say within a week, and let me know how my sister is.
+I am not half so brutal as you think.  I really am anxious about
+her.  Please!"
+
+"I will promise that," he answered.
+
+"Wait one moment, then," she begged, turning to the letters by
+her side.  "There is just something I want to ask you.  Don't be
+impatient--it is entirely a matter of business."
+
+All the time he was acutely conscious of that restless desire to
+get out of the room.  The woman's white arms, from which the
+sleeves of her blue gown had fallen back, were stretched towards
+him as she lazily turned over her pile of correspondence.  They
+were very beautiful arms and Tavernake, although he had had no
+experience, was dimly aware of the fact.  Her eyes, too, seemed
+always to be trying to reach some part of him which was dead, or
+as yet unborn.  He could feel her striving to get there, beating
+against the walls of his indifference.  Why should a woman wear
+blue stockings because she had a blue gown, he wondered idly.
+She was not like Beatrice, this alluring, beautiful woman, who
+lay there talking to him in a manner whose meaning came to him
+only in strange, bewildering flashes.  He could be with Beatrice
+and feel the truth of what he had once told her--that her sex was
+a thing which need not even be taken into account between them.
+With this woman it was different; he felt that she wished it to
+be different.
+
+"Perhaps you had better tell me about that matter of business
+next time I am here," he suggested, with an abruptness which was
+almost brusque.  "I must go now.  I do not know why I have stayed
+so long."
+
+She held out her fingers.
+
+"You are a very sudden person," she declared, smiling at his
+discomfiture.  "If you must go!"
+
+He scarcely touched her hand, anxious only to get away.  And then
+the door opened and a man of somewhat remarkable appearance
+entered the room with the air of a privileged person.  He was
+oddly dressed, with little regard to the fashion of the moment.
+His black coat was cut after the mode of a past generation, his
+collar was of the type affected by Gladstone and his fellow-
+statesmen, his black bow was arranged with studied negligence and
+he showed more frilled white shirt-front than is usual in the
+daytime.  His silk hat was glossy but broad-brimmed; his masses
+of gray hair, brushed back from a high, broad forehead, gave him
+almost a patriarchal aspect.  His features were large and fairly
+well-shaped, but his mouth was weak and his cheeks lacked the
+color of a healthy life.  Tavernake stared at him open-mouthed.
+He, for his part, looked at Tavernake as he might have looked at
+some strange wild animal.
+
+"A thousand apologies, dear Elizabeth!" be exclaimed.  "I
+knocked, but I imagine that you did not hear me.  Knowing your
+habits, it did not occur to me that you might be engaged at this
+hour of the morning."
+
+"It is a young man from the house agent's," she announced
+indifferently, "come to see me about a flat."
+
+"In that case," he suggested amiably, "I am, perhaps, not in the
+way."
+
+Elizabeth turned her head slightly and looked at him; he backed
+precipitately toward the door.
+
+"In a few minutes," he said.  "I will return in a few minutes."
+
+Tavernake attempted to follow his example.
+
+"There is no occasion for your friend to leave," he protested.
+"If you have any instructions for us, a note to the office will
+always bring some one here to see you."
+
+She sat up on the couch and smiled at him.  His obvious
+embarrassment amused her.  It was a new sort of game, this,
+altogether.
+
+"Come, Mr. Tavernake," she said, "three minutes more won't
+matter, will it?  I will not keep you longer than that, I
+promise."
+
+He came reluctantly a few steps back.
+
+"I am sorry," he explained, "but we really are busy this
+morning."
+
+"This is business," she declared, still smiling at him
+pleasantly.  "My sister has filled you with suspicions about me.
+Some of them may be justifiable, some are not.  I am not so rich
+as I should like some people to believe.  It is so much easier to
+live well, you know, when people believe that you are rolling in
+money.  Still, I am by no means a pauper.  I cannot afford to
+take Grantham House, but neither can I afford to go on living
+here.  I have decided to make a change, to try and economize, to
+try and live within my means.  Now will you bring me a list of
+small houses or flats, something at not more than say two or
+three hundred a year?  It shall be strictly a business
+proceeding.  I will pay you for your time, if that is necessary,
+and your commission in advance.  There, you can't refuse my offer
+on those terms, can you?"
+
+Tavernake remained silent.  He was conscious that his lack of
+response seemed both sullen and awkward, but he was for the
+moment tongue-tied.  His habit of inopportune self-analysis had
+once more asserted itself.  He could not understand the curious
+nature of his mistrust of this woman, nor could he understand the
+pleasure which her suggestion gave him.  He wanted to refuse, and
+yet he was glad to be able to tell himself that he was, after
+all, but an employee of his firm and not in a position to decline
+business on their behalf.
+
+She leaned a little towards him; her tone was almost beseeching.
+
+"You are not going to be unkind?  You will not refuse me?" she
+pleaded.
+
+"I will bring you a list," he answered heavily, "on the terms you
+suggest."
+
+"To-morrow morning?" she begged.
+
+"As soon as I am able," he promised.
+
+Then he escaped.  Outside in the corridor, the man who had
+interrupted his interview was walking backwards and forwards.
+Tavernake passed him without responding to his bland greeting.
+He forgot all about the lift and descended five flights of
+stairs. . . .
+
+A few minutes later, he presented himself at the office and
+reported that Mrs. Wenham Gardner had decided unfavorably about
+Grantham House, and that she was not disposed, indeed, to take
+premises of anything like such a rental.  Mr. Dowling was
+disappointed, and inclined to think that his employee had
+mismanaged the affair.
+
+"I wish that I had gone myself," he declared.  "She obviously
+wished me to, but it happened to be inconvenient.  By-the-bye,
+Tavernake, close the door, will you?  There is another matter
+concerning which I should like to speak to you."
+
+Tavernake did as he was bidden at once, without any disquietude.
+His own services to the firm were of such a nature that he had no
+misgiving whatever as to his employer's desire for a private
+interview.
+
+"It is about the Marston Rise estate," Mr. Dowling explained,
+arranging his pince nez.  "I believe that the time is coming when
+some sort of overtures should be made.  You know what has been in
+my mind for a very considerable time."
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+"Yes," he admitted, "I know quite well."
+
+"I did hear a rumor," Mr. Dowling continued, "that some one had
+bought one small plot on the outskirts of the estate.  I dare say
+it is not true, and in any case it is not worth while troubling
+about, but it shows that the public is beginning to nibble.  I am
+of opinion that the time is almost--yes, almost ripe for a move."
+
+"Do you wish me to do anything in the matter, sir?" Tavernake
+asked.
+
+"In the first place," Mr. Dowling declared, "I should like you to
+try to find out whether any of the plots have really been sold,
+and, if so, to whom, and what would be their price.  Can you do
+this during the week?"
+
+"I think so," Tavernake answered.
+
+"Say Monday morning," Mr. Dowling suggested, taking down his hat.
+"I shall be playing golf to-morrow and Friday, and of course
+Saturday.  Monday morning you might let me have a report."
+
+Tavernake went back to his office.  After all, then, things were
+to come to a crisis a little earlier than he had thought.  He
+knew quite well that that report, if he made it honestly, and no
+other idea was likely to occur to him, would effectually sever
+his connection with Messrs. Dowling, Spence & Company.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE PLOT THICKENS
+
+
+The man whom Tavernake had left walking up and down the corridor
+lost no time in presenting himself once more at the apartments of
+Mrs. Wenham Gardner.  He entered the suite without ceremony,
+carefully closing both doors behind him.  It became obvious then
+that his deportment on the occasion of his previous appearance
+had been in the nature of a bluff.  The air with which he looked
+across the room at the woman who watched him was furtive; the
+hand which laid his hat upon the table was shaking; there was a
+gleam almost of terror in his eyes.  The woman remained
+impassive, inscrutable, simply watching him.  After a moment or
+two, however, she spoke--a single monosyllable.
+
+"Well?"
+
+The man broke down.
+
+"Elizabeth," he exclaimed, "you are too--too ghastly!  I can't
+stand it.  You are unnatural."
+
+She stretched herself upon the couch and turned towards him.
+
+"Unnatural, am I?" she remarked.  "And what are you?"
+
+He sank into a chair.  He had become very flabby indeed.
+
+"What you are always calling me, I suppose," he muttered,--"a
+coward.  You have so little consideration, Elizabeth.  My health
+isn't what it was."
+
+His eyes had wandered longingly toward the cupboard at the
+further end of the apartment.  The woman upon the couch smiled.
+
+"You may help yourself," she directed carelessly.  "Perhaps then
+you will be able to tell me why you have come in such a state."
+
+He crossed the room in a few hasty steps, his head and shoulders
+disappeared inside the cupboard.  There was the sound of the
+withdrawal of a cork, the fizz of a sodawater syphon.  He
+returned to his place a different man.
+
+"You must remember my age, Elizabeth dear," he said,
+apologetically.  "I haven't your nerve--it isn't likely that I
+should have.  When I was twenty-five, there was nothing in the
+world of which I was afraid."
+
+She looked him over critically.
+
+"Perhaps I am not so absolutely courageous as you think," she
+remarked.  "To tell you the truth, there are a good many things
+of which I am afraid when you come to me in such a state.  I am
+afraid of you, of what you will do or say."
+
+"You need not be," he assured her hastily.  "When I am away from
+you, I am dumb.  What I suffer no one knows.  I keep it to
+myself."
+
+She nodded, a little contemptuously.
+
+"I suppose you do your best," she declared.  "Tell me, now, what
+is this fresh thing which has disturbed you?"
+
+Her visitor stared at her.
+
+"Does there need to be any fresh thing?" he muttered.
+
+"I suppose it is something about Wenham?" she asked.
+
+The man shivered.  He opened his lips and closed them again.  The
+woman's tone, if possible, grew colder.
+
+"I hope you are not going to tell me that you have disobeyed my
+orders," she said.
+
+"No," he protested, "no!  I was there yesterday.  I came back by
+the mail from Penzance.  I had to motor thirty miles to catch
+it."
+
+"Something has happened, of course," she went on, "something
+which you are afraid to tell 'me.  Sit up like a man, my dear
+father, and let me have the truth."
+
+"Nothing fresh has happened at all," he assured her.  "It is
+simply that the memory of the day I spent at that place and that
+the sight of him has got on my nerves till I can't sleep or think
+of anything else."
+
+"What rubbish!" she exclaimed.
+
+"You have only seen the place in fine weather," he continued,
+dropping his voice a little.  "Elizabeth, you have no idea what
+it is really like.  Yesterday morning I got out of the train at
+Bodmin and I motored through to the village of Clawes.  After
+that there were five miles to walk.  There's no road, only a sort
+of broken track, and for the whole of that five miles there isn't
+even a farm building to be seen and I didn't meet a human soul.
+There was a sort of pall of white-gray mists everywhere over the
+moor, sometimes so dense that I couldn't see my way, and you
+could stop and listen and there wasn't a thing to be heard, not
+even a sheep bell."
+
+She laughed softly.  .
+
+"My dear, foolish father," she murmured, "you don't understand
+what a rest cure is.  This is quite all right, quite as it should
+be.  Poor Wenham has been seeing too many people all his life
+-- that is why we have to keep him quiet for a time.  You can
+skip the scenery.  I suppose you got to the house at last?"
+
+"Yes, I got there," continued her father.  "You know what a
+bleak-looking place it is, right on the side of a bare hill--a
+square, gray stone place just the color of the hillside.  Well, I
+got there and walked in.  There was Ted Mathers, half dressed, no
+collar, with a bottle of whiskey on the table, playing some
+wretched game of cards by himself.  Elizabeth, what a brute that
+man is!"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"Go on," she said.  "What about Wenham?"
+
+"He was there in a corner, gazing out of the window.  When I came
+he sprang up, but when he saw who it was, he--he tried to hide.
+He was afraid of me."
+
+"Why?" she asked.
+
+"He said that I--I reminded him of you."
+
+"Absurd!" she murmured.  "Tell me, how did he look?"
+
+"Ill, wretched, paler and thinner than ever, and wilder looking."
+
+"What did Mathers say about him?" she demanded.
+
+"What could he?  He told me that he cried all day and begged to
+be taken back to America."
+
+"No one goes near the place, I suppose?" she asked.
+
+"Not a soul.  A man comes from the village to sell things once a
+week.  Mathers knows when to expect him and takes care that
+Wenham is not around.  They are out of the world there--no road,
+no paths, nothing to bring even a tourist.  I could have imagined
+such a spot in Arizona, Elizabeth, but in England--no!"
+
+"Has he any amusements at all?" she inquired.
+
+The man's hands were shaking; once more his eyes went longingly
+toward the cupboard.
+
+"He has made--a doll," he said, "carved it out of a piece of wood
+and dressed it in oddments from his ties.  Mathers showed it to
+me as a joke.  Elizabeth, it was wonderful--horrible!"
+
+"Why?" she asked him.
+
+"It is you," he continued, moistening his lips with his tongue,
+"you, in a blue gown--your favorite shade.  He has even made blue
+stockings and strange little shoes.  He has got some hair from
+somewhere and parted it just like yours."
+
+"It sounds very touching," she remarked.
+
+The man was shivering again.
+
+"Elizabeth," he said, "I do not think that he means it kindly.
+Mathers took me up into his room.  He has made something there
+which looks like a scaffold.  The doll was hanging by a piece of
+string from the gallows.  Elizabeth!--my God, but it was like
+you!" he cried, suddenly dropping his head upon his arms.
+
+For a moment, a reflection of the terror which had seized him
+flashed in her own face.  It passed quickly away.  She laughed
+mockingly.
+
+"My dear father," she protested, "you are certainly not yourself
+this morning."
+
+"I saw you swinging," he muttered, "swinging by that piece of
+cord!  There was a great black pin through your heart.
+Elizabeth, if he should get away sometime!  If some one should
+come over from America and discover where he was!  If he should
+find us out!  Oh, my God, if he should find us out!"
+
+Elizabeth had risen to her feet.  She was standing now before the
+fire, her left elbow resting upon the mantelpiece, a trifle of
+silver gleaming in her right hand.
+
+"Father," she said, "there is no danger in life for those who
+know no fear.  Look at me."
+
+His eyes sought hers, fascinated.
+
+"If he should find me out," she continued, "it would be no such
+terrible thing, after all.  It would be the end."
+
+Her fingers disclosed the little ornament she was carrying--a
+tiny pistol.  She slipped it back into her pocket.  The man was
+wondering how such a thing as this came to be his daughter.
+
+"You have courage, Elizabeth," he whispered.
+
+"I have courage," she assented, "because I have brains.  I never
+allow myself to be in a position where I should be likely to get
+the worst of it.  Ever since the day when he turned so suddenly
+against me, I have been careful."
+
+Her father leaned towards her.
+
+"Elizabeth," he said, "I never really understood.  What was it
+that came over him so suddenly?  One day he was your slave, the
+next I think he would have murdered you if he could."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"Honestly," she replied, "I felt it impossible to keep up the
+sham any longer.  I married Wenham Gardner in New York because he
+was supposed to be a millionaire and because it seemed to be the
+best thing to do, but as to living with him, I never meant that.
+You know how ridiculous his behavior was on the boat.  He never
+let me out of his sight, but swore that he was going to give up
+smoking and drinking and lead a new life for my sake.  I really
+believe he meant it, too."
+
+"Wouldn't it have been better, dear," her father suggested,
+timidly, "to have encouraged him?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"He was absolutely hopeless," she declared.  "You say that I have
+no nerves; that is because I do not allow myself to suffer.  If I
+had gone on living with Wenham, it would have driven me mad.  His
+habits, his manner of life, everything disgusted me.  Until I
+came to see so much of him, I never understood what the term
+'decadent' really can mean.  The very touch of him grew to be
+hateful.  No woman could live with such a man.  By the way, he
+signed the draft, I suppose?"
+
+Her father handed her a slip of paper, which she looked at and
+locked in her drawer.
+
+"Did he make any trouble about it?" she asked.
+
+The professor shivered.
+
+"He refused to sign it," he said, in a low tone, "swore he would
+never sign it.  Mathers sent me out for a few minutes, made me go
+into another room.  When I came back, he gave me the draft.  I
+heard him calling out."
+
+"Mathers certainly earns his money," she remarked, drily.
+
+He gazed at her with grudging admiration.  This was his daughter,
+his own flesh and blood.  Back through the years, for a moment,
+he seemed to see her, a child with hair down her back, sitting on
+his knee, listening to his stories, wondering at the little arts
+and tricks by which he had wrested their pennies and sixpennies
+from a credulous public.  Phrenologist, hypnotist, conjurer--all
+these things the great Professor Franklin had called himself.
+Often, from the rude stage where he had given his performance, he
+had terrified to death the women and children of his audience.
+It flashed upon him at that moment that never, even in the days
+of her childhood, had he seen fear in Elizabeth's face.
+
+"You should have been a man, Elizabeth," he muttered.
+
+She shook her head, smiling as though not ill-pleased at the
+compliment.
+
+"The power of a man is so limited," she declared.  "A woman has
+more weapons."
+
+"More weapons indeed," the professor agreed, as his eyes traveled
+over the slim yet wonderful perfection of her form, lingered for
+a moment at the little knot of lace at her throat, wrestled with
+the delicate sweetness of her features, struggling hard to think
+from whom among his ancestors could have come a creature so
+physically attractive.
+
+"More weapons, indeed," he repeated.  "Elizabeth, what a gift--
+what a gift!"
+
+"You speak," she replied, "as though it were an evil one."
+
+"I was only thinking," he said, "that it seems a pity.  You are
+so wonderful, we might have found an easier and a less dangerous
+way to fortune."
+
+She smiled.
+
+"The Bohemian blood in me, I suppose," she remarked.  "The
+crooked ways attract, you know, when one has been brought up as I
+was."
+
+"Your poor mother had no love for them," he reminded her.
+
+"Beatrice has inherited everything that belonged to my mother.  I
+am your own daughter, father.  You ought to be proud of me.  But
+there, I gave you another commission.  Is it true that Jerry is
+really here?"
+
+"He arrived in England on Wednesday on the Lusitania.  He has
+been in town all the time since."
+
+A distinct frown darkened her face.
+
+"He must have had my letter, then," she murmured, half to
+herself.
+
+"Without a doubt," her father admitted.  "Elizabeth, why do you
+take chances about seeing this man?  He was fond of you in New
+York, I know, but then he was fond of his brother, too.  He may
+not believe your story.  It may be dangerous."
+
+She smiled.
+
+"I think I can convince Jerry Gardner of anything I choose to
+tell him," she said.  "Besides, it is absolutely necessary that I
+have some information about Wenham's affairs.  He must have a
+great deal more money somewhere and I must find out how we are to
+get at it."
+
+The professor shook his head.
+
+"I don't like it," he muttered.  "Supposing he finds Beatrice!"
+
+Elizabeth shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"Beatrice is made of silent stuff," she declared.  "I should
+never be afraid of her.  All the same, I wish I could find out
+just where she is.  It would look better if we were living
+together."
+
+The professor shook his head sadly.
+
+"She left us of her own free will," he said, "and I don't
+believe, Elizabeth, that she would ever come back again.  She
+knew very well what she was doing.  She knew that our views of
+life were not hers.  She didn't know half but she knew enough.
+You were quite right in what you said just now; Beatrice was more
+like her mother, and her mother was a good woman."
+
+"Really!" Elizabeth remarked, insolently.
+
+"Don't answer like that," he blustered, striking the table.  "She
+was your mother, too."
+
+The woman's face was inscrutable, hard, and flawless behind the
+little cloud of tobacco smoke.  The man began to tremble once
+more.  Every time he ventured to assert himself, a single look
+from her was sufficient to quell him.
+
+"Elizabeth," he muttered, "you haven't a heart, you haven't a
+soul, you haven't a conscience.  I wonder--what sort of a woman
+you are!"
+
+"I am your daughter," she reminded him, pleasantly.
+
+"I was never quite so bad as that," he went on, taking a large
+silk handkerchief from his pocket and dabbing his forehead.  "I
+had to live and times were hard.  I have cheated the public,
+perhaps.  I haven't been above playing at cards a little
+cleverly, or making something where I could out of the weaker
+men.  But, Elizabeth, I am afraid of you."
+
+"Men are generally afraid of the big stakes," she remarked,
+flicking the ash from her cigarette.  "They will cheat and lie
+for halfpennies, but they are bad gamblers when life or death
+-- the big things are in the balance.  Bah!" she went on.
+"Father, I want Jerry Gardner to come and see me."
+
+"If you can't make him come, my dear," the professor said, "I am
+sure it will be of no use my trying."
+
+"He has had my letter," she continued, half to herself; "he has
+had my letter and he does not come."
+
+"There is nothing to be done but wait," her father decided.
+
+"And meanwhile," she went on, "supposing he were to discover
+Beatrice, supposing they two were to come together; supposing he
+were to tell her what he knows and she were to tell him what she
+guessed!"
+
+The professor buried his face in his hands.  Elizabeth threw her
+cigarette away with an impatient gesture.
+
+"What an idiot I am!" she declared.  "What is the use of wasting
+time like this?"
+
+There was a knock at the door.  A trim-looking French maid
+presented herself.  She addressed her mistress in voluble French.
+A coiffeur and a manicurist were waiting in the next apartment;
+it was time that Madame habited herself.  The professor listened
+to these announcements with an air of half-admiring wonder.
+
+"I suppose I must be going," he said, rising to his feet.  "There
+is just one thing I should like to ask you, Elizabeth, if I may,
+before I go."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Who was the young man whom I met here just now?"
+
+"Why do you ask that?" she demanded.
+
+"I really do not know," her father replied, thoughtfully, "except
+that his appearance seemed a little singular.  In some respects
+he appeared so commonplace.  His clothes and bearing, in fact,
+were so ordinary that I was surprised to find him here with you.
+And, on the other hand, his face--you must remember, my dear,
+that this is entirely a professional instinct; I am still
+interested in faces--"
+
+"Quite so," she admitted.  "Go on.  The young man rather puzzles
+me myself.  I should like to hear what you make of him.  What did
+you think of his face?"
+
+"There was something powerful about it," he declared, "something
+dogged, splendid, narrow, impossible,--the sort of face which
+belongs to a man who achieves great things because he is too
+stupid to recognize failure, even when it has him in its arms and
+its fingers are upon his throat.  That young man has qualities,
+my dear, I am sure.  Mind you, at present they are dormant, but
+he has qualities."
+
+She led him to the door.
+
+"My dear father," she said, "sometimes I really respect you.  If
+you should come across that young man again, keep your eye upon
+him.  He knows one thing at least which I wish he would tell us
+-- he knows where Beatrice is."
+
+Her father looked at her in amazement.
+
+"He knows where Beatrice is and he has not told you?"
+
+She nodded.
+
+"You tried to have him tell you and he refused?" the professor
+persisted.
+
+"Exactly," she admitted.
+
+Her father put on his hat.
+
+"I knew that young man was something out of the common."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE JOY OF BATTLE
+
+
+They sat on the trunk of a fallen tree, in the topmost corner of
+the field.  In the hedge, close at hand, was a commotion of
+birds.  In the elm tree, a little further away, a thrush was
+singing.  A soft west wind blew in their faces; the air
+immediately around them was filled with sunlight.  Yet almost to
+their feet stretched one of those great arms of the city--a
+suburb, with its miles of villas, its clanging of electric cars,
+its waste plots, its rows of struggling shops.  And only a little
+further away still, the body itself--the huge city, throbbing
+beneath its pall of smoke and cloud.  The girl, who had been
+gazing steadily downwards for several moments, turned at last to
+her companion.
+
+"Do you know," she said, "that this makes me think of the first
+night you spoke to me?  You remember it--up on the roof at
+Blenheim House?"
+
+Tavernake did not answer for a moment.  He was looking through a
+queerly-shaped instrument that he had brought with him at
+half-a-dozen stakes that he had laboriously driven into the
+ground some distance away.  He was absolutely absorbed in his
+task.
+
+"The main avenue," he muttered softly to himself.  "Yes, it must
+be a trifle more to the left.  Then we get all the offshoots
+parallel and the better houses have their southern aspect.  I beg
+your pardon, Beatrice, did you say anything?" he broke off
+suddenly.
+
+She smiled.
+
+"Nothing worth mentioning.  I was just thinking that it reminded
+me a little up here of the first time you and I ever talked
+together."
+
+He glanced down at the panorama below, with its odd jumble of
+hideous buildings, softened here and there with wreaths of
+sunstained smoke, its great blots of ugliness irredeemable,
+insistent.
+
+"It's different, of course," she went on.  "I remember, even now,
+the view from the house-top that night.  In a sense, it was finer
+than this; everything was more lurid and yet more chaotic; one
+simply felt that underneath all those mysterious places was some
+great being, toiling and struggling--Life itself, groaning
+through space with human cogwheels.  Up here one sees too much.
+Oh, my dear Leonard," she continued, "to think that you, too,
+should be one of the devastators!"
+
+He fitted his instrument into its case and replaced it in his
+pocket.
+
+"Come," he said, "you mustn't call me hard names.  I shall remind
+you of the man whose works you are making me read.  You know what
+he says--'The aesthete is, after all, only a dallier.  The world
+lives and progresses by reason of its utilitarians.'  This hill
+represents to me most of the things that are worth having in
+life."
+
+She laughed shortly.
+
+"You will cut down those hedges and drive away the birds to find
+a fresh home; you will plough up the green grass, cut out a
+street and lay down granite stones.  Then I see your ugly little
+houses coming up like mushrooms all over the place.  You are a
+vandal, my dear Leonard."
+
+"I am simply obeying the law," he answered.  "After all, even
+from your own point of view, I do not think that it is so bad.
+Look closer, and you will find that the hedges are blackened here
+and there with smuts.  The birds will find a better dwelling
+place further away.  See how the smoke from those factory
+chimneys is sending its smuts across these fields.  They are no
+longer country; they are better gathered in."
+
+She shivered.
+
+"There is something about life," she said, sadly, "which
+terrifies me.  Every force that counts seems to be destructive."
+
+Up the steep hill behind them came the puffing and groaning of a
+small motor-car.  They both turned their heads to watch it come
+into view.  It was an insignificant affair of an almost extinct
+pattern, a single cylinder machine with a round tonneau back.
+The engine was knocking badly as the driver brought it to a
+standstill a few yards away from them.  Involuntarily Tavernake
+stiffened as he saw the two men who descended from it, and who
+were already passing through the gate close to where they were.
+One was Mr. Dowling, the other the manager of the bank where they
+kept their account.  Mr. Dowling recognized his manager with
+surprise but much cordiality.
+
+"Dear me!" he exclaimed.  "Dear me, this is most fortunate!  You
+know Mr. Tavernake, of course, Belton?  My manager, Mr. Tavernake
+--Mr. Belton, of the London & Westminster Bank.  I have brought
+Mr. Belton up here, Tavernake, to have a look round, so that he
+may know what we mean to do with all the money we shall have to
+come and borrow, eh?"
+
+The bank manager smiled.
+
+"It is a very fine situation," he remarked.
+
+The eyes of the two men fell upon Beatrice, who had drawn a
+little to one side.
+
+"May we have the pleasure, Tavernake?  "Mr. Dowling said,
+graciously.  "You are not married, I believe?"
+
+"No, this is my sister," Tavernake answered, slowly,--"Mr. Belton
+and Mr. Dowling."
+
+The two men acknowledged the salute with some slight surprise.
+Beatrice, although her clothes were simple, had always the air of
+belonging to a different world.
+
+"Your brother, my dear Miss Tavernake," Mr. Dowling declared, "is
+a perfect genius at discovering these desirable sites.  This one
+I honestly consider to be the find of our lifetime.  We have
+now," he proceeded, turning to Mr. Belton, "certain information
+that the cars will run to whatever point we desire in this
+vicinity, and the Metropolitan Railway has also arranged for an
+extension of its system.  To-morrow I propose," Mr. Dowling
+continued, holding the sides of his coat and assuming a somewhat
+pompous manner, "to make an offer for the whole of this site.  It
+will involve a very large sum of money indeed, but I am convinced
+that it will be a remunerative speculation."
+
+Tavernake remained grimly silent.  This was scarcely the time or
+the place which he would have selected for an explanation with
+his employer.  There were signs, however, that the thing was to
+be forced upon him.
+
+"I am very pleased indeed to meet you here, Tavernake," Mr.
+Dowling went on, "pleased both for personal reasons and because
+it shows, if I may be allowed to say so, the interest which you
+take in the firm's business, that you should devote your holiday
+to coming and--er--surveying the scene of our exploits, so to
+speak.  Perhaps now that you are here you would be able to
+explain to Mr. Belton better than I should, just what it is that
+we propose."
+
+Tavernake hesitated for a moment.  Finally, however, he proceeded
+to make clear a very elaborate and carefully thought out building
+scheme, to which both men listened with much attention.  When he
+had finished, however, he turned round to Mr. Dowling, facing him
+squarely.
+
+"You will understand, sir," he concluded, "that a scheme such as
+I have pointed out could only be carried through if the whole of
+the property were in one person's hands.  I may say that the
+information to which you referred a few days ago was perfectly
+correct.  A considerable portion of the south side of the hill
+has already been purchased, besides certain other plots which
+would interfere considerably with any comprehensive scheme of
+building."
+
+Mr. Dowling's face fell at once; his tone was one of annoyance
+mingled with irritation.
+
+"Come, come," he declared, "this sounds very bad, Mr. Tavernake,
+very neglectful, very careless as to the interests of the firm.
+Why did we not keep our eye upon it?  Why did we not forestall
+this other purchaser, eh?  It appears to me that we have been
+slack, very slack indeed."
+
+Tavernake took a small book from his pocket.
+
+"You will remember, sir," he said, "that it was on the eleventh
+of May last year when I first spoke to you of this site."
+
+"Well, well," Mr. Dowling exclaimed, sharply, "what of it?"
+
+"You were starting out for a fortnight's golf somewhere,"
+Tavernake continued, "and you promised to look into the affair
+when you returned.  I spoke to you again but you declared that
+you were far too busy to go into the matter at all for the
+present, you didn't care about this side of London, you
+considered that we had enough on hand--in fact, you threw cold
+water upon the idea."
+
+"I may not have been very enthusiastic at first," Mr. Dowling
+admitted, grudgingly.  "Latterly, however, I have come round to
+your views."
+
+"There have been several articles in various newspapers, and a
+good deal of talk," Tavernake remarked, "which have been more
+effectual, I think, in bringing you round, than my advice.
+However, what I wish to say to you is this, sir, that when I
+found myself unable to interest you in this scheme, I went into
+it myself to some extent."
+
+"Went into it yourself?" Mr. Dowling repeated, incredulously.
+"What do you mean, Tavernake?  What do you mean, sir?"
+
+"I mean that I have invested my savings in the purchase of
+several plots of land upon this hillside," Tavernake explained.
+
+"On your own account?" Mr. Dowling demanded.  "Your savings,
+indeed!"
+
+"Certainly," Tavernake answered.  "Why not?"
+
+"But it's the firm's business, sir--the firm's, not yours!"
+
+"The firm had the opportunity," Tavernake pointed out, "and were
+not inclined to avail themselves of it.  If I had not bought the
+land when I did, some one else would have bought the whole of it
+long ago."
+
+Mr. Dowling was obviously in a furious temper.
+
+"Do you mean to tell me, sir," he exclaimed, "that you dared to
+enter into private speculations while still an employee of the
+firm?  It is a most unheard-of thing, unwarranted, ridiculous.  I
+shall require you, sir, to at once make over the plots of land to
+us--to the firm, you understand.  We shall give you your price,
+of course, although I expect you paid much more for it than we
+should have done.  Still, we must give you what you paid, and
+four per cent interest for your money."
+
+"I am sorry," Tavernake replied, "but I am afraid that I should
+require better terms than that.  In fact," he continued, "I do
+not wish to sell.  I have given a great deal of thought and time
+to this matter, and I intend to carry it out as a personal
+speculation."
+
+"Then you will carry it out, sir, from some other place than from
+within the walls of my office," Mr. Dowling declared, furiously.
+"You understand that, Tavernake?"
+
+"Perfectly," Tavernake answered.  "You wish me to leave you.  It
+is very unwise of you to suggest it, but I am quite prepared to
+go."
+
+"You will either resell me those plots at cost price, or you
+shall not set foot within the office again," Mr. Dowling
+insisted.  "It is a gross breach of faith, this.  I never heard
+of such a thing in all my life.  Most unprofessional, impossible
+behavior!"
+
+Tavernake showed no signs of anger--he simply turned a little
+away.
+
+"I shall not sell you my land, Mr. Dowling," he said, "and it
+will suit me very well to leave your employ.  You appear," he
+continued, "to expect some one else to do the whole of the work
+for you while you reap the entire profits.  Those days have gone
+by.  My business in the world is to make a fortune for myself,
+and not for you!"
+
+"How dare you, sir!" Mr. Dowling cried.  "I never heard such
+impertinence in my life."
+
+"You haven't done a stroke of work for five years," Tavernake
+went on, unmoved, "and my efforts have supplied you with a fairly
+good income.  In future, those efforts will be directed towards
+my own advancement."
+
+Mr. Dowling turned back toward the car.
+
+"Young man," he said, "you can brazen it out as much as you like,
+but you have been guilty of a gross breach of faith.  I shall
+take care that the exact situation is made known in all
+responsible quarters.  You'll get no situation with any firm with
+whom I am acquainted--I can promise you that.  If you have
+anything more to say to Dowling, Spence & Company, let it be in
+writing."
+
+They parted company there and then.  Tavernake and Beatrice went
+down the hill in silence.
+
+"Does this bother you at all?" she inquired presently.
+
+"Nothing to speak of," Tavernake answered.  "It had to come.  I
+wasn't quite ready but that doesn't matter."
+
+"What shall you do now?" she asked.
+
+"Borrow enough to buy the whole of the hill," he replied.
+
+She looked back.
+
+"Won't that mean a great deal of money?"
+
+He nodded.
+
+"It will be a big thing, of course," he admitted.  "Never mind, I
+dare say I shall be able to interest some one in it.  In any
+case, I never meant Mr. Dowling to make a fortune out of this."
+
+They walked on in silence a little further.  Then she spoke
+again, with some hesitation.
+
+"I suppose that what you have done is quite fair, Leonard?"
+
+He answered her promptly, without any sign of offence at her
+question.
+
+"As a matter of fact," he confessed, "it is an unusual thing for
+any one in the employ of a firm of estate agents to make
+speculations on their own account in land.  In this case,
+however, I consider that I was justified.  I have opened up three
+building speculations for the firm, on each one of which they
+have made a great deal of money, and I have not even had my
+salary increased, or any recognition whatever offered me.  There
+is a debt, of course, which an employee owes to his employer.
+There is also a debt, however, which the employer owes to his
+employee.  In my case I have never been treated with the
+slightest consideration of any sort.  What I have done I shall
+stick to.  After all, I am more interested in making money for
+myself than for other people."
+
+They had reached the corner of the field now, and turning into
+the lane commenced the steep descent.  It was Sunday evening, and
+from all the little conventicles and tin churches below, the
+bells began their unmusical summons.  From further away in the
+distance came the more melodious chiming from the Cathedral and
+the city churches.  The shriller and nearer note, however,
+prevailed.  The whole medley of sound was a discord.  As they
+descended, they could see the black-coated throngs slowly moving
+towards the different places of worship.  There was something
+uninspiring about it all.  She shuddered.
+
+"Leonard," she said, "I wonder why you are so anxious to get on
+in the world.  Why do you want to be rich?"
+
+He was glancing back toward the hill, the light of calculations
+in his eyes.  Once more he was measuring out those plots of land,
+calculating rent, deducting interest.
+
+"We all seek different things," he replied tolerantly,--"some
+fame, some pleasure.  Mr. Dowling, for instance, has no other
+ambition than to muddle round the golf links a few strokes better
+than his partner."
+
+"And you?" she asked.
+
+"It is success I seek," he answered.  "Women, as a rule, do not
+understand.  You, for instance, Beatrice, are too sentimental.  I
+am very practical.  It is money that I want.  I want money
+because money means success."
+
+"And afterwards?" she whispered.
+
+He was attending to her no longer.  They were turning now into
+the broad thoroughfare at the bottom of the lane, at the end of
+which a tram-car was waiting.  He scribbled a few, final notes
+into his pocket-book.
+
+"To-morrow," he exclaimed, with the joy of battle in his tone,
+"to-morrow the fight begins in earnest!"
+
+Beatrice passed her hand through his arm.
+
+"Not only for you, dear friend, but for me," she said.  "For you?
+What do you mean?" he asked quickly.
+
+"I have been trying to tell you all day," she continued, "but you
+have been too engrossed.  Yesterday afternoon I went to see Mr.
+Grier at the Atlas Theatre.  I had my voice tried, and to-morrow
+night I am going to take a small part in the new musical comedy."
+
+Tavernake stared at her in something like consternation.  His
+ideas as to the stage and all that belonged to it were of a
+primitive order.  Mrs. Fitzgerald was perhaps as near as possible
+to his idea of the type.  He glanced incredulously at Beatrice
+-- slim, quietly dressed, yet with the unmistakable, to him
+mysterious, distinction of breeding.
+
+"You an actress!" he exclaimed.
+
+She laughed softly.
+
+"Dear Leonard," she said, "this is going to be a part of your
+education.  To-morrow night you shall come to the theatre and
+wait for me at the stage-door."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+A BEWILDERING OFFER
+
+
+Elizabeth stood with her hands behind her back, leaning slightly
+against the writing-table.  The professor, with his broad-brimmed
+hat clinched in his fingers, walked restlessly up and down the
+little room.  The discussion had not been altogether a pleasant
+one.  Elizabeth was composed but serious, her father nervous and
+excited.
+
+"You are mad, Elizabeth!" he declared.  "Is it that you do not
+understand, or will not?  I tell you that we must go."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"Where would you drag me to?" she asked.  "We certainly can't go
+back to New York."
+
+He turned fiercely upon her.
+
+"Whose fault is it that we can't?" he demanded.  "If it weren't
+for you and your confounded schemes, I could be walking down
+Broadway next week.  God's own city it is, too!" he muttered.  "I
+wish we'd never seen those two young men."
+
+"It was a pity, perhaps," she admitted, "yet we had to do
+something.  We were absolutely stonybroke, as they say over
+here."
+
+"Anyway, we've got to get out of this," the professor declared.
+
+"My dear father," she replied, "I will agree that if a new city
+or a new world could arise from the bottom of the
+
+Once more he struck the table.  Then he threw out his hands above
+his head with the melodramatic instinct which had always been
+strong in his blood.
+
+"Do you think that I am a fool?" he cried.  "Do you think I do
+not know that if there were not something moving in your brain
+you would think no more of that clerk, that bourgeois estate
+agent, than of the door-mat beneath your feet?  It is what I
+always complain about.  You make use of me as a tool.  There are
+always things which I do not understand.  He comes here, this
+young man, under a pretext, whether he knows it or not.  You talk
+to him for an hour at a time.  There should be nothing in your
+life which I do not know of, Elizabeth," he continued, his voice
+suddenly hoarse as he leaned towards her.  "Can't you see that
+there is danger in friendships for you and for me, there is
+danger in intimacies of any sort?  I share the danger; I have a
+right to share the knowledge.  This young man has no money of his
+own, I take it.  Of what use is he to us?"
+
+"You are too hasty, my dear father," she replied.  "Let me assure
+you that there is nothing at all mysterious about Mr. Tavernake.
+The simple truth is that the young man rather attracts me."
+
+The professor gazed at her incredulously.
+
+"Attracts you!  He!"
+
+"You have never perfectly understood me, my dear parent," she
+murmured.  "You have never appreciated that trait in my
+character, that strange preference, if you like, for the
+absolutely original.  Now in all my life I never met such a young
+man as this.  He wears the clothes and he has the features and
+speech of just such a person as you have described, but there is
+a difference."
+
+"A difference, indeed!" the professor interrupted roughly.  "What
+difference, I should like to know?"
+
+She shrugged her shoulders lightly.
+
+"He is stolid without being stupid," she explained.  "He is
+entirely self-centered.  I smile at him, and he waits patiently
+until I have finished to get on with our business.  I have said
+quite nice things to him and he has stared at me without change
+of expression, absolutely without pleasure or emotion of any
+sort."
+
+"You are too vain, Elizabeth," her father declared.  "You have
+been spoilt.  There are a few people in the world whom even you
+might fail to charm.  No doubt this young man is one of them."
+
+She sighed gently.
+
+"It really does seem," she admitted, "as though you were right,
+but we shall see.  By-the-bye, hadn't you better go?  The five
+minutes are nearly up."
+
+He came over to her side, his hat and gloves in his hand,
+prepared for departure.
+
+"Will you tell me, upon your honor, Elizabeth," he begged, "that
+there is no other reason for your interest?  That you are not
+engaged in any fresh schemes of which I know nothing?  Things are
+bad enough as they are.  I cannot sleep, I cannot rest, for
+thinking of our position.  If I thought that you had any fresh
+plans on hand--"
+
+She flicked the ash from her cigarette and checked him with a
+little gesture.
+
+"He knows where Beatrice is," she remarked thoughtfully, "and I
+can't get him to tell me.  There is nothing beyond -- absolutely
+nothing." . . .
+
+When Tavernake was announced, Elizabeth was still smoking,
+sitting in an easy-chair and looking into the fire.  Something in
+her attitude, the droop of her head as it rested upon her
+fingers, reminded him suddenly of Beatrice.  He showed no other
+emotion than a sudden pause in his walk across the room.  Even
+that, however, in a person whose machinelike attitude towards her
+provoked her resentment, was noticeable.
+
+"Good morning, my friend!" she said pleasantly.  "You have
+brought me the fresh list?"
+
+"Unfortunately, no, madam," Tavernake answered.  "I have called
+simply to announce that I am not able to be of any further
+assistance to you in the matter."
+
+She looked at him for a moment without remark.
+
+"Are you serious, Mr. Tavernake?" she asked.
+
+"Yes," he replied.  "The fact is I am not in a position to help
+you.  I have left the employ of Messrs. Dowling, Spence &
+Company."
+
+"Of your own accord?" she inquired quietly.
+
+"No, I was dismissed," he confessed.  "I should have been
+compelled to leave in a very short time, but Mr. Dowling
+forestalled me."
+
+"Won't you sit down and tell me about it?" she invited.
+
+He looked her in the eyes, square and unflinching.  He was still
+able to do that!
+
+"It could not possibly interest you," he said.
+
+"And-- my sister?  You have seen her?"
+
+"I have seen your sister," Tavernake answered, without
+hesitation.
+
+"You have a message for me?"
+
+"None," he declared.
+
+"She refuses-- to be reconciled, then?"
+
+"I am afraid she has no friendly feelings towards you."
+
+"She gave you no reason?"
+
+"No direct reason," he admitted, "but her attitude is-- quite
+uncompromising."
+
+She rose and swept across the floor towards him.  With firm but
+gentle fingers she took his worn bowler hat and mended gloves
+from his hand.  Her gesture guided him towards a sofa.
+
+"Beatrice has prejudiced you against me," she murmured.  "It is
+not fair.  Please come and sit down-- for five minutes," she
+pleaded.  "I want you to tell me why you have quarrelled with
+that funny little man, Mr. Dowling."
+
+"But, madam,--" he protested.
+
+"If you refuse, I shall think that my sister has been telling you
+stories about me," she declared, watching him closely.
+
+Tavernake drew a little away from her but seated himself on the
+sofa which she had indicated.  He took up as much room as
+possible, and to his relief she did not persist in her first
+intention, which was obviously to seat herself beside him.
+
+"Your sister has told me nothing about you whatsoever," he said
+deliberately.  "At the same time, she asked me not to give you
+her address."
+
+"We will talk about that presently," she interrupted.  "In the
+first place, tell me why you have left your place."
+
+"Mr. Dowling discovered," he told her, in a matter-of-fact tone,
+"that I had been doing some business on my own account.  He was
+quite right to disapprove.  I have not been back to the office
+since he found it out."
+
+"What sort of business?" she asked.
+
+"The business of the firm is to buy property in undeveloped
+districts and sell it for building estate," he explained.  "I
+have been very successful hitherto in finding sites for their
+operations.  A short time ago, I discovered one so good that I
+invested all my own savings in buying certain lots, and have an
+option upon the whole.  Mr. Dowling found it out and dismissed
+me."
+
+"But it seems most unfair," she declared.
+
+"Not at all," he answered.  "In Mr. Dowling's place I should have
+done the same thing.  Every one with his way in life to make must
+look out for himself.  Strictly speaking, what I did was wrong.
+I wish, however, that I had done it before.  One must think of
+one's self first."
+
+"And now?" she inquired.  "What are you going to do now?"
+
+"I am going to find a capitalist or float a company to buy the
+rest of the site," he announced.  "After that, we must see about
+building.  There is no hurry about that, though.  The first thing
+is to secure the site."
+
+"How much money does it require?"
+
+"About twelve thousand pounds," he told her.
+
+"It seems very little," she murmured.
+
+"The need for money comes afterwards," he explained.  "We want to
+drain and plan and build without mortgages.  As soon as we are
+sure of the site, one can think of that.  My option only extends
+for a week or so."
+
+"Do you really think that it is a good speculation?" she asked.
+
+"I do not think about such matters," he answered, drily.  "I
+know."
+
+She leaned back in her chair, watching him for several seconds -
+admiring him, as a matter of fact.  The profound conviction of
+his words was almost inspiring.  In her presence, and she knew
+that she was a very beautiful woman, he appeared, notwithstanding
+his absence of any knowledge of her sex and his lack of social
+status, unmoved, wholly undisturbed.  He sat there in perfect
+naturalness.  It did not seem to him even unaccountable that she
+should be interested in his concerns.  He was not conceited or
+aggressive in any way.  His complete self-confidence lacked any
+militant impulse.  He was-- himself, impervious to surroundings,
+however unusual.
+
+"Why should I not be your capitalist?" she inquired slowly.
+
+"Have you as much as twelve thousand pounds that you want to
+invest?" he asked, incredulously.
+
+She rose to her feet and moved across to her desk.  He sat quite
+still, watching her without any apparent curiosity.  She unlocked
+a drawer and returned to him with a bankbook in her hand.
+
+"Add that up," she directed, "and tell me how much I have."
+
+He drew a lead pencil from his pocket and quickly added up the
+total.
+
+"If you have not given any cheques since this was made up," he
+said calmly, "you have a credit balance of thirteen thousand, one
+hundred and eighteen pounds, nine shillings and fourpence.  It is
+very foolish of you to keep so much money on current account.
+You are absolutely losing about eight pounds a week."
+
+She smiled.
+
+"It is foolish of me, I suppose," she admitted, "but I have no
+one to advise me just now.  My father knows no more about money
+than a child, and I have just had quite a large amount paid to me
+in cash.  I only wish we could get Beatrice to share some of
+this, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+He made no remark.  To all appearance, he had never heard of her
+sister.  She came and sat down by his side again.
+
+"Will you have me for a partner, Mr. Tavernake?" she whispered.
+
+Then, indeed, for a moment, the impassivity of his features
+relaxed.  He was frankly amazed.
+
+"You cannot mean this," he declared.  "You know nothing about the
+value of the property, nothing about the affair at all.  It is
+quite impossible."
+
+"I know what you have told me," she said.  "Is not that enough?
+You are sure that it will make money and you have just told me
+how foolish I am to keep so much money in my bank.  Very well,
+then, I give it to you to invest.  You must pay me quite a good
+deal of interest."
+
+"But you know nothing about me," he protested, "nothing about the
+property."
+
+"One must trust somebody," she replied.  "Why shouldn't I trust
+you?"
+
+He was nonplussed.  This woman seemed to have an answer for
+everything.  Besides, when once he had got over the
+unexpectedness of the thing, it was, of course, a wonderful
+stroke of fortune for him.  Then came a whole rush of thoughts, a
+glow which he thrust back sternly.  It would mean seeing her
+often; it would mean coming here to her rooms; it would mean,
+perhaps, that she might come to look upon him as a friend.  He
+set his teeth hard.  This was folly!
+
+"Have you any idea about terms?" he inquired.
+
+She laughed softly.
+
+"My dear friend," she said, "why do you ask me such a question?
+You know quite well that I am not competent to discuss terms with
+you.  Listen.  You are engaged in a speculation to carry out
+which you want the loan of twelve thousand pounds.  Draw up a
+paper in which you state what my share will be of the profits,
+what interest I shall get for my money, and give particulars of
+the property.  Then I will take it to my solicitor, if you insist
+upon it, although I am willing to accept what you think is fair."
+
+"You must take it to a solicitor, of course," he answered,
+thoughtfully.  "I may as well tell you at once, however, that he
+will probably advise you against investing it in such a way."
+
+"That will make no difference at all," she declared.  "Solicitors
+hate all investments, I know, except their horrid mortgages.
+There are only two conditions that I shall make."
+
+"What are they?" he asked.
+
+"The first is that you must not say a word of this to my sister."
+
+Tavernake frowned.
+
+"That is a little difficult," he remarked.  "It happens that your
+sister knows something about the estate and my plans."
+
+"There is no need to tell her the name of your partner,"
+Elizabeth said.  "I want this to be our secret entirely, yours
+and mine."
+
+Her hand fell upon his; he gripped the sides of his chair.  Again
+he was conscious of this bewildering, incomprehensible sensation.
+
+"And the other condition?" he demanded, hoarsely.
+
+"That you come sometimes and tell me how things are going on."
+
+"Come here?" he repeated.
+
+She nodded.
+
+"Please!  I am very lonely.  I shall look forward to your
+visits."
+
+Tavernake rose slowly to his feet.  He held out his hand -she
+knew better than to attempt to keep him.  He made a speech which
+was for him gallant, but while he made it he looked into her eyes
+with a directness to which she was indeed unaccustomed.
+
+"I shall come," he said.  "I should have wanted to come, anyhow."
+
+Then he turned abruptly away and left the room.  It was the first
+speech of its sort which he had ever made in his life.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+TAVERNAKE BLUNDERS
+
+
+Tavernake felt that he had indeed wandered into an alien world as
+he took his place the following evening among the little crowd of
+people who were waiting outside the stage-door of the Atlas
+Theatre.  These were surroundings to which he was totally
+unaccustomed.  Two very handsome motor-cars were drawn up against
+the curb, and behind them a string of electric broughams and
+taxicabs, proving conclusively that the young ladies of the Atlas
+Theatre were popular in other than purely theatrical circles.
+
+The handful of young men by whom Tavernake was surrounded were of
+a genus unknown to him.  They were all dressed exactly alike,
+they all seemed to breathe the same atmosphere, to exhibit the
+same indifference towards the other loungers.  One or two more
+privileged passed in through the stage-door and disappeared.
+Tavernake contented himself with standing on the edge of the
+curbstone, his hands thrust into the pockets of his dark
+overcoat, his bowler hat, which was not quite the correct shape,
+slightly on the back of his head; his serious, stolid face
+illuminated by the gleam from a neighboring gas lamp.
+
+Presently, people began to emerge from the door.  First of all,
+the musicians and a little stream of stage hands.
+
+Then a girl's hat appeared in the doorway, and the first of the
+Atlas young ladies came out, to be claimed at once by her escort.
+Very soon afterwards, Beatrice arrived.  She recognized Tavernake
+at once and crossed over to him.
+
+"Well?" she asked.
+
+"You looked very nice," he said, slowly, as he led the way down
+the street.  "Of course, I knew about your singing, but
+everything else--seemed such a surprise."
+
+"For instance?"
+
+"Why, I mean your dancing," he went on, "and somehow or other you
+looked different on the stage."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"'Different' won't do for me," she persisted.  "I must have
+something more specific."
+
+"Well, then, you looked much prettier than I thought you were,"
+Tavernake declared, solemnly.  "You looked exceedingly nice."
+
+"You really thought so?" she asked, a little doubtfully.
+
+"I really thought so.  I thought you looked much nicer than any
+of the others."
+
+She squeezed his arm affectionately.
+
+"Dear Leonard," she said, "it's so nice to have you think so.  Do
+you know, Mr. Grier actually asked me out to supper."
+
+"What impertinence!" Tavernake muttered.
+
+Beatrice threw her head back and laughed.
+
+"My dear brother," she protested, "it was a tremendous
+compliment.  You must remember that it was entirely through him,
+too, that I got the engagement.  Four pounds a week I am going to
+have.  Just think of it!"
+
+"Four pounds a week is all very well," Tavernake admitted.  "It
+seems a great deal of money to earn like that.  But I don't think
+you ought to go out to supper with any one whom you know so
+slightly."
+
+"Dear prig!  You know, you are a shocking prig, Leonard."
+
+"Am I?" he answered, without offence, and with the air of one
+seriously considering the subject.
+
+"Of course you are.  How could you help it, living the sort of
+life you've led all your days?  Never mind, I like you for it.  I
+don't know whether I want to go out to supper with anybody--I
+really haven't decided yet--but if I did, it would certainly be
+better for me to go with Mr. Grier, because he can do me no end
+of good at the theatre, if he likes."
+
+Tavernake was silent for several moments.  He was conscious of
+feeling something which he did not altogether understand.  He
+only knew that it involved a strong and unreasonable dislike to
+Mr. Grier.  Then he remembered that he was her brother, that he
+had the right to speak with authority.
+
+"I hope that you will not go out to supper with any one," he
+said.
+
+She began to laugh but checked herself.
+
+"Well," she remarked, "that sounds very terrible.  Shall we take
+a 'bus?  To tell you the truth, I am dying of hunger.  We
+rehearsed for two hours before the performance, and I ate nothing
+but a sandwich--I was so excited."
+
+Tavernake hesitated a moment--he certainly was not himself this
+evening!
+
+"Would you like to have some supper at a restaurant," he asked,
+"before we go home?"
+
+"I should love it," she declared, taking his arm as they passed
+through a stream of people.  "To tell you the truth, I was so
+hoping that you would propose it."
+
+"I think," Tavernake said, deliberately, "that there is a place a
+little way along here."
+
+They pushed their way down the Strand and entered a restaurant
+which Tavernake knew only by name.  A small table was found for
+them and Beatrice looked about with delight.
+
+"Isn't this jolly!" she exclaimed, taking off her gloves.  "Why,
+there are five or six of the girls from the theatre here already.
+There are two, see, at the corner table, and the fair-haired girl
+--she is just behind me in the chorus."
+
+Tavernake glanced around.  The young women whom she pointed out
+were all escorted by men who were scrupulously attired in evening
+dress.  She seemed to read his thoughts as she laughed at him.
+
+"You stupid boy," she said.  "You don't suppose that I want to be
+like them, do you?  There are lots of things it's delightful to
+look on at, and that's all.  Isn't this fish good?  I love this
+place."
+
+Tavernake looked around him with an interest which he took no
+pains to conceal.  Certainly the little groups of people by whom
+they were surrounded on every side had the air of finding some
+zest in life which up to the present, at any rate, had escaped
+him.  They came streaming in, finding friends everywhere,
+laughing and talking, insisting upon tables in impossible places,
+calling out greetings to acquaintances across the room, chaffing
+the maitre d'h�tel who was hastening from table to table.  The
+gathering babel of voices was mingled every now and then with the
+popping of corks, and behind it all were the soft strains of a
+very seductive little band, perched up in the balcony.  Tavernake
+felt the color mounting into his cheeks.  It was true: there was
+something here which was new to him!
+
+"Beatrice," he asked her suddenly, "have you ever drunk
+champagne?"
+
+She laughed at him.
+
+"Often, my dear brother," she answered.  "Why?"
+
+"I never have," he confessed.  "We are going to have some now."
+
+She would have checked him but he had summoned a waiter
+imperiously and given his order.
+
+"My dear Leonard," she protested, "this is shocking
+extravagance."
+
+"Is it?" he replied.  "I don't care.  Tell me about the theatre.
+Were they kind to you there?  Will you be able to keep your
+place?"
+
+"The girls were all much nicer than I expected," she told him,
+"and the musical director said that my voice was much too good
+for the chorus.  Oh, I do hope that they will keep me!"
+
+"They would be idiots if they didn't," he declared, vigorously.
+"You sing better and you dance more gracefully and to me you
+seemed much prettier than any one else there."
+
+She laughed into his eyes.
+
+"My dear brother," she exclaimed, "your education is progressing
+indeed!  It is positively the first evening I have ever heard you
+attempt to make pretty speeches, and you are quite an adept
+already."
+
+"I don't know about that," he protested.  "I suppose it never
+occurred to me before that you were good-looking," he added,
+examining her critically, "or I dare say I should have told you
+so.  You see, one doesn't notice these things in an ordinary way.
+Lots of other people must have told you so, though."
+
+"I was never spoilt with compliments," she said.  "You see, I had
+a beautiful sister."
+
+The words seemed to have escaped her unconsciously.  Almost as
+they passed her lips, her expression changed.  She shivered, as
+though reminded of something unpleasant.  Tavernake, however,
+noticed nothing.  For the greater part of the day he had been
+sedulously fighting against a new and unaccustomed state of mind.
+He had found his thoughts slipping away, time after time, until
+he had had to set his teeth and use all his will power to keep
+his attention concentrated upon his work.  And now once more they
+had escaped, again he felt the strange stir in his blood.  The
+slight flush on his cheek grew suddenly deeper.  He looked past
+the girl opposite to him, out of the restaurant, across the
+street, into that little sitting-room in the Milan Court.  It was
+Elizabeth who was there in front of him.  Again he heard her
+voice, saw the turn of her head, the slow, delightful curve of
+the lips, the eyes that looked into his and spoke to him the
+first strange whispers of a new language.  His heart gave a quick
+throb.  He was for the moment transformed, a prisoner no longer,
+a different person, indeed, from the stolid, well-behaved young
+man who found himself for the first time in his life in these
+unaccustomed surroundings.  Then Beatrice leaned towards him, her
+voice brought him back to the present--not, alas, the voice which
+at that moment he would have given so much to have heard.
+
+"To-night," she murmured, "I feel as though we were at the
+beginning of new things.  We must drink a toast."
+
+Tavernake filled her glass and his own.
+
+"Luck to you in your new profession!" he said.
+
+"And here is one after your own heart, you most curious of men!"
+she exclaimed, a few seconds later.  "To the undiscovered in
+life!"
+
+He drained his glass and set it down empty.
+
+"The undiscovered," he muttered, looking around.  "It is a very
+good toast, Beatrice.  There are many things of which one might
+remain ignorant all one's life if one relied wholly upon one's
+own perceptions."
+
+"I believe," she agreed, "that if I had not appeared you were in
+great danger of becoming narrow."
+
+"I am sure of it," he answered, "but you see you came."
+
+She was thoughtful for a moment.
+
+"This reminds me just a little of that first dreary feast of
+ours," she said.  "You knew what it was like then to feed a
+genuinely starving girl.  And I was miserable, Leonard.  It
+didn't seem to me that there was any other end save one."
+
+"You've got over all that nonsense?" he asked anxiously.
+
+"Yes, I suppose so," she answered.  "You see, I've started life
+again and one gets stronger.  But there are times even now," she
+added, "when I am afraid."
+
+The mirth had suddenly died from her face.  She looked older,
+tired, and careworn.  The shadows were back under her eyes; she
+glanced around almost timorously.  He filled her glass.
+
+"That is foolishness," he said.  "Nothing nor anybody can harm
+you now."
+
+Some note in his voice attracted her attention.  Strong and
+square, with hard, forceful face, he sat wholly at his ease among
+these unfamiliar surroundings, a very tower of refuge, she felt,
+to the weak.  His face was not strikingly intellectual--she was
+not sure now about his mouth--but one seemed to feel that dogged
+nature, the tireless pains by which he would pursue any aim dear
+to him.  The shadows passed away from her mind.  What was dead
+was gone!  It was not reasonable that she should be haunted all
+her days by the ghosts of other people's sins.  The atmosphere of
+the place, the atmosphere of the last few hours, found its way
+again into her blood.  After all, she was young, the music was
+sweet, her pulses were throbbing to the tune of this new life.
+She drank her wine and laughed, her head beating time to the
+music.
+
+"We have been sad long enough," she declared.  "You and I, my
+dear serious brother, will embark in earnest now upon the paths
+of frivolity.  Tell me, how did things go to-day?"
+
+It flashed into his mind that he had great news, but that it was
+not for her.  About that matter there was still doubt in his
+mind, but he could not speak of it.
+
+"I have had an offer," he said guardedly.  "I cannot say much
+about it at present, for nothing is certain, but I am sure that I
+shall be able to raise the money somehow."
+
+His tone was calm and confident.  There was no self-assurance or
+bluster about it, and yet it was convincing.  She looked at him
+curiously.
+
+"You are a very positive person, Leonard," she remarked.  "You
+must have great faith in yourself, I think."
+
+He considered the question for a moment.
+
+"Perhaps I have," he admitted.  "I do not think that there is any
+other way to succeed."
+
+The atmosphere of the place was becoming now almost languorous.
+The band had ceased to play; little parties of men and women were
+standing about, bidding one another goodnight.  The lamps had
+been lowered, and in the gloom the voices and laughter seemed to
+have become lower and more insinuating; the lights in the eyes of
+the women, as they passed down the room on their way out, softer
+and more irresistible.
+
+"I suppose we must go," she said reluctantly.
+
+Tavernake paid his bill and they turned into the street.  She
+took his arm and they turned westward.  Even out here, the
+atmosphere of the restaurant appeared to have found its way.  The
+soberness of life, its harder and more practical side, was for
+the moment obscured.  It was not the daytime crowd, this, whose
+footsteps pressed the pavements.  The careworn faces of the
+money-seekers had vanished.  The men and women to whom life was
+something of a struggle had sought their homes--resting, perhaps,
+before they took up their labors again.  Every moment taxicabs
+and motor-cars whirled by, flashing upon the night a momentary
+impression of men in evening dress, of women in soft garments
+with jewels in their hair.  The spirit of pleasure seemed to have
+crept into the atmosphere.  Even the poorer people whom they
+passed in the street, were laughing or singing.
+
+Tavernake stopped short.
+
+"To-night," he declared, "is not the night for omnibuses.  We are
+going to have a taxicab.  I know that you are tired."
+
+"I should love it," she admitted.
+
+They hailed one and drove off.  Beatrice leaned back among the
+cushions and closed her eyes, her ungloved hand rested almost
+caressingly upon his.  He leaned forward.  There were new things
+in the world--he was sure of it now, sure though they were coming
+to him through the mists, coming to him so vaguely that even
+while he obeyed he did not understand.  Her full, soft lips were
+slightly parted; her heavily-fringed eyelids closed; her deep
+brown hair, which had escaped bounds a little, drooping over her
+ear.  His fingers suddenly clasped hers tightly.
+
+"Beatrice!" he whispered.
+
+She sat up with a start, her eyes questioning his, the breath
+coming quickly through her parted lips.
+
+"Once you asked me to kiss you, Beatrice," he said.  "To-night
+-- I am going to."
+
+She made no attempt to repulse him.  He took her in his arms and
+kissed her.  Even in that moment he knew that he had made a
+mistake.  Nevertheless, he kissed her again and again, crushing
+her lips against his.
+
+"Please let me go, Leonard," she begged at last.
+
+He obeyed at once.  He understood quite well that some strange
+thing had happened.  It seemed to him during those next few
+minutes that everything which had passed that night was a dream,
+that this vivid picture of a life more intense, making larger
+demands upon the senses than anything he had yet experienced, was
+a mirage, a thing which would live only in his memory, a life in
+which he could never take any part.  He had blundered; he had
+come into a new world and he had blundered.  A sense of guilt was
+upon him.  He had a sudden wild desire to cry out that it was
+Elizabeth whom he had kissed.  Beatrice was sitting upright in
+her place, her head turned a little away from him.  He felt that
+she was expecting him to speak--that there were inevitable words
+which he should say.  His silence was a confession.  He would
+have lied but the seal was upon his lips.  So the moment passed,
+and Tavernake had taken another step forward towards his destiny!
+. . .
+
+As he helped her out of the cab, her fingers tightened for a
+moment upon his hand.  She patted it gently as she passed out
+before him into the house, leaving the door open.  When he had
+paid the cabman and followed, she had disappeared.  He looked
+into the sitting-room; it was empty.  Overhead, he could hear her
+footsteps as she ascended to her room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+AN EVENING CALL
+
+
+In the morning, when he left for the city, she was not down.
+When he came home in the evening, she was gone.  Without removing
+his hat or overcoat, he took the letter which he found propped up
+on the mantelpiece and addressed to him to the window and read
+it.
+
+DEAR BROTHER LEONARD,--It wasn't your fault and I don't think it
+was mine.  If either of us is to blame, it is certainly I, for
+though you are such a clever and ambitious young person, you
+really know very little indeed of the world,--not so much, I
+think, as I do.  I am going to stay for a few nights, at any
+rate, with one of the girls at the theatre, who I know wants some
+one to share her tiny flat with her.  Afterwards, I shall see.
+
+Don't throw this letter in the fire and don't think me
+ungrateful.  I shall never forget what you did for me.  How could
+I?
+
+I will send you my address as soon as I am sure of it, or you can
+always write me to the theatre.
+
+                Good-bye, dear Leonard,
+                                        YOUR SISTER BEATRICE.
+
+Tavernake looked from the sheet of notepaper out across the gray
+square.  He knew that he was very angry, angry though he
+deliberately folded the letter up and placed it in his pocket,
+angry though he took off his overcoat and hung it up with his
+usual care; but his anger was with himself.  He had blundered
+badly.  This episode of his life was one which he had better
+forget.  It was absolutely out of harmony with all his ideas.  He
+told himself that he was glad Beatrice was gone.  Housekeeping
+with an imaginary sister in this practical world was an
+absurdity.  Sooner or later it must have come to an end.  Better
+now, before it had gone too far--better now, much better!  All
+the same, he knew that he was going to be very lonely.
+
+He rang the bell for the woman who waited upon them, and whom he
+seldom saw, for Beatrice herself had supplied their immediate
+wants.  He found some dinner ready, which he ate with absolute
+unconsciousness.  Then he threw himself fiercely into his work.
+It was all very well for the first hour or so, but as ten o'clock
+grew near he began to find a curious difficulty in keeping his
+attention fixed upon those calculations.  The matter of average
+rentals, percentage upon capital--things which but yesterday he
+had found fascinating--seemed suddenly irksome.  He could fix his
+attention upon nothing.  At last he pushed his papers away, put
+on his hat and coat, and walked into the street.
+
+At the Milan Court, the hall-porter received his inquiry for
+Elizabeth with an air of faint but well-bred surprise.
+Tavernake, in those days, was a person exceedingly difficult to
+place.  His clothes so obviously denoted the station in life
+which he really occupied, while the slight imperiousness of his
+manner, his absolute freedom from any sort of nervousness or
+awkwardness, seemed to bespeak a consideration which those who
+had to deal with him as a stranger found sometimes a little
+puzzling.
+
+"Mrs. Wenham Gardner is in her rooms, I believe, sir," the man
+said.  "If you will wait for a moment, I will inquire."
+
+He disappeared into his office, thrusting his head out, a moment
+or two later, with the telephone receiver still in his hand.
+
+"Mrs. Gardner would like the name again, sir, please," he
+remarked.
+
+Tavernake repeated it firmly.
+
+"You might say," he added, "that I shall not detain her for more
+than a few minutes."
+
+The man disappeared once more.  When he returned, he indicated
+the lift to Tavernake.
+
+"If you will go up to the fifth floor, sir," he said, " Mrs.
+Gardner will see you."
+
+Tavernake found his courage almost leaving him as he knocked at
+the door of her rooms.  Her French maid ushered him into the
+little sitting-room, where, to his dismay, he found three men,
+one sitting on the table, the other two in easy-chairs.
+Elizabeth, in a dress of pale blue satin, was standing before the
+mirror.  She turned round as Tavernake entered.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake shall decide!" she exclaimed, waving her hand to
+him.  " Mr. Tavernake, there is a difference of opinion about my
+earrings.  Major Post here,"--she indicated a distinguished-
+looking elderly gentleman, with carefully trimmed beard and
+moustache, and an eyeglass attached to a thin band of black
+ribbon--" Major Post wants me to wear turquoises.  I prefer my
+pearls.  Mr. Crease half agrees with me, but as he never agrees
+with any one, on principle, he hates to say so.  Mr. Faulkes is
+wavering.  You shall decide; you, I know, are one of those people
+who never waver."
+
+"I should wear the pearls," Tavernake said.
+
+Elizabeth made them a little courtesy.
+
+"You see, my dear friends," she declared, " you have to come to
+England, after all, to find a man who knows his own mind and
+speaks it without fear.  The pearls it shall be."
+
+"It may be decision," Crease drawled, speaking with a slight
+American accent, "or it may be gallantry.  Mr. Tavernake knew
+your own choice."
+
+"The last word, as usual," she sighed.  "Now, if you good people
+will kindly go on downstairs, I will join you in a few minutes.
+Mr. Tavernake is my man of business and I am sure he has
+something to say to me."
+
+She dismissed them all pleasantly.  As soon as the door was
+closed she turned to Tavernake.  Her manner seemed to become a
+shade less gracious.
+
+"Well?"
+
+"I don't know why I came," Tavernake confessed bluntly.  "I was
+restless and I wanted to see you."
+
+She looked at him for a moment and then she laughed.  Tavernake
+felt a sense of relief; at least she was not angry.
+
+"Oh, you strangest of mortals!" she exclaimed, holding out her
+hands.  "Well, you see me--in one of my most becoming gowns, too.
+What do you think of the fit?"
+
+She swept round and faced him again with an expectant look.
+Tavernake, who knew nothing of women's fashions, still realized
+the superbness of that one unbroken line.
+
+"I can't think how you can move a step in it," he said, "but you
+look--"
+
+He paused.  It was as though he had lost his breath.  Then he set
+his teeth and finished.
+
+"You look beautiful," he declared.  "I suppose you know that.  I
+suppose they've all been telling you so."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"They haven't all your courage, dear Briton," she remarked, "and
+if they did tell me so, I am not sure that I should be convinced.
+You see, most of my friends have lived so long and lived so
+quickly that they have learned to play with words until one never
+knows whether the things they speak come from their hearts.  With
+you it is different."
+
+"Yes," Tavernake admitted, "with me it is different!"
+
+She glanced at the clock.
+
+"Well," she said, "you have seen me and I am glad to have seen
+you, and you may kiss my fingers if you like, and then you must
+run away.  I am engaged to have supper with my friends
+downstairs."
+
+He raised her fingers clumsily enough to his lips and kept them
+there for a moment.  When he let them go, she wrung them as
+though in pain, and looked at him.  She turned abruptly away.  In
+a sense she was disappointed.  After all, he was an easy victim!
+
+"Elise," she called out, "my cloak."
+
+Her maid came hurrying from the next room.  Elizabeth turned
+towards her, holding out her shoulders.  She nodded to Tavernake.
+
+"You know the way down, Mr. Tavernake?  I shall see you again
+soon, sha'n't I?  Good-night!"
+
+She scarcely glanced at him as she sent him away, yet Tavernake
+walked on air.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+A WARNING FROM Mr. PRITCHARD
+
+
+Tavernake hesitated for a moment under the portico of the Milan
+Court, looking out at the rain which had suddenly commenced to
+descend.  He scarcely noticed that he had a companion until the
+man who was standing by his side addressed him.
+
+"Say, your name is Tavernake, isn't it?"
+
+Tavernake, who had been on the point of striding away, turned
+sharply around.  The man who had spoken to him was wearing
+morning clothes of dark gray tweed and a soft Homburg hat.  His
+complexion was a little sallow and he was clean-shaven except for
+a slight black moustache.  He was smoking a black cigar and his
+accent was transatlantic.  Something about his appearance struck
+Tavernake as being vaguely familiar, but he could not at first
+recall where he had seen him before.
+
+"That is my name, certainly," Tavernake admitted.
+
+"I am going to ask you a somewhat impertinent question," his
+neighbor remarked.
+
+"I suppose you can ask it," Tavernake rejoined.  "I am not
+obliged to answer, am I?"
+
+The man smiled.
+
+"Come," he said, "that's honest, at any rate.  Are you in a hurry
+for a few minutes?"
+
+"I am in no particular hurry," Tavernake answered.  "What do you
+want?"
+
+"A few nights ago," the stranger continued, lowering his voice a
+little, "I met you with a young lady whose appearance, for some
+reason which we needn't go into, interested me.  To-night I
+happened to overhear you inquiring, only a few minutes ago, for
+the sister of the same young lady."
+
+"What you heard doesn't concern me in the least," Tavernake
+retorted.  "I should say that you had no business to listen."
+
+His companion smiled.
+
+"Well," he declared, "I have always heard a good deal about
+British frankness, and it seems to me that I'm getting some.
+Anyway, I'll tell you where I come in.  I am interested in Mrs.
+Wenham Gardner.  I am interested, also, in her sister, whom I
+think you know--Miss Beatrice Franklin, not Miss Tavernake!"
+
+Tavernake made no immediate reply.  The man was an American,
+without a doubt.  Perhaps he knew something of Beatrice.  Perhaps
+this was one of the friends of that former life concerning which
+she had told him nothing.
+
+"You are not, by any chance, proposing," Tavernake said at last,
+"to discuss either of these ladies with me?  I do not know you or
+what your business may be.  In any case, I am going now."
+
+The other laid his hand on Tavernake's shoulder.
+
+"You'll be soaked to the skin," he protested.  "I want you to
+come into the smoking-room here with me for a few minutes.  We
+will have a drink together and a little conversation, if you
+don't mind."
+
+"But I do mind," Tavernake declared.  "I don't know who you are
+and I don't want to know you, and I am not going to talk about
+Mrs. Gardner, or any other lady of my acquaintance, with
+strangers.  Good-night!"
+
+"One moment, please, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+Tavernake hesitated.  There was something curiously compelling in
+the other's smooth, distinct voice.
+
+"I'd like you to take this card," he said.  "I told you my name
+before but I expect you've forgotten it,--Pritchard--Sam
+Pritchard.  Ever heard of me before?"
+
+"Never!"
+
+"Not to have heard of me in the United States," the other
+continued, with a grim smile, "would be a tribute to your
+respectability.  Most of the crooks who find their way over here
+know of Sam Pritchard.  I am a detective and I come from New
+York."
+
+Tavernake turned and looked the man over.  There was something
+convincing about his tone and appearance.  It did not occur to
+him to doubt for a moment a word of this stranger's story.
+
+"You haven't anything against her--against either of them?" he
+asked, quickly.
+
+"Nothing directly," the detective answered.  "All the same, you
+have been calling upon Mrs. Wenham Gardner this evening, and if
+you are a friend of hers I think that you had better come along
+with me and have that talk."
+
+"I will come," Tavernake agreed, "but I come as a listener.
+Remember that I have nothing to tell you.  So far as you are
+concerned, I do not know either of those ladies."
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"Well," he said, "I guess we'll let it go at that.  All the same,
+if you don't mind, we'll talk.  Come this way and we'll get to
+the smoking-room through the hotel.  It's under cover."
+
+Tavernake moved restlessly in his chair.
+
+"What the devil is all this talk about crooks!" he exclaimed
+impatiently.  "I didn't come here to listen to this sort of
+thing.  I am not sure that I believe a word of what you say."
+
+"Why should you," Pritchard remarked, "without proof?  Look
+here."
+
+He drew a leather case from his pocket and spread it out.  There
+were a dozen photographs there of men in prison attire.  The
+detective pointed to one, and with a little shiver Tavernake
+recognized the face of the man who had been sitting at the right
+hand of Elizabeth.
+
+"You don't mean to say," he faltered, "that Mrs. Gardner--"
+
+The detective folded up his case and replaced it in his pocket.
+
+"No," he said, "we haven't any photographs of your lady friend
+there, nor of her sister.  And yet, it may not be so far off."
+
+"If you are trying to fasten anything upon those ladies,--"
+Tavernake began, threateningly.
+
+The detective laughed and patted him on the shoulder.
+
+"It isn't my business to try and fasten things upon any one," he
+interrupted.  "At the same time, you seem to be a friend of Mrs.
+Wenham Gardner, and it is just as well that some one should warn
+her."
+
+"Warn her of what?" Tavernake asked.
+
+The detective looked at his cigar meditatively.
+
+"Make her understand that there is trouble ahead," he replied.
+
+Tavernake sipped his whiskey and soda and lit a cigarette.  Then
+he turned in his chair and looked thoughtfully at his companion.
+Pritchard was a striking-looking man, with hard, clean-cut
+features--a man of determination.
+
+"Mr. Pritchard, I am a clerk in an estate office.  My people were
+work-people and I am trying to better myself in the world.  I
+haven't learned how to beat about a subject, but I have learned a
+little of the world, and I know that people such as you are not
+in the habit of doing things without a reason.  Why the devil
+have you brought me in here to talk about Mrs. Gardner and her
+sister?  If you've anything to say, why don't you go to Mrs.
+Gardner herself and say it?  Why do you come and talk to
+strangers about their affairs?  I am here listening to you, but I
+tell you straight I don't like it."
+
+Pritchard nodded.
+
+"Say, I am not sure that I don't like that sort of talk," he
+declared.  "I know all about you, young man.  You're in Dowling &
+Spence's office and you've got to quit.  You've got an estate you
+want financing.  Miss Beatrice Franklin was living under your
+roof--as your sister, I understand--until yesterday, and Mrs.
+Gardner, for some reason of her own, seems to be doing her best
+to add you to the list of her admirers.  I am not sure what it
+all means but I could make a pretty good guess.  Here's my point,
+though.  You're right.  I didn't bring you here for your health.
+I brought you here because you can do me a service and yourself
+one at the same time, and you'll be doing no one any harm, nobody
+you care about, anyway.  I have no grudge against Miss Beatrice.
+I'd just as soon she kept out of the trouble that's coming."
+
+"What is this service?" Tavernake asked.
+
+Pritchard for the moment evaded the point.
+
+"I dare say you can understand, Mr. Tavernake," he said, "that in
+my profession one has to sometimes go a long way round to get a
+man or a woman just where you want them.  Now we merely glanced
+at that table as we came in, and I can tell you this for gospel
+truth--there isn't one of that crowd that I couldn't, if I liked,
+haul back to New York on some charge or another.  You wonder why
+I don't do it.  I'll tell you.  It's because I am waiting
+-- waiting until I can bring home something more serious,
+something that will keep them out of the way for just as long as
+possible.  Do you follow me, Mr. Tavernake?"
+
+"I suppose I do," Tavernake answered, doubtfully.  "You are only
+talking of the men, of course?"
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"My young friend," he agreed, "I am only talking of the men.  At
+the same time, I guess I'm not betraying any confidence, or
+telling you anything that Mrs. Wenham Gardner doesn't know
+herself, when I say that she's doing her best to qualify for a
+similar position."
+
+"You mean that she is doing something against the law!" Tavernake
+exclaimed, indignantly.  "I don't believe it for a moment.  If
+she is associating with these people, it's because she doesn't
+know who they are."
+
+Pritchard flicked the ash from his cigar.
+
+"Well," he said, "every man has a right to his own opinions, and
+for my part I like to hear any one stick up for his friends.  It
+makes no odds to me.  However, here are a few facts I am going to
+bring before you.  Four months ago, one of the turns at a
+vaudeville show down Broadway consisted of a performance by a
+Professor Franklin and his two daughters, Elizabeth and Beatrice.
+The professor hypnotized, told fortunes, felt heads, and the
+usual rigmarole.  Beatrice sang, Elizabeth danced.
+
+People came to see the show, not because it was any good but
+because the girls, even in New York, were beautiful."
+
+"A music-hall in New York!" Tavernake muttered.
+
+The detective nodded.
+
+"Among the young bloods of the city," he continued, "were two
+brothers, as much alike as twins, although they aren't twins,
+whose names were Wenham and Jerry Gardner.  There's nothing in
+fast life which those young men haven't tried.  Between them, I
+should say they represented everything that was known of
+debauchery and dissipation.  The eldest can't be more than
+twenty-seven to-day, but if you were to see them in the morning,
+either of them, before they had been massaged and galvanized into
+life, you'd think they were little old men, with just strength
+enough left to crawl about.  Well, to cut a long story short,
+both of them fell in love with Elizabeth."
+
+"Brutes!" Tavernake interjected.
+
+"I guess they found Miss Elizabeth a pretty tough nut to crack,"
+the detective went on.  "Anyhow, you know what her price was from
+her name, which is hers right enough.  Wenham, who was a year
+younger than his brother, was the first to bid it.  Three months
+ago, Mr. and Mrs. Wenham Gardner, Miss Beatrice, and the devoted
+father left New York in the Lusitania and came to London."
+
+"Where is this Wenham Gardner, then?" Tavernake demanded.
+
+Pritchard took his cigar case from his pocket and selected
+another cigar.
+
+"Say, that's where you strike the nail right on the head," he
+remarked.  "Where is this Wenham Gardner?
+
+I don't mind telling you, Mr. Tavernake, that to discover his
+whereabouts is exactly what I am over on this side for.  I have a
+commission from the family to find out, and a blank cheque to do
+it with."
+
+"Do you mean that he has disappeared, then?" asked Tavernake.
+
+"Off the face of the earth, sir," Pritchard replied.  "Something
+like two months ago, the young married couple, with Miss
+Beatrice, started for a holiday tour somewhere down in the west
+of England.  A few days after they started, Miss Beatrice comes
+back to London alone.  She goes to a boarding-house, is
+practically penniless, but she has shaken her sister--has, I
+believe, never spoken with her since.  A little later, Elizabeth
+alone turns up in London.  She has plenty of money, more money
+than she has ever had the control of before in her life, but no
+husband."
+
+"So far, I don't see anything remarkable about that," Tavernake
+interposed.
+
+"That may or may not be," Pritchard answered, drily.  "This
+creature, Wenham Gardner--I hate to call him a man--was her
+abject slave--up till the time they reached London, at any rate.
+He would never have quit of his own accord.  He stopped quite
+suddenly communicating with all his friends.  None of their
+cables, even, were answered."
+
+"Why don't you go and ask Mrs. Gardner where he is?" Tavernake
+demanded bluntly.
+
+"I have already," Pritchard declared, "taken that liberty.  With
+tears in her eyes, she assured me that after some slight quarrel,
+in which she admits that she was the one to blame, her husband
+walked out of the house where they were staying, and she has not
+seen him since.  She was quite ready with all the particulars,
+and even implored me to help find him."
+
+"I cannot imagine," Tavernake said, "why any one should
+disbelieve her."
+
+The detective smiled.
+
+"There are a few little outside circumstances," he remarked,
+looking at the ash of his cigar.  "In the first place, how do you
+suppose that this young Wenham Gardner spent the last week of his
+stay in New York?"
+
+"How should I know?" Tavernake replied, impatiently.
+
+"By realizing every cent of his property on which he could lay
+his hands," the detective continued.  "It isn't at any time an
+easy business, and the Gardner interest is spread out in many
+directions, but he must have sailed with something like forty
+thousand pounds in hard cash.  A suspicious person might presume
+that that forty thousand pounds has found its way to the stronger
+of the combination."
+
+"Anything else?" Tavernake asked.
+
+"I won't worry you much more," the detective answered.  "There
+are a few other circumstances which seem to need explanation, but
+they can wait.  There is one serious one, however, and that is
+where you come in."
+
+"Indeed!" Tavernake remarked.  "I was hoping you would come to
+that soon."
+
+"The two sisters, Beatrice and Elizabeth, have been together ever
+since we can learn anything of their history.  Those people who
+don't understand the disappearance of Wenham Gardner would like
+to know why they quarreled and parted, why Beatrice is keeping
+away from her sister in this strange manner.  I personally, too,
+should like to know from Miss Beatrice when she last saw Wenham
+Gardner alive."
+
+"You want me to ask Miss Beatrice these things?" Tavernake
+demanded.
+
+"It might come better from you," Pritchard admitted.  "I have
+written her to the theatre but naturally she has not replied."
+
+Tavernake looked curiously at his companion.
+
+"Do you really suppose," he asked, "that, even granted there were
+any unusual circumstances in connection with that quarrel--do you
+seriously suppose that Beatrice would give her sister away?"
+
+The detective sighed.
+
+"No doubt, Mr. Tavernake," he said, "these young ladies are
+friends of yours, and perhaps for that reason you are a little
+prejudiced in their favor.  Their whole bringing-up and
+associations, however, have certainly not been of a strict order.
+I cannot help thinking that persuasion might be brought to bear
+upon Miss Beatrice, that it might be pointed out to her that a
+true story is the safest."
+
+"Well, if you've finished," Tavernake declared, "I'd like to tell
+you what I think of your story.  I think it's all d -d silly
+nonsense!  This Wenham Gardner, by your own saying, was half mad.
+There was a quarrel and he's gone off to Paris or somewhere.  As
+to your suggestions about Mrs. Gardner, I think they're
+infamous."
+
+Pritchard was unmoved by his companion's warmth.
+
+"Why, that's all right, Mr. Tavernake," he affirmed.  "I can
+quite understand your feeling like that just at first.  You see,
+I've been among crime and criminals all my days, and I learn to
+look for a certain set of motives when a thing of this sort
+happens.  You've been brought up among honest folk, who go the
+straightforward way about life, and naturally you look at the
+same matter from a different point of view.  But you and I have
+got to talk this out.  I want you to understand that those very
+charming young ladies are not quite the class of young women whom
+you know anything about.  Mind you, I haven't a word to say
+against Miss Beatrice.  I dare say she's as straight as they make
+'em.  But--you must take another whiskey and soda, Mr. Tavernake.
+Now, I insist upon it.  Tim, come right over here."
+
+Mr. Pritchard seemed to have forgotten what he was talking about.
+The room had been suddenly invaded.  The whole of the little
+supper party, whose individual members he had pointed out to his
+companion, came trooping into the room.  They were all apparently
+on the best of terms with themselves, and they all seemed to make
+a point of absolutely ignoring Pritchard's presence.  Elizabeth
+was the one exception.  She was carrying a tiny Chinese spaniel
+under one arm; with the fingers of her other hand she held a
+tortoise-shell mounted monocle to her eye, and stared directly at
+the two men.  Presently she came languidly across the room to
+them.
+
+"Dear me," she said, "I had no idea that even your wide circle of
+acquaintances, Mr. Pritchard, included my friend, Mr. Tavernake."
+
+The two men rose to their feet.  Tavernake felt confused and
+angry.  It was as though he had been playing the traitor in
+listening, even for a moment, to these stories.
+
+"Mr. Pritchard introduced himself to me only a few minutes ago,"
+he declared.  "He brought me in here and I have been listening to
+a lot of rubbish from him of which I don't believe a single
+word."
+
+She flashed a wonderful smile upon him.
+
+"Mr. Pritchard is so very censorious," she murmured.  "He takes
+such a very low view of human nature.  After all, though, I
+suppose we must not blame him.  I think that as men and women we
+do not exist to him.  We are simply the pegs by means of which he
+can climb a little higher in the esteem of his employers."
+
+Pritchard took up his soft hat and stick.
+
+"Mrs. Gardner," he said, "I will confess that I have been wasting
+my time with this young man.  You are a trifle severe upon me.
+You may find, and before long, that I am your best friend."
+
+She laughed delightfully.
+
+"Dear Mr. Pritchard," she exclaimed, "it is a strange thought,
+that!  If only I dared hope that some day it might come true!"
+
+"More unlikely things, madam, are happening every hour," the
+detective remarked.  "The world--our little corner of it, at any
+rate--is full of anomalies.  There might even come a time to any
+one of us three when liberty was more dangerous than the prison
+cell itself."
+
+He nodded carelessly to Tavernake, and with a bow to Elizabeth
+turned and left the room.  Elizabeth remained as though turned to
+stone, looking after him as he descended the stairs.
+
+"The man is a fool!" Tavernake cried, roughly.
+
+Elizabeth shook her head and sighed.
+
+"He is something far more ineffective," she said.  "He is just a
+little too clever."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER, XV
+
+GENERAL DISCONTENT
+
+
+Elizabeth did not at once rejoin her friends.  Instead, she sank
+on to the low settee close to where she had been standing, and
+drew Tavernake down to her side.  She waved her hand across at
+the others, who were calling for her.
+
+"In a moment, dear people," she said.
+
+Then she leaned back among the cushions and laughed at her
+companion.
+
+"Tell me, Mr. Tavernake," she asked, "don't you feel that you
+have stepped into a sort of modern Arabian Nights?"
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Oh, I know Mr. Pritchard's weakness," she continued.  "He loves
+to throw a glamour around everything he says or does.  Because he
+honors me by interesting himself in my concerns, he has probably
+told you all sorts of wonderful things about me and my friends.
+A very ingenious romancer, Mr. Pritchard, you know.  Confess,
+now, didn't he tell you some stories about us?"
+
+She might have spared herself the trouble of beating about the
+bush.  There was no hesitation about Tavernake.
+
+"He said that your friends were every one of them criminals,"
+Tavernake declared, "and he admitted that he was working hard at
+the present moment to discover that you were one, too."
+
+She laughed softly but heartily.
+
+"I wonder what was his object," she remarked, "in taking you into
+his confidence."
+
+"He happened to know," Tavernake explained, "that I was intimate
+with your sister.  He wanted me to ask Beatrice a certain
+question."
+
+Elizabeth laughed no more.  She looked steadfastly into his eyes.
+
+"And that question?"
+
+"He wanted me to ask Beatrice why she left you and hid herself in
+London."
+
+She tried to smile but not very successfully.
+
+"According to his story," Tavernake continued, "you and Beatrice
+and your husband were away together somewhere in the country.
+Something happened there, something which resulted in the
+disappearance of your husband.  Beatrice came back alone and has
+not been near you since.  Soon afterwards, you, too, came back
+alone.  Mr. Gardner has not been seen or heard of."
+
+Elizabeth was bending over her dog, but even Tavernake,
+unobservant though he was, could see that she was shaken.
+
+"Pritchard is a clever man, generally," she remarked,
+"diabolically clever.  Why has he told you all this, I wonder?
+He must have known that you would probably repeat it to me.  Why
+does he want to show me his hand?"
+
+"I have no idea," Tavernake replied.  "These matters are all
+beyond me.  They do not concern me in any way.  I am not keeping
+you from your friends?  Please send me away when you like."
+
+"Don't go just yet," she begged.  "Sit with me for a moment.
+Can't you see," she added, whispering, "that I have had a shock?
+Sit with me.  I can't go back to those others just yet."
+
+Tavernake did as he was bidden.  The woman at his side was still
+caressing the little animal she carried.  Watching her, however,
+Tavernake could see that her bosom was rising and falling
+quickly.  There was an unnatural pallor in her cheeks, a
+terrified gleam in her eyes.  Nevertheless, these things passed.
+In a very few seconds she was herself again.
+
+"Come," she said, "it is not often that I give way.  The only
+time I am ever afraid is when there is something which I do not
+understand.  I do not understand Mr. Pritchard to-night.  I know
+that he is my enemy.  I cannot imagine why he should talk to you.
+He must have known that you would repeat all he said.  It is not
+like him.  Tell me, Mr. Tavernake, you have heard all sorts of
+things about me.  Do you believe them?  Do you believe--it's
+rather a horrible thing to ask, isn't it?" she went on hurriedly,
+--"do you believe that I made away with my husband?"
+
+"You surely do not need to ask me that question," Tavernake
+answered, fervently.  "I should believe your word, whatever you
+told me.  I should not believe that you could do anything wrong."
+
+Her hand touched his for a moment and he was repaid.
+
+"Don't think too well of me," she begged.  "I don't want to
+disappoint you."
+
+Some one pushed open the swing doors and she started nervously.
+It was only a waiter who passed through into the bar.
+
+"What I think of you," Tavernake said slowly, "nothing could
+alter, but because I am stupid, I suppose, there is quite a good
+deal that I cannot understand.  I cannot understand, for
+instance, why they should suspect you of having anything to do
+with your husband's disappearance.  You can prove where you were
+when he left you?"
+
+"Quite easily," she answered, "only, unfortunately, no one seems
+to have seen him go.  He timed his departure so cunningly that he
+apparently vanished into thin air.  Even then," she continued,
+"but for one thing I don't suppose that any one would have had
+suspicions.  I dare say Mr. Pritchard told you that before we
+left New York my husband sold out some of his property and
+brought it over to Europe with him in cash.  We had both
+determined that we would live abroad and have nothing more to do
+with America.  It was not I who persuaded him to do this.  It
+made no difference to me.  If he had run away and left me, the
+courts would have given me money.  If he had died and I had been
+a widow, he would have left me his property.  But simply because
+there was all this money in our hands, and because he
+disappeared, his people and this man Pritchard suspect me."
+
+"It is wicked," he muttered.
+
+She turned slowly towards him.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she said, "do you know that you can help me very
+much indeed?"
+
+"I only wish I could," he replied.  "Try me."
+
+"Can't you see," she went on, "that the great thing against me is
+that Beatrice left me suddenly when we were on that wretched
+expedition, and came back alone?  She is in London, I know, quite
+close to me, and still she hides.  Pritchard asks himself why.
+Mr. Tavernake, go and tell her what people are saying, go and
+tell her everything that has happened, let her understand that
+her keeping away is doing me a terrible injury, beg her to come
+and let people see that we are reconciled, and warn her, too,
+against Pritchard.  Will you do this for me?"
+
+"Of course I will," Tavernake answered.  "I will see her
+to-morrow."
+
+Elizabeth drew a little sigh of relief.
+
+"And you'll let me know what she says?" she asked, rising.
+
+"I shall be only too glad to," Tavernake assured her.
+
+"Good-night!"
+
+She looked up into his face with a smile which had turned the
+heads of hardened stagers in New York.  No wonder that Tavernake
+felt his heart beat against his ribs!  He took her hands and held
+them for a moment.  Then he turned abruptly away.
+
+"Good-night!" he said.
+
+He disappeared through the swing doors.  She strolled across the
+room to where her friends were sitting in a circle, laughing and
+talking.  Her father, who had just come in and joined them,
+gripped her by the arm as she sat down.
+
+"What does it mean?" he demanded, with shaking voice.  "Did you
+see that he was there with Pritchard--your young man--that
+wretched estate agent's clerk?  I tell you that Pritchard was
+pumping him for all he was worth."
+
+"My dear father," she whispered, coldly, "don't be melodramatic.
+You give yourself away the whole time.  Go to bed if you can't
+behave like a man."
+
+The lights had been turned low, there was no one else in the
+room.  The little old gentleman with the eyeglass leaned forward.
+
+"Have you any notion, my dear Elizabeth," he asked, "why our
+friend Pritchard is so much in evidence just at present?"
+
+"Not on account of you, Jimmy," she answered, "nor of any one
+else here, in fact.  The truth is he has conceived a violent
+admiration for me--an admiration so pronounced, indeed, that he
+hates to let me out of his sight."
+
+They all laughed uproariously.  Then Walter Crease, the
+journalist, leaned forward,--a man with a long, narrow face,
+yellow-stained fingers, and hollow cheekbones.  He glanced around
+the room before he spoke, and his voice sounded like a hoarse
+whisper.
+
+"See here," he said, "seems to me Pritchard is getting mighty
+awkward.  He hasn't got his posse around him in this country,
+anyway."
+
+There was a dead silence for several seconds.  Then the little
+old gentleman nodded solemnly.
+
+"I am a trifle tired of Pritchard myself," he admitted, "and he
+certainly knows too much.  He carries too much in his head to go
+around safely."
+
+The eyes of Elizabeth were bright.
+
+"He treats us like children," she declared.  "To-night he has
+told the whole of my affairs to a perfect stranger.  It is
+intolerable!"
+
+The little party broke up soon after.  Only Walter Crease and the
+man called Jimmy Post were left talking, and they retired into
+the window-seat, whispering together.
+
+Tavernake, with his hands thrust deep in his overcoat pockets,
+left the hotel and strode along the Strand.  Some fancy seized
+him before he had gone many paces, and turning abruptly to the
+left he descended to the Embankment.  He made his way to the very
+seat upon which he had sat once before with Beatrice.  With
+folded arms he leaned back in the corner, looking out across the
+river, at the curving line of lights, at the black, turgid
+waters, the slowly-moving hulk of a barge on its way down the
+stream.  It was a new thing, this, for him to have to accuse
+himself of folly, of weakness.  For the last few days he had
+moved in a mist of uncertainty, setting his heel upon all
+reflection, avoiding every issue.  To-night he could escape those
+accusing thoughts no longer; to-night he was more than ever
+bitter with himself.  What folly was this which had sprung up in
+his life--folly colossal, unimaginable, as unexpected as though
+it had fallen a thunderbolt from the skies!  What had happened to
+change him so completely!
+
+His thought traveled back to the boarding-house.  It was there
+that the thing had begun.  Before that night upon the roof, the
+finger-posts which he had set up with such care and deliberation
+along the road which led towards his coveted goal, had seemed to
+him to point with unfaltering directness towards everything in
+life worthy of consideration.  To-night they were only dreary
+phantasms, marking time across a miserable plain.  Perhaps, after
+all, there had been something in his nature, some rebel thing,
+intolerable yet to be reckoned with, which had been first born of
+that fateful curiosity of his.  It had leapt up so suddenly,
+sprung with such scanty notice into strenuous and insistent life.
+Yet what place had it there?  He must fight against it, root it
+out with both hands.  What was this world of intrigue, this
+criminal, undesirable world, to him?  His common sense forbade
+him altogether to dissociate Elizabeth from her friends, from her
+surroundings.  She was the secret of the pain which was tearing
+at his heartstrings, of all the excitement, the joy, the passion
+which had swept like a full flood across the level way of his
+life, which had set him drifting among the unknown seas.  Yet it
+was Beatrice who had brought this upon him.  If she had never
+left, if he had not tasted the horrors of this new loneliness, he
+might have been able to struggle on.  He missed her, missed her
+diabolically.  The other things, marvelous though they were, had
+been more or less like a mirage.  This world of new emotions had
+spread like a silken mesh over all his thoughts, over all his
+desires.  Beatrice had been a tangible person, restful,
+delightful, a real companion, his one resource against this
+madness.  And now she was gone, and he was powerless to get her
+back.  He turned his head, he looked up the road along which he
+had torn that night with his arms around her.  She owed him her
+life and she had gone!  With all a man's inconsequence, it seemed
+to him as he rose heavily to his feet and started homeward, that
+she had repaid him with a certain amount of ingratitude, that she
+had left him at the one moment in his life when he needed her
+most.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+AN OFFER OF MARRIAGE
+
+
+The next afternoon, at half-past four, Tavernake was having tea
+with Beatrice in the tiny flat which she was sharing with another
+girl, off Kingsway.  She opened the door to him herself, and
+though she chattered ceaselessly, it seemed to him that she was
+by no means at her ease.  She installed him in the only available
+chair, an absurd little wicker thing many sizes too small for
+him, and seated herself upon the hearth-rug a few feet away.
+
+"You have soon managed to find me out, Leonard," she remarked.
+
+"Yes," he answered.  "I had to go to the stage doorkeeper for
+your address."
+
+"He hadn't the slightest right to give it you," she declared.
+
+Tavernake shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"I had to have it," he said simply.
+
+"The power of the purse again!" she laughed.  "Now that you are
+here, I don't believe that you are a bit glad to see me.  Are
+you?"
+
+He did not answer for a moment.  He was thinking of that vigil
+upon the Embankment, of the long walk home, of the battle with
+himself, the continual striving to tear from his heart this new
+thing, for which, with a curious and most masculine
+inconsistency, he persisted in holding her responsible.
+
+"You know, Leonard," she continued, getting up abruptly and
+beginning to make the tea, "I believe that you are angry with me.
+If you are, all I can say is that you are a very foolish person.
+I had to come away.  Can't you see that?"
+
+"I cannot," he answered stolidly.
+
+She sighed.
+
+"You are not a reasonable person," she declared.  "I suppose it
+is because you have led such a queer life, and had no womenfolk
+to look after you.  You don't understand.  It was absurd, in a
+way, that I should ever have called myself your sister, that we
+should even have attempted such a ridiculous experiment.  But
+after--after the other night--"
+
+"Can't we forget that?" he interrupted.
+
+She raised her eyes and looked at him.
+
+"Can you?" she asked.
+
+There was a curious, almost a pleading earnestness in her tone.
+Her eyes had something new to say, something which, though it
+failed to stir his blood, made him vaguely uncomfortable.
+Nevertheless, he answered her without hesitation.
+
+"Yes," he replied, "I could forget it.  I will promise to forget
+it."
+
+It was unaccountable, but he almost fancied that he saw this new
+thing pass from her face, leaving her pale and tremulous.  She
+looked away again and busied herself with the tea-caddy, but the
+fingers which held the spoon were shaking a little.
+
+"Oh, I suppose I could forget," she said, "but it would be very
+difficult for either of us to behave as though it had never
+happened.  Besides, it really was an impossible situation, you
+know," she went on, looking down into the tea-caddy.  "It is much
+better for me to be here with Annie.  You can come and see me now
+and then and we can still be very good friends."
+
+Tavernake was annoyed.  He said nothing, and Beatrice, glancing
+up, laughed at his gloomy expression.
+
+"You certainly are," she declared, "the most impossible, the most
+primitive person I ever met.  London isn't Arcadia, you know, and
+you are not my brother.  Besides, you were such an autocrat.  You
+didn't even like my going out to supper with Mr. Grier."
+
+"I hate the fellow!" Tavernake admitted.  "Are you seeing much of
+him?"
+
+"He took us all out to supper last night," she replied.  "I
+thought it was very kind of him to ask me."
+
+"Kind, indeed!  Does he want to marry you?" Tavernake demanded.
+
+She set down the teapot and again she laughed softly.  In her
+plain black gown, very simple, adorned only by the little white
+bow at her neck, quakerlike and spotless, with the added color in
+her cheeks, too, which seemed to have come there during the last
+few moments, she was a very alluring person.
+
+"He can't," she declared.  "He is married already."
+
+Then there came to Tavernake an inspiration, an inspiration so
+wonderful that he gripped the sides of his chair and sat up.
+Here, after all, was the way out for him, the way out from his
+garden of madness, the way to escape from that mysterious,
+paralyzing yoke whose burden was already heavy upon his
+shoulders.  In that swift, vivid moment he saw something of the
+truth.  He saw himself losing all his virility, the tool and
+plaything of this woman who had bewitched him, a poor, fond
+creature living only for the kind words and glances she might
+throw him at her pleasure.  In those few seconds he knew the true
+from the false.  Without hesitation, he gripped with all the
+colossal selfishness of his unthinking sex at the rope which was
+thrown to him.
+
+"Well, then, I do," he said firmly.  "Will you marry me,
+Beatrice?"
+
+She threw her head back and laughed, laughed long and softly, and
+Tavernake, simple and unversed in the ways of women, believed
+that she was indeed amused.
+
+"Neither you nor any one else, dear Leonard!" she exclaimed.
+
+"But I want you to," he persisted.  "I think that you will."
+
+There was coquetry now in the tantalizing look she flashed him.
+
+"Am I, too, then, one of these things to be attained in your
+life?" she asked.  "Dear Leonard, you mustn't say it like that.
+I don't like the look of your jaw.  It frightens me."
+
+"There is nothing to be afraid of in marrying me," he answered.
+"I should make you a very good husband.  Some day you would be
+rich, very rich indeed.  I am quite sure that I shall succeed, if
+not at once, very soon.  There is plenty of money to be made in
+the world if one perseveres."
+
+She had the air of trying to take him seriously.
+
+"You sound quite convincing," she admitted, "but I do wish that
+you would put all these thoughts out of your mind, Leonard.  It
+doesn't sound like you in the least.  Remember what you told me
+that first night; you assured me that women had not the slightest
+part in your life."
+
+"I have changed," he confessed.  "I did not expect anything of
+the sort to happen, but it has.  It would be foolish of me to
+deny it.  I have been all my life learning, Beatrice," he
+continued, with a sudden curious softness in his tone, "and yet,
+somehow or other, it seems to me that I never knew anything at
+all until lately.  There was no one to direct me, no one to show
+me just what is worth while in life.  You have taught me a great
+deal, you have taught me how little I know.  And there are
+things," he went on, solemnly, "of which I am afraid, things
+which I do not begin even to understand.  Can't you see how it is
+with me?  I am really very ignorant.  I want some one who
+understands; I want you, Beatrice, very badly."
+
+She patted the back of his hand caressingly.
+
+"You mustn't talk like that, Leonard," she said.  "I shouldn't
+make you a good wife.  I am not going to marry any one."
+
+"And why?" he asked.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"That is my secret," she told him, looking into the fire.
+
+"You mean to say that, you will never marry?" he persisted.
+
+"Oh, I suppose I shall change, like other women," she answered.
+"Just at present, I feel like that."
+
+"Is it because your sister's marriage--"
+
+She caught hold of both his hands; her eyes were suddenly full of
+terror.
+
+"You mustn't talk about Elizabeth," she begged, "you please
+mustn't talk about her.  Promise that you won't."
+
+"But I came here to talk about her," he replied.
+
+Beatrice, for a moment, said nothing.  Then she threw down his
+hands and laughed once more.  As she flung herself back in her
+place, it seemed to Tavernake that he saw once more the girl who
+had stood upon the roof of the boarding-house.
+
+"You came to talk about Elizabeth!" she exclaimed.  "I forgot.
+Well, go on, what is it?"
+
+"Your sister is in trouble!"
+
+"Are you her confidant?" Beatrice asked.
+
+"I am not exactly that," he admitted, "but she has asked me to
+come and see you."
+
+Beatrice had suddenly grown hard, her lips were set together,
+even her attitude was uncompromising.
+
+"Say exactly what you have to say," she told him.  "I will not
+interrupt."
+
+"It sounds foolish," Tavernake declared, "because I know so
+little, but it seems that your sister is being annoyed by a man
+named Pritchard, an American detective.  She tells me that he
+suspects her of being concerned in some way with the
+disappearance of her husband.  One of his reasons is that you
+left her abruptly and went into hiding, that you will not see or
+speak to her.  She wishes you to be reconciled."
+
+"Is that all?" Beatrice asked.
+
+"It is all," he replied, "so long as you understand its
+significance.  If you go to see your sister, or let her come to
+see you, this man Pritchard will have one of his causes for
+suspicion removed."
+
+"So you came as Elizabeth's ambassador," Beatrice said, half as
+though to herself.  "Well, here is my answer.  I will not go to
+Elizabeth.  If she finds out my whereabouts and comes here, then
+I shall go away again and hide.  I shall never willingly exchange
+another word with her as long as I live."
+
+Tavernake looked at her doubtfully.
+
+"But she is your sister!" he explained.
+
+"She is my sister," Beatrice repeated, "and yet what I have said
+to you I mean."
+
+There was a short silence.  Tavernake felt unaccountably ill at
+ease.  Something had sprung up between them which he did not
+understand.  He was swift to recognize, however, the note of
+absolute finality in her tone.
+
+"I have given my message," he declared.  "I shall tell her what
+you say.  Perhaps I had better go now."
+
+He half rose to his feet.  Suddenly she lost control of herself.
+
+"Leonard, Leonard," she cried, "don't you see that you are being
+very foolish indeed?  You have been good to me.  Let me try and
+repay it a little.  Elizabeth is my sister, but listen!  What I
+say to you now I say in deadly earnest.  Elizabeth has no heart,
+she has no thought for other people, she makes use of them and
+they count for no more to her than the figures that pass through
+one's dreams.  She has some sort of hateful gift," Beatrice
+continued, and her voice shook and her eyes flashed, "some
+hateful gift of attracting people to her and making them do her
+bidding, of spoiling their lives and throwing them away when they
+have ceased to be useful.  Leonard, you must not let her do this
+with you."
+
+He rose to his feet awkwardly.  Very likely it was all true, and
+yet, what difference did it make?
+
+"Thank you," he said.
+
+They stood, for a moment, hand in hand.  Then they heard the
+sound of a key in the lock.
+
+"Here's Annie coming back!" Beatrice exclaimed.
+
+Tavernake was introduced to Miss Annie Legarde, who thought he
+was a very strange person indeed because he did not fit in with
+any of the types of men, young or old, of whom she knew anything.
+And as for Tavernake, he considered that Miss Annie Legarde would
+have looked at least as well in a hat half the size, and much
+better without the powder upon her face.  Her clothes were
+obviously more expensive than Beatrice's, but they were put on
+with less care and taste.
+
+Beatrice came out on to the landing with him.
+
+"So you won't marry me, Beatrice?" he said, as she held out her
+hand.
+
+She looked at him for a moment and then turned away with a faint
+sob, without even a word of farewell.  He watched her disappear
+and heard the door shut.  Slowly he began to descend the stone
+steps.  There was something to him a little fateful about the
+closed door above, the long yet easy descent into the street.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+THE BALCONY AT IMANO'S
+
+
+At six o'clock that evening, Tavernake rang up the Milan Court
+and inquired for Elizabeth.  There was a moment or two's delay
+and then he heard her reply.  Even over the telephone wires, even
+though he stood, cramped and uncomfortable, in that stuffy little
+telephone booth, he felt the quick start of pleasure, the thrill
+of something different in life, which came to him always at the
+sound of her voice, at the slightest suggestion of her presence.
+
+"Well, my friend, what fortune?" she asked him.
+
+"None," he answered.  "I have done my best.  Beatrice will not
+listen to me."
+
+"She will not come and see me?"
+
+"She will not."
+
+Elizabeth was silent for a moment.  When she spoke again, there
+was a change in her tone.
+
+"You have failed, then."
+
+"I did everything that could be done," Tavernake insisted
+eagerly.  "I am quite sure that nothing anybody could say would
+move Beatrice.  She is very decided indeed."
+
+"I have another idea," Elizabeth remarked, after a brief pause.
+"She will not come to me; very well, I must go to her.  You must
+take me there."
+
+"I cannot do that," Tavernake answered.
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Beatrice has refused absolutely to permit me to tell you or any
+one else of her whereabouts," he declared.  "Without her
+permission I cannot do it."
+
+"Do you mean that?" she asked.
+
+"Of course," he answered uncomfortably.
+
+There was another silence.  When she spoke again, her voice had
+changed for the second time.  Tavernake felt his heart sink as he
+listened.
+
+"Very well," she said.  "I thought that you were my friend, that
+you wished to help me."
+
+"I do," he replied, "but you would not have me break my word?"
+
+"You are breaking your word with me," she told him.
+
+"It is a different thing," he insisted.
+
+"You will not take me there?" she said once more.
+
+"I cannot," Tavernake answered.
+
+"Very well, good-bye!"
+
+"Don't go," he begged.  "Can't I see you somewhere for a few
+minutes this evening?"
+
+"I am afraid not," Elizabeth replied coolly.
+
+"Are you going out?" he persisted.
+
+"I am going to the Duke of York's Theatre with some friends," she
+answered.  "I am sorry.  You have disappointed me."
+
+She rang off and he turned away from the telephone booth into the
+street.  It seemed to him, as he walked down the crowded
+thoroughfare, that some reflection of his own self-contempt was
+visible in the countenances of the men and women who were
+hurrying past him.  Wherever he looked, he was acutely conscious
+of it.  In his heart he felt the bitter sense of shame of a man
+who wilfully succumbs to weakness.  Yet that night he made his
+efforts.
+
+For four hours he sat in his lonely rooms and worked.  Then the
+unequal struggle was ended.  With a groan he caught up his hat
+and coat and left the house.  Half an hour later, he was among
+the little crowd of loiterers and footmen standing outside the
+doors of the Duke of York's Theatre.
+
+It was still some time before the termination of the performance.
+As the slow minutes dragged by, he grew to hate himself, to hate
+this new thing in his life which had torn down his everyday
+standards, which had carried him off his feet in this strange and
+detestable fashion.  It was a dormant sense, without a doubt,
+which Elizabeth had stirred into life--the sense of sex,
+quiescent in him so long, chiefly through his perfect physical
+sanity; perhaps, too, in some measure, from his half-starved
+imagination.  It was significant, though, that once aroused it
+burned with surprising and unwavering fidelity.  The whole world
+of women now were different creatures to him, but they left him
+as utterly unmoved as in his unawakened days.  It was Elizabeth
+only he wanted, craved for fiercely, with all this late-born
+passion of mingled sentiment and desire.  He felt himself, as he
+hung round there upon the pavement, rubbing shoulders with the
+liveried servants, the loafers, and the passers-by, a thing to be
+despised.  He was like a whipped dog fawning back to his master.
+Yet if only he could persuade her to come with him, if it were
+but for an hour!  If only she would sit opposite him in that
+wonderful little restaurant, where the lights and the music, the
+laughter and the wine, were all outward symbols of this new life
+from before which her fingers seemed to have torn aside the
+curtains!  His heart beat with a fierce impatience.  He watched
+the thin stream of people who left before the play was over,
+suburbanites mostly, in a hurry for their trains.  Very soon the
+whole audience followed, commissionaires were busy with their
+whistles, the servants eagerly looking right and left for their
+masters.  And then Elizabeth!  She came out in the midst of
+half-a-dozen others, brilliant in a wonderful cloak and dress of
+turquoise blue, laughing with her friends, to all appearance the
+gayest of the party.  Tavernake stepped quickly forward, but at
+that moment there was a crush and he could not advance.  She
+passed within a yard of him, escorted by a couple of men, and for
+a moment their eyes met.  She raised her eyebrows, as though in
+surprise, and her recognition was of the slightest.  She passed
+on and entered a waiting motorcar, accompanied by the two men.
+Tavernake stood and looked after it.  She did not even glance
+round.  Except for that little gesture of cold surprise, she had
+ignored him.  Tavernake, scarcely knowing what he did, turned
+slowly towards the Strand.
+
+He was face to face now with a crisis before which he seemed
+powerless.  Men were there in the world to be bullied, cajoled,
+or swept out of the way.  What did one do with a woman who was
+kind one moment and insolent the next, who raised her eyebrows
+and passed on when he wanted her, when he was there longing for
+her?  Those old solid dreams of his--wealth, power, his name on
+great prospectuses, a position in the world--these things now
+appeared like the day fancies of a child.  He had seen his way
+towards them.  Already he had felt his feet upon the rungs of the
+ladder which leads to material success.  This was something
+different, something greater.  Then a sense of despair chilled
+his heart.  He felt how ignorant, how helpless he was.  He had
+not even studied the first text-book of life.  Those very
+qualities which had served him so well before were hopeless here.
+Persistence, Beatrice had told him once, only annoys a woman.
+
+He came to a standstill outside the entrance to the Milan Court,
+and retraced his steps.  The thought of Beatrice had brought
+something soothing with it.  He felt that he must see her, see
+her at once.  He walked back along the Strand and entered the
+restaurant where Beatrice and he had had their memorable supper.
+From the vestibule he could just see Grier's back as he stood
+talking to a waiter by the side of a round table in the middle of
+the room.  Tavernake slowly withdrew and made his way upstairs.
+There were one or two little tables there in the balcony, hidden
+from the lower part of the room.  He seated himself at one,
+handing his coat and hat mechanically to the waiter who came
+hurrying up.
+
+"But, Monsieur," the man explained, with a deprecating gesture,
+"these tables are all taken."
+
+Tavernake, who kept an account book in which he registered even
+his car fares, put five shillings in the man's hand.
+
+"This one I will have," he said, firmly, and sat down.
+
+The man looked at him and turned aside to speak to the head
+waiter.  They conversed together in whispers.  Tavernake took no
+notice.  His jaw was set.  Himself unseen, he was gazing
+steadfastly at that table below.  The head waiter shrugged his
+shoulders and departed; his other clients must be mollified.
+There was a finality which was unanswerable about Tavernake's
+methods.
+
+Tavernake ate and drank what they brought to him, ate and drank
+and suffered.  Everything was as it had been that other night--
+the popping of corks, the soft music, the laughter of women, the
+pleasant, luxurious sense of warmth and gayety pervading the
+whole place.
+
+It was all just the same, but this time he sat outside and looked
+on.  Beatrice was seated next Grier, and on her other side was a
+young man of the type which Tavernake detested, partly because it
+inspired him with a reluctant but insistent sense of inferiority.
+The young man was handsome, tall, and thin.  His evening clothes
+fitted him perfectly, his studs and links were of the latest
+mode, his white tie arranged as though by the fingers of an
+artist.  And yet he was no tailor's model.  A gentleman, beyond a
+doubt, Tavernake decided, watching grudgingly the courteous
+movement of his head, listening sometimes to his well-bred but
+rather languid voice.  Beatrice laughed often into his face.  She
+admired him, of course.  How could she help it!  Grier sat at her
+other side.  He, too, talked to her whenever he had the chance.
+It was a new fever which Tavernake was tasting, a new fever
+burning in his blood.  He was jealous; he hated the whole party
+below.  In imagination he saw Elizabeth with her friends, supping
+most likely in that other, more resplendent restaurant, only a
+few yards away.  He imagined her the centre of every attention.
+Without a doubt, she was looking at her neighbor as she had
+looked at him.  Tavernake bit his lip, frowning.  If he had had
+it in his power, in those black moments, to have thrown a
+thunderbolt from his place, he would have wrecked every table in
+the room, he would have watched with joy the white, startled
+faces of the revelers as they fled away into the night.  It was a
+new torture, indescribable, bitter.  Indeed, this curiosity of
+his, of which he had spoken to Beatrice as they had walked
+together down Oxford Street on that first evening, was being
+satisfied with a vengeance!  He was learning of those other
+things of life.  He had sipped at the sweetness; he was drinking
+the bitters!
+
+An altercation by his side distracted him.  Again there was the
+head waiter and a protesting guest.  Tavernake looked up and
+recognized Professor Franklin.  With his broad-brimmed hat in his
+hand, the professor, in fluent phraseology and a strong American
+accent, was making himself decidedly disagreeable.
+
+"You had better send for your manager right away, young man," he
+declared.  "On Tuesday night he brought me here himself and I
+engaged this table for the week.  No, I tell you I won't have any
+other!  I guess my order was good enough.  You send for Luigi
+right here.  You know who I am?  Professor Franklin's my name,
+from New York, and if I say I mean to have a thing, I expect to
+get it."
+
+For the first time he recognized Tavernake, and paused for a
+moment in his speech.
+
+"Have I got your table, Professor?" Tavernake asked, slowly.
+
+"You have, sir," the professor answered.  "I did not recognize
+you when I came in or I would have addressed you personally.  I
+have particular reasons for occupying a front table here every
+night this week."
+
+The thoughts began to crowd in upon Tavernake's brain.  He
+hesitated.
+
+"Why not sit down with me?" he suggested.
+
+The professor acquiesced without a word.  The head waiter, with a
+sigh of relief, took his hat and overcoat and accepted his order.
+Tavernake leaned across the table.
+
+"Professor," he said, "why do you insist upon sitting up here?"
+
+The professor moved his head slowly downwards.
+
+"My young friend, I speak to you in confidence?"
+
+"In confidence," Tavernake repeated.
+
+"I come here secretly," the professor continued, "because it is
+the only chance I have of seeing a very dear relative of mine.  I
+am obliged to keep away from her just now, but from here I can
+watch, I can see that she is well."
+
+"You mean your daughter Beatrice," Tavernake said, calmly.
+
+The professor trembled all over.
+
+"You know!" he muttered.
+
+"Yes, I know," Tavernake answered.  "I have been able to be of
+some slight assistance to your daughter Beatrice."
+
+The professor grasped his hand.
+
+"Yes, yes," he said, "Elizabeth is very angry with you because
+you will not tell her where to find the little girl.  You are
+right, Mr. Tavernake.  You must never tell her."
+
+"I don't intend it," Tavernake declared.
+
+"Say, this is a great evening for me!" the professor went on,
+eagerly.  "I found out by accident myself.  I was at the bar and
+I saw her come in with a lot of others."
+
+"Why don't you go and speak to her?" Tavernake asked.
+
+The professor shivered.
+
+"There has been a disagreement," he explained.  "Beatrice and
+Elizabeth have quarreled.  Mind you, Beatrice was right."
+
+"Then why don't you go to her instead of staying with Elizabeth?"
+Tavernake demanded, bluntly.
+
+The professor temporarily collapsed.  He drank heavily of the
+whiskey and soda by his side, and answered gloomily.
+
+"My young friend," he said, "Beatrice, when she left us, was
+penniless.  Mind you, Elizabeth is the one with brains.  It is
+Elizabeth who has the money.  She has a strong will, too.  She
+keeps me there whether I will or not, she makes me do many things
+--many things, surely--which I hate.  But Elizabeth has her way.
+If I had gone with Beatrice, if I were to go to her now, I should
+be only a burden upon her."
+
+"You have no money, then?" Tavernake remarked.
+
+The professor shook his head sadly.
+
+"Speculations, my young friend," he replied, "speculations
+undertaken solely with the object of making a fortune for my
+children.  I have had money and lost it."
+
+"Can't you earn any?" Tavernake asked.  "Beatrice doesn't seem
+extravagant."
+
+The professor regarded this outspoken young man with an air of
+hurt dignity.
+
+"If you will forgive me," he said.  "I think that we will choose
+another subject of conversation."
+
+"At any rate," Tavernake declared, "you must be fond of your
+daughter or you would not come here night after night just to
+look at her."
+
+The professor shook out a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed
+his eyes.
+
+"Beatrice was always my favorite," he announced solemnly, "but
+Elizabeth--well, you can't get away from Elizabeth," he added,
+leaning across the table.  "To tell you the truth, Mr. Tavernake,
+Elizabeth terrifies me sometimes, she is so bold.  I am afraid
+where her scheming may land us.  I would be happier with Beatrice
+if only she had the means to satisfy my trifling wants."
+
+He turned to the waiter and ordered a pint of champagne.
+
+"Veuve Clicquot '99," he instructed the man.  "At my age," he
+remarked, with a sigh, "one has to be careful about these little
+matters.  The wrong brand of champagne means a sleepless night."
+
+Tavernake looked at him in a puzzled way.  The professor was a
+riddle to him.  He represented no type which had come within the
+orbit of his experience.  With the arrival of the champagne, the
+professor became almost eloquent.  He leaned forward, gazing
+stealthily down at the round table.
+
+"If I could tell you of that girl's mother, Mr. Tavernake," he
+said, "if I could tell you what her history, our history, has
+been, it would seem to you so strange that you would probably
+regard me as a romancer.  No, we have to carry our secrets with
+us."
+
+"By-the-bye," Tavernake asked, "what are you a professor of?"
+
+"Of the hidden sciences, sir," was the immediate reply.
+"Phrenology was my earliest love.  Since then I have studied in
+the East; I have spent many years in a monastery in China.  I
+have gratified in every way my natural love of the occult.  I
+represent today those people of advanced thought who have
+traveled, even in spirit, for ever such a little distance across
+the line which divides the Seen from the Unseen, the Known from
+the Infinite."
+
+He took a long draught of champagne.  Tavernake gazed at him in
+blank amazement.
+
+"I don't know much about science," he said.  "It is only lately
+that I have begun to realize how ignorant I really am.  Your
+daughter has helped to teach me."
+
+The professor sighed heavily.
+
+"A young woman of attainments, sir," he remarked, "of character,
+too.  Look at the way she carries her head.  That was a trick of
+her mother's."
+
+"Don't you mean to speak to her at all, then?" Tavernake asked.
+
+"I dare not," the professor replied.  "I am naturally of a
+truthful disposition, and if Elizabeth were to ask me if I had
+spoken to her sister, I should give myself away at once.  No, I
+look on and that is all."
+
+Tavernake drummed with his fingers upon the tablecloth.
+Something in the merriment of that little party downstairs had
+filled him with a very bitter feeling.
+
+"You ought to go and claim her, professor," he declared.  "Look
+down at them now.  Is that the best life for a girl?  The men are
+almost strangers to her, and the girls are not fit for her to
+associate with.  She has no friends, no relatives.  Your daughter
+Elizabeth can do without you very well.  She is strong enough to
+take care of herself."
+
+"But my dear sir," the professor objected, "Beatrice could not
+support me."
+
+Tavernake paid his bill without another word.  Downstairs the
+lights had been lowered, the party at the round table were
+already upon their feet.
+
+"Good-night, professor!" he said.  "I am going to see the last of
+Beatrice from the top of the stairs."
+
+The professor followed him--they stood there and watched her
+depart with Annie Legarde.  The two girls got into a taxicab
+together, and Tavernake breathed a sigh of relief, a relief for
+which he was wholly unable to account, when he saw that Grier
+made no effort to follow them.  As soon as the taxi had rolled
+away, they descended and passed into the street.  Then the
+professor suddenly changed his tone.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," he said, "I know what you are thinking about me:
+I am a weak old man who drinks too much and who wasn't born
+altogether honest.  I can't give up anything.  I'd be happier,
+really happier, on a crust with Beatrice, but I daren't, I simply
+daren't try it.  I prefer the flesh pots with Elizabeth, and you
+despise me for it.  I don't blame you, Mr. Tavernake, but
+listen."
+
+"Well?" Tavernake interjected.
+
+The professor's fingers gripped his arm.
+
+"You've known Beatrice longer--you don't know Elizabeth very
+well, but let me tell you this.  Elizabeth is a very wonderful
+person.  I know something about character, I know something about
+those hidden powers which men and women possess--strange powers
+which no one can understand, powers which drag a man to a woman's
+feet, or which make him shiver when he passes another even in a
+crowd.  You see, these things are a science with me, Mr.
+Tavernake, but I don't pretend to understand everything.  All I
+know is that Elizabeth is one of those people who can just do
+what she likes with men.  I am her father and I am her slave.  I
+tell myself that I would rather be with Beatrice, and I am as
+powerless to go as though I were bound with chains.  You are a
+young ignorant man, Mr. Tavernake, you know nothing of life, and
+I will give you a word of warning.  It is better for you that you
+keep away from over there."
+
+He raised one hand and pointed across the street towards the
+Milan Court; with the other he once more gripped Tavernake's arm.
+
+"Why she should take the trouble even to speak with you for a
+moment, I do not know," the professor continued, "but she does.
+It has pleased her to talk with you--why I can't imagine--only if
+I were you I would get away while there is yet time.  She is my
+daughter but she has no heart, no pity.  I saw her smile at you.
+I am sorry always for the man she smiles upon like that.
+Goodnight, Mr. Tavernake!"
+
+The professor crossed the street.  Tavernake watched him until he
+was out of sight.  Then he felt an arm thrust through his.
+
+"Why, this is what I call luck!" a familiar voice exclaimed.
+"Mr. Tavernake, you're the very man I was looking for!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+A MIDNIGHT ADVENTURE
+
+
+Tavernake was not sociably inclined and took no pains to conceal
+the fact.  Mr. Pritchard, however, was not easily to be shaken
+off.
+
+"So you've been palling up to the old man, eh?" he remarked, in
+friendly fashion.
+
+"I came across the professor unexpectedly," Tavernake answered,
+coldly.  "What do you want with me, please?  I am on my way
+home."
+
+Pritchard laughed softly to himself.
+
+"Say, there's something about you Britishers I can't help
+admiring!" he declared.  "You are downright, aren't you?"
+
+"I suppose you think we are too clumsy to be anything else,"
+Tavernake replied.  "This is my 'bus coming.  Good-night!"
+
+Pritchard's hand, however, tightened upon his companion's arm.
+
+"Look here, young man," he said, "don't you be foolish.  I'm a
+valuable acquaintance for you, if you only realized it.  Come
+along across the street with me.  My club is on the Terrace, just
+below.  Stroll along there with me and I'll tell you something
+about the professor, if you like."
+
+"Thank you," Tavernake answered, "I don't think I care about
+hearing gossip.  Besides, I think I know all there is to be known
+about him."
+
+"Did you give Miss Beatrice my message?" Pritchard asked
+suddenly.
+
+"If I did," Tavernake replied, "I have no answer for you."
+
+"Will you tell her this," Pritchard began,--
+
+"No, I will tell her nothing!" Tavernake interrupted.  "You can
+look after your own affairs.  I have no interest in them and I
+don't want to have.  Good-night!"
+
+Pritchard laughed again but he did not relax his grasp upon the
+other's arm.
+
+"Now, Mr. Tavernake," he said, "it won't do for you to quarrel
+with me.  I shouldn't be surprised if you discovered that I am
+one of the most useful acquaintances you ever met in your life.
+You needn't come into the club unless you like, but walk as far
+as there with me.  When we get on to the Terrace, with closed
+houses on one side and a palisade upon the other, I am going to
+say something to you."
+
+"Very well," Tavernake decided, reluctantly.  "I don't know what
+there is you can have to tell me, but I'll come as far as there,
+at any rate."
+
+They crossed the Strand and turned into Adam Street.  As they
+neared the further corner, Pritchard stepped from the pavement
+into the middle of the street, and looked searchingly around.
+
+"Say, you'll excuse my being a little careful," he remarked.
+"This is rather a lonely part for the middle of London, and I
+have been followed for the last two days by people whose company
+I am not over keen about."
+
+"Followed?  What for?" Tavernake demanded.
+
+"Oh, the usual thing!" answered the detective, with a shrug of
+the shoulders.  "That company of crooks I showed you last night
+don't fancy having me around.  They've a good many grudges up
+against Sam Pritchard.  I am not quite so safe over here as I
+should be in New York.  Most of them are off to Paris tomorrow,
+thank Heavens!"
+
+"And you?" Tavernake asked.  "Are you going, too?"
+
+Pritchard shook his head.
+
+"If only those fools would believe it, I'm not over here on their
+business at all.  I came over on a special commission this time,
+as you know.  I have a word of warning for you, Mr. Tavernake.  I
+guess you won't like to hear it, but you've got to."
+
+Tavernake stopped short.
+
+"I don't want your warnings!" he said angrily.  "I don't want you
+interfering in my affairs!"
+
+The detective smiled quietly.  Then a new expression suddenly
+tightened his lips.
+
+"Never mind about that just now!" he exclaimed.  "See here, take
+this police whistle from my left hand, quick, and blow it for all
+that you are worth!"
+
+It was characteristic of Tavernake that he was prepared to obey
+without a second's hesitation.  The opportunity, however, was
+denied him.  The events which followed came and passed like a
+thought.  A blow on his left wrist and the whistle fell into the
+road.  A dark figure had sprung up, apparently from space; a long
+arm was twined around Pritchard's neck, bending him backwards;
+there was a gleam of steel within a few inches of his throat.
+And then Tavernake saw a wonderful thing.  With a turn of his
+wrist, Pritchard suddenly seemed to lift the form of his
+assailant into the air.  Tavernake caught a swift impression of a
+man's white face, the head pointing to the street, the legs
+twitching convulsively.  Head over heels Pritchard seemed to
+throw him, while the knife clattered harmlessly into the roadway.
+The man lay crumpled up and moaning before the door of one of the
+houses.  Pritchard sprang after him.  The door had been
+cautiously opened and the man crawled through; Pritchard
+followed; then the door closed and Tavernake beat upon it in
+vain.
+
+For several seconds--it seemed to Tavernake much longer--he stood
+gazing at the door, breathing heavily, absolutely unable to
+collect his thoughts.  The whole affair had happened with such
+amazing celerity!  He could not bring himself to realize it, to
+believe that it was Pritchard who had been with him only a few
+seconds ago, who in danger of his life had performed that
+marvelous trick of jiu-jutsu, had followed his unknown assailant
+into that dark, mysterious house, from no single window of which
+was a single gleam of light visible.  Tavernake had led an
+uneventful life.  Of the passions which breed murder and the
+desire to kill he knew nothing.  He was dazed with the suddenness
+of it all.  How could such a thing happen in the midst of London,
+in a thoroughfare only momentarily deserted, at the further end
+of which, indeed, were many signs of life!  Then the thought of
+that knife made him shiver--blue glittering steel cutting the air
+like whipcord.  He remembered the look in the assassin's face--
+horrible, an epitome of the passions, which seemed to reveal to
+him in that moment the existence of some other, some unknown
+world, about which he had neither read nor dreamed.
+
+The sound of footsteps came as an immense relief.  A man came
+round the corner, smoking a cigarette and humming softly to
+himself.  The presence of another human being seemed suddenly to
+bring Tavernake's feet back upon the earth.  He moved toward the
+pavement and addressed the newcomer.
+
+"Can you tell me how to get inside that house?" he asked quickly.
+
+The man removed the cigarette from his mouth and stared at his
+questioner.
+
+"I should ring the bell," he replied, "but surely it's
+unoccupied?  What do you want to get in there for?"
+
+"Less than a minute ago," Tavernake told him, "I was walking here
+with a friend.  A man came up behind us and tried deliberately to
+stab him.  He bolted afterwards through that door, my friend
+followed him, the door was closed in my face."
+
+The newcomer was a youngish man, a musician, who had just come
+from a concert and was on his way to the club at the end of the
+street.  Probably, had he been a journalist, his curiosity would
+have been greater than his incredulity.  As it was, however, he
+gazed at Tavernake, for a moment, blankly.
+
+"Look here," he said, "this doesn't sound a very likely story of
+yours, you know."
+
+"I don't care whether it's likely or not," Tavernake answered
+hotly; "it's true!  The knife's somewhere in the road there--it
+fell up against the railings."
+
+They crossed the road together and searched.  There were no signs
+of the weapon.  Tavernake peered over the railings.
+
+"When my friend struck the other man and twisted him over," he
+explained, "the knife seemed to fly up into the air; it might
+even have reached the gardens."
+
+His companion turned slowly away.
+
+"Well, it's no use looking down there for it," he remarked.  "We
+might try the door, if you like."
+
+They leaned their weight against it, hammered at the panels, and
+waited.  The door was fast closed and no reply came.  The
+musician shrugged his shoulders and prepared to depart, after one
+more glance at Tavernake, half suspicious, half questioning.
+
+"If you think it worth while," he said, "you had better fetch the
+police, perhaps.  If you take my advice, though, I think I should
+go home and forget all about it."
+
+He passed on, leaving Tavernake speechless.  The idea that people
+might not believe his story had never seriously occurred to him.
+Yet all of a sudden he began to doubt it himself.  He stepped
+back into the road and looked up at the windows of the house
+-- dark, uncurtained, revealing no sign of life or habitation.
+Had he really taken that walk with Pritchard, stood on this spot
+with him only a minute or two ago?  Then he picked up the police
+whistle and he had no longer any doubts.  The whole scene was
+before him again, more vividly than ever.  Even at this moment,
+Pritchard might be in need of help!
+
+He turned and walked sharply to the corner of the Terrace,
+finding himself almost immediately face to face with a policeman.
+
+"You must come into this house with me at once!" Tavernake
+exclaimed, pointing backwards.  "A friend of mine was attacked
+here just now; a man tried to stab him.  They are both in that
+house.  The man ran away and my friend followed him.  The door is
+closed and no one answers."
+
+The constable looked at Tavernake very much as the musician had
+done.
+
+"Do either of them live there, sir?" he asked.
+
+"How should I know!" Tavernake answered.  "The man sprang upon my
+friend from behind.  He had a knife in his hand--I saw it.  My
+friend threw him over and he escaped into that house.  They are
+both there now.
+
+"Which house is it, sir?" the policeman inquired.
+
+They were standing almost in front of it.  The gate was open and
+Tavernake beat against the panels with the flat of his hand.
+Then, with a cry of triumph, he stooped down and picked something
+up from a crack in the flagged stones.
+
+"The key!" he cried.  "Come on, quick!"
+
+He thrust it into the lock and turned it; the door swung smoothly
+open.  The policeman laid his hand upon Tavernake's shoulder.
+
+"Look here," he said, "let's have that story of yours again, a
+little more clearly.  Who is it that's in this house?"
+
+"Five minutes ago," Tavernake began, speaking rapidly, "I met a
+man in the Strand whom I know slightly--Pritchard, an American
+detective.  He said that he had something to say to me and he
+asked me to walk round with him to a club in this Terrace.  We
+were in the middle of the road there, talking, when a man sprang
+at him; he must have come up behind quite noiselessly.  The man
+had a knife in his hand.  My friend threw him head over heels
+-- it was some trick of jiu-jutsu; I have seen it done at the
+Polytechnic.  He fell in front of this door which must either
+have been ajar or else some one who was waiting must have let him
+in.  He crawled through and my friend followed him.  The door was
+slammed in my face."
+
+"How long ago was this?" the policeman asked.
+
+"Not much more than five minutes," Tavernake answered.
+
+The policeman coughed.
+
+"It's a very queer story, sir."
+
+"It's true!" Tavernake declared, fiercely.  "You and I have got
+to search this house."
+
+The policeman nodded.
+
+"There's no harm in that, sir, anyway."
+
+He flashed his lantern around the hall--unfurnished, with paper
+hanging from the walls.  Then they began to enter the rooms, one
+by one.  Nowhere was there any sign of occupation.  From floor to
+floor they passed, in grim silence.  In the front chamber of the
+attic was a camp bedstead, two or three humble articles of
+furniture, and a small stove.
+
+"Caretaker's kit," the policeman muttered.  "Nothing seems to
+have been used for some time."
+
+They descended the stairs again.
+
+"You say you saw the two men enter this house, sir?" the
+policeman remarked doubtfully.
+
+"I did," Tavernake declared.  "There is no doubt about it."
+
+"The back entrances are all properly locked," the policeman
+pointed out.  "None of the windows by which any one could escape
+have been opened.  We've been into every room.  There's no one in
+the house now, sir, is there?"
+
+"There doesn't seem to be," Tavernake admitted.
+
+The policeman looked him over once more; Tavernake certainly had
+not the appearance of one attempting a hoax.
+
+"I am afraid there is nothing more we can do, sir,"
+
+the man said civilly.  "You had better give me your name and
+address."
+
+"Can't we go over the place once more?" Tavernake suggested.  "I
+tell you I saw them come in."
+
+"I have my beat outside to look after, sir," the constable
+answered.  "If it wasn't that you seem respectable, I should
+begin to think that you wanted me out of the way for a bit.  Name
+and address, please."
+
+Tavernake gave them readily.  They passed out together into the
+street.
+
+"I shall report this matter," the man said, closing his book.
+"Perhaps the sergeant will have the house searched again.  If you
+take my advice, sir," he added, "you'll go home."
+
+"I saw them both pass through that door," Tavernake repeated,
+half to himself, still standing upon the pavement and staring at
+the unlit windows.
+
+The constable made no reply but moved off.  Soon he reached the
+corner of the Terrace and disappeared.  Tavernake slowly crossed
+the road and with his back to the railings looked steadfastly at
+the dark front of gray stone houses.  Big Ben struck one o'clock,
+several people passed backwards and forwards.  Men were coming
+out from the club, and separating for the night; the roar of the
+city was growing fainter.  Yet Tavernake felt indisposed to move.
+The look in that man's drawn white face and black eyes haunted
+him, There was tragedy there, the shadow of terrible things,
+fear, and the murderous desire to kill!  Through that door they
+had passed, the two men, one in flight, the other in pursuit.
+Where were they now?  Perhaps it had been a trap.  Pritchard had
+spoken seriously enough of his enemies.
+
+Then, as he stood there, he saw for the first time a thin line of
+light through the closely-drawn curtains of a room on the ground
+floor of the adjoining house.  Without a moment's hesitation, he
+crossed the road and rang the bell.  The door was opened, after a
+trifling delay, by a man in plain clothes, who might, however,
+have been a servant in mufti.  He looked at Tavernake
+suspiciously.
+
+"I am sorry to have disturbed you," Tavernake explained, "but I
+saw some one go in the house next to you, a little time ago.  Can
+you tell me if you have heard any noises or voices during the
+last half-hour?"
+
+The man shook his head.
+
+"We have heard nothing, sir," he said.
+
+"Who lives here?" Tavernake asked.
+
+"Did you call me up at one o'clock in the morning to ask silly
+questions?" the man replied insolently.  "Every one's in bed here
+and I was just going."
+
+"There's a light in your ground floor room," Tavernake remarked.
+"There's some one talking there now--I can hear voices."
+
+The man closed the door in his face.  For some time Tavernake
+wandered restlessly about, starting at last reluctantly
+homewards.  He had reached the Strand and was crossing Trafalgar
+Square when a sudden thought held him.  He stood still for a
+moment in the middle of the street.  Then he turned abruptly
+round.  In less than five minutes he was once more on the
+Terrace.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+TAVERNAKE INTERVENES
+
+
+Tavernake had the feelings of a man suddenly sobered as he turned
+once more into the Adelphi Terrace.  Waiting until no one was in
+sight, he opened the door of the empty house with the Yale key
+which he had kept, and carefully closed it.  He struck a match
+and listened for several minutes intently; not a sound from
+anywhere.  He moved a few yards further to the bottom of the
+stairs, and listened again; still silence.  He turned the handle
+of the ground floor apartment and commenced a fresh search.  Room
+by room he examined by the light of his rapidly dwindling
+matches.  This time he meant to leave behind him no possibility
+of any mistake.  He even measured the depths of the walls for any
+secret hiding place.  From room to room he passed, leisurely,
+always on the alert, always listening.  Once, as he opened a door
+on the third floor there was a soft scurrying as though of a
+skirt across the floor.  He struck a match quickly, to find a
+great rat sitting up and looking at him with black, beady eyes.
+It was the only sign of life he found in the whole building.
+
+When he had finished his search, he came down to the ground floor
+and entered the room corresponding with the one from which he had
+heard voices in the adjoining house.  He crouched here upon the
+dusty boards for some time, listening.  Now and then he fancied
+that he could still hear voices on the other side of the wall,
+but he was never absolutely certain.
+
+At last he rose to stretch himself, and almost as he did so a
+fresh sound from outside attracted his notice.  A motor-car had
+turned into the Terrace.  He walked to the uncurtained window and
+stood there, sure of being himself unseen.  Then his heart gave a
+great leap.  Unemotional though he was, this was a happening
+which might well have excited a more phlegmatic individual.  A
+motor-car which he remembered very well, although it was driven
+now by a man in dark livery, had stopped at the next house.  A
+woman and two men had descended.  Tavernake never glanced at the
+latter; his eyes were fastened upon their companion.  She was
+wrapped in a long cloak, but she lifted her skirts as she crossed
+the pavement, and he saw the flash of her silver buckles.  Her
+carriage, her figure, were unmistakable.  It was Elizabeth who
+was paying this early morning visit next door!  Already the
+little party had disappeared.  They did not even ring the bell.
+The door must have been opened silently at their coming.  The
+motor-car glided off.  Once more the Terrace was deserted.
+
+Tavernake felt sure that he knew now the solution,--there was a
+way from this house into the next one.  He struck another match
+and, standing back a few yards, looked critically at the dividing
+wall.  In ancient days this had evidently been a dwelling-house
+of importance, elaborately decorated, as the fresco work upon the
+ceiling still indicated.  The wall had been divided into three
+panels, with a high wainscoting.  Inch by inch he examined it
+from one end to the other; he started from the back and came
+toward the front.  About three-quarters of the way there, he
+paused.  It was very simple, after all.  The solid wall for a
+couple of feet suddenly ceased, and the design was continued with
+an expanse of stretched canvas, which yielded easily to his
+finger.  He leaned his ear against it; he could hear now
+distinctly the sound of voices--he heard even the woman's
+laughter.  For the height of about four feet the wall had been
+bodily removed.  He made a small hole in the canvas--there was
+still darkness.  He enlarged the hole until he could thrust his
+hand through--there was nothing but canvas the other side.  He
+knew now where he was.  There was only that single thickness of
+canvas between him and the room.  He had but to make the smallest
+hole in it and he would be able to see through.  Even now, with
+the removal of the barrier on his side, the voices were more
+distinct.  A complete section of the wall had evidently been
+taken out and replaced by a detachable framework of wood covered
+with stretched canvas.  He stood back for a moment and felt with
+his finger; he could almost trace the spot where the woodwork
+fitted upon hinges.  Then he went on his hands and knees again,
+and with his penknife in his hand he paused to listen.  He could
+hear the man Crease talking--a slow, nasal drawl.  Then he heard
+Pritchard's voice, followed by what seemed to be a groan.  There
+was a silence, then Elizabeth seemed to ask a question.  He heard
+her low laugh and some note in it sent a shiver through his body.
+Pritchard was speaking fiercely now.  Then, in the middle of his
+sentence, there was silence once more, followed by another groan.
+He could almost feel the people in that room holding their
+breaths.
+
+Tavernake was rapidly forgetting all caution.  The point of his
+knife was through the canvas.  Slowly he worked it round until a
+small piece, the size of a half-crown, was partially cut through.
+With infinite pains he got his head and shoulders into the small
+recess and for the first time looked into the room.  Pritchard
+was sitting almost in the middle of the apartment; his arms
+seemed to be bound to the chair and his legs were tied together.
+A few yards away, Elizabeth, her fur coat laid aside, was
+lounging back in an easy-chair, her dress all glittering with
+sequins, a curious light in her eyes, a cruel smile parting her
+lips.  By her side--sitting, in fact, on the arm of her chair
+--was Crease, his long, worn face paler, even, than usual; his
+lips curled in a smile of cynical amusement.  Major Post was
+there, carefully dressed as though he had been attending some
+social gathering, standing upon the hearth-rug with his
+coat-tails under his arms.  The professor, in whose face seemed
+written the most abject terror, was talking.  Tavernake now could
+hear every word distinctly.
+
+"My dear Elizabeth!  My dear Crease!  You are both too
+precipitate!  I tell you that I protest--I protest most strongly.
+Mr. Pritchard, I am sure, with a little persuasion, will listen
+to reason.  I will not be a party to any such proceeding as--as
+this.  You understand, Crease?  We have gone quite far enough as
+it is.  I will not have it."
+
+Elizabeth laughed softly.
+
+"My dear father," she said, "you will really have to take
+something for your nerves.  Nothing need happen to Mr. Pritchard
+at all unless he asks for it.  He has his chance--.  no one
+should expect more."
+
+"You are right, my dear Elizabeth," declared Crease, speaking
+very slowly and with his usual drawl.  "This question of his
+health for the future--at any rate, for the immediate future--is
+entirely in Pritchard's own hands.  There is no one who has
+received so many warnings as he.  Bramley was cautioned twice;
+Mallison was warned three times and burned to death; Forsith had
+word from us only once, and he was shot in a drunken brawl.  This
+man Pritchard has been warned a dozen times, he has escaped death
+twice.  The time has come to show him that we are in earnest.
+Threats are useless; the time has come for deeds.  I say that if
+Pritchard refuses this trifling request of ours, let us see that
+he leaves this house in such a state that he will not be able to
+do us any harm for some time at least."
+
+"But he will give his word!" the professor cried excitedly.  "I
+am quite sure that if you allow me to talk to him reasonably, he
+will pledge his word to go back to the States and interfere no
+longer with your affairs."
+
+Pritchard turned his head slightly.  He was a little pale, and
+the blood was dropping slowly on to the floor from a wound in his
+temple, but his tone was contemptuous.
+
+"I will give you my word, Professor, and you, Elizabeth Gardner,
+and you, Jim Post, and you, Walter Crease, that crippled, or
+straight, in evil or good health, from the very jaws of death I
+will hang on to life until you have paid your just debts.  You
+understand that, all of you?  I don't know what sort of a show
+this is.  You may be in earnest, or you may be trying a rag.  In
+any case, let me assure you of this.  You won't get me to beg for
+mercy.  If you force me to drink that stuff you are talking
+about, I'll find the antidote, and as sure as there's a prison in
+America, so surely I'll make you suffer for it!  If you take my
+advice," he went on slowly, "and I know what I'm talking about,
+you'll cut these ropes and set open your front door.  You 'll
+live longer, all of you."
+
+"An idiot," Elizabeth remarked pleasantly, "can do but little
+harm in the world.  The word of a person of weak intellect is not
+to be relied upon.  For my part, I am very tired of our friend,
+Mr. Pritchard.  If you others had been disposed to go to much
+greater lengths, if you had said 'Hang him from the ceiling,' I
+should have been well pleased."
+
+Pritchard made a slight movement in his chair--it was certainly
+not a movement of fear.
+
+"Madam," he said, "I admire your candor.  Let me return it.  I
+don't believe there's one of you here has the pluck to attempt to
+do me any serious injury.  If there is, get on with it.  You
+hear, Mr. Walter Crease?  Bring out that bottle of yours."
+
+Crease removed his cigar from his lips and rose slowly to his
+feet.  From his waistcoat pocket he produced a small phial, from
+which he drew the cork.
+
+"Seems to me it's up to us to do the trick," he remarked
+languidly.  "Catch hold of his forehead, Jimmy."
+
+The man known as Major Post threw away his cigarette, and coming
+round behind Pritchard's chair, suddenly bent the man's head
+backward.  Crease advanced, phial in hand.  Then all Hell seemed
+to be let loose in Tavernake.  He stepped back in his place and
+marked the extent of that wooden partition.  Then, setting his
+teeth, he sprang at it, throwing the great weight of his massive
+shoulder against the framework door.  Scratched and bleeding, but
+still upon his feet, he burst into the room, with the noise of
+bricks falling behind,--an apparition so unexpected that the
+little company gathered there seemed turned into some waxwork
+group from the Chamber of Horrors--motionless, without even the
+power of movement.
+
+Tavernake, in those few moments, was like a giant among a company
+of degenerates.  He was strong, his muscles were like whipcord,
+and his condition was perfect.  Walter Crease went over like a
+log before his fist; Major Post felt the revolver at which he had
+snatched struck from his hand, and he himself remembered nothing
+more till he came to his senses some time afterwards.  A slash
+and a cut and Pritchard was free.  The professor stood wringing
+his hands.  Elizabeth had risen to her feet.  She was pale, but
+she was still more nearly composed than any other person in the
+room.  Tavernake and Pritchard were masters of the situation.
+Pritchard leaned toward the mirror and straightened his tie.
+
+"I am afraid," he said looking down at Walter Crease's groaning
+figure, "that our hosts are scarcely in fit condition to take
+leave of us.  Never mind, Mrs. Gardner, we excuse ourselves to
+you.  I cannot pretend to be sorry that my friend's somewhat
+impetuous entrance has disturbed your plans for the evening, but
+I do hope that you will realize now the fatuousness of such
+methods in these days.  Good-night!  It is time we finished our
+stroll together, Tavernake."
+
+They moved towards the door--there was no one to stop them.  Only
+the professor tried to say a few words.
+
+"My dear Mr. Pritchard--my dear Pritchard, if you will allow me
+to call you so," he exclaimed, "let me beg of you, before you
+leave us, not to take this trifling adventure too seriously!  I
+can assure you that it was simply an attempt to coerce you, not
+in the least an affair to be taken seriously!"
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"Professor," he said, "and you, Walter Crease, and you, Jimmy
+Post, if you're able to listen, listen to me.
+
+You have played the part of children to-night.  So surely as men
+and women exist who live as you do, so surely must the law wait
+upon their heels.  You cannot cheat justice.  It is as inexorable
+as Time itself.  When you try these little tricks, you simply
+give another turn to the wheel, add another danger to life.  You
+had better learn to look upon me as necessary, all of you, for I
+am certainly inevitable."
+
+They passed backwards through the door, then they went down the
+silent hall and out into the street.  Even as they did so, the
+clock struck a quarter to two.
+
+"My friend Tavernake," Pritchard declared, lighting a cigarette
+with steady fingers, "you are a man.  Come into the club with me
+while I bathe my forehead.  After all, we'll have that drink
+together before we say goodnight."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+A PLEASANT REUNION
+
+
+Tavernake awoke some hours later with a puzzled sense of having
+lost his own identity, of having taken up another man's life,
+stepped into another man's shoes.  From the day of his first
+arrival in London, a raw country youth, till the night when he
+had spoken to Beatrice on the roof of Blenheim House, nothing
+that could properly be called an adventure had ever happened to
+him.  He had never for a moment felt the want of it; he had not
+even indulged in the reading of books of romance.  The thing
+which had happened last night, as in the cold morning sunlight he
+sat up in his bed, seemed to him a thing grotesque,
+inconceivable.  It was not really possible that those people
+--those well-bred, well-looking people--had seriously
+contemplated an enormity which seemed to belong to the back pages
+of history, or that he, Tavernake, had burst through a wall with
+no weapons in his hand, and had dominated the situation!  He sat
+there steadily thinking.  It was incredible, but it was true!
+There existed still in his mind some faint doubt as to whether
+they would really have proceeded to extremities.  Pritchard
+himself had made light of the whole affair, afterwards had
+treated it, indeed, as a huge practical joke.  Tavernake,
+remembering that little group as he had first seen it, remained
+doubtful.
+
+By degrees, his own personal characteristics began to assert
+themselves.  He began to wonder how his action would affect his
+commercial interests.  He had probably made an enemy of this
+wonderful sister of Beatrice's, the woman who had so completely
+filled his thoughts during the last few days, the woman, too, who
+was to have found the money by means of which he was to set his
+feet upon the first rung of the ladder.  This was a thing, he
+decided, which must be settled at once.  He must see her and know
+exactly what terms they were on, whether or not she meant to be
+off with her bargain.  The thought of action of any sort was
+stimulating.  He rose and dressed, had his breakfast, and set out
+on his pilgrimage.
+
+Soon after eleven o'clock, he presented himself at the Milan
+Court and asked for Mrs. Wenham Gardner.  For several minutes he
+waited about in nervous anticipation, then he was told that she
+was not at home.  More than a little disappointed, he pressed for
+news of her.  The hall porter thought that she had gone down into
+the country, and if so it was doubtful when she would be back.
+Tavernake was now seriously disconcerted.
+
+"I want particularly to wire to her," he insisted.  "Please find
+out from her maid how I shall direct a telegram."
+
+The hall porter, who was a most superior person, regarded him
+blandly.
+
+"We do not give addresses, sir," he explained, "unless at the
+expressed wish of our clients.  If you leave a telegram here, I
+will send it up to Mrs. Gardner's rooms to be forwarded."
+
+Tavernake scribbled one out, begging for news of her return,
+added his address and left the place.  Then he wandered aimlessly
+about the streets.  There seemed something flat about the
+morning, some aftermath of the excitement of the previous night
+was still stirring in his blood.  Nevertheless, he pulled himself
+together with an effort, called for a young surveyor whom he had
+engaged to assist him, and spent the rest of the day out upon the
+hill.  Religiously he kept his thoughts turned upon his work
+until the twilight came.  Then he hurried home to meet the
+disappointment which he had more than half anticipated.  There
+was no telegram for him!  He ate his dinner and sat with folded
+arms, looking out into the street.  Still no telegram!  The
+restlessness came back once more.  Soon after ten o'clock it
+became unbearable.  He found himself longing for company, the
+loneliness of his little room since the departure of Beatrice had
+never seemed so real a thing.  He stood it as long as he could
+and then, catching up his hat and stick, he set his face
+eastwards, walking vigorously, and with frequent glances at the
+clocks he passed.
+
+A few minutes past eleven o'clock, he found himself once more in
+that dark thoroughfare at the back of the theatre.  The lamp over
+the stage-door was flickering in the same uncertain manner, the
+same motor-cars were there, the same crowd of young men, except
+that each night they seemed to grow larger.  This time he had a
+few minutes only to wait.  Beatrice came out among the earliest.
+At the sight of her he was suddenly conscious that he had, after
+all, no excuse for coming, that she would probably cross-examine
+him about Elizabeth, would probably guess the secret of his
+torments.  He shrank back, but he was a moment too late for she
+had seen him.  With a few words of excuse to the others with whom
+she was talking, she picked up her skirts and came swiftly across
+the muddy street.  Tavernake had no time to escape.  He remained
+there until she came, but his cheeks were hot, and he had an
+uncomfortable feeling that his presence, that their meeting like
+this, was an embarrassment to both of them.
+
+"My dear Leonard," she exclaimed, "why do you hide over there?"
+
+"I don't know," he answered simply.
+
+She laughed.
+
+"It looks as though you didn't want to see me," she remarked.
+"If you didn't, why are you here?"
+
+"I suppose I did want to see you," he replied.  "Anyhow, I was
+lonely.  I wanted to talk to some one.  I walked all the way up
+here from Chelsea."
+
+"You have something to tell me?" she suggested.
+
+"There was something," he admitted.  "I thought perhaps you ought
+to know.  I had supper with your father last night.  We talked
+about you."
+
+She started as though he had struck her; her face was suddenly
+pale and anxious.
+
+"Are you serious, Leonard?" she asked.  "My father?"
+
+He nodded.
+
+"I am sorry," he said.  "I ought not to have blundered.  it out
+like that.  I forgot that you--you were not seeing anything of
+him."
+
+"How did you meet him?"
+
+"By accident," he answered.  "I was sitting alone up in the
+balcony at Imano's, and he wanted my table because he could see
+you from there, so we shared it, and then we began talking.  I
+knew who he was, of course; I had seen him in your sister's room.
+He told me that he had engaged the table for every night this
+week."
+
+She looked across the road.
+
+"I can't go out with those people now," she declared.  "Wait here
+for me."
+
+She went back to her friends and talked to them for a moment or
+two.  Tavernake could hear Grier's protesting voice and
+Beatrice's light laugh.  Evidently they were trying uselessly to
+persuade her to change her mind.  Soon she came back to him.
+
+"I am sorry," he said reluctantly.  "I am afraid that I have
+spoiled your evening."
+
+"Don't be foolish, please," she replied taking his arm.  "Do you
+believe that my father will be up in the balcony at Imano's
+to-night?"
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+"He told me so."
+
+"We will go and sit up there," she decided.  "He knows where I am
+to be found now so it doesn't matter.  I should like to see him."
+
+They walked off together.  Though she was evidently absent and
+distressed, Tavernake felt once more that sense of pleasant
+companionship which her near presence always brought him.
+
+"There is something else I must ask you," she began presently.
+"I want to know if you have seen Pritchard lately."
+
+"I was with him last night," Tavernake answered.
+
+She shivered.
+
+"He was asking questions?"
+
+"Not about you," Tavernake assured her quickly.  "It is your
+sister in whom he is interested."
+
+Beatrice nodded, but she seemed very little relieved.  Tavernake
+could see that the old look of fear was back in her face.
+
+"I am sorry, Beatrice," he said, regretfully.  "I seem just now
+to be always bringing you reminiscences of the people whom it
+terrifies you to hear about."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"It isn't your fault, Leonard," she declared, "only it is rather
+strange that you should be mixed up with them in any way, isn't
+it?  I suppose some day you'll find out everything about me.
+Perhaps you'll be sorry then that you ever even called yourself
+my brother."
+
+"Don't be foolish," he answered, brusquely.
+
+She patted his hand.
+
+"Is the speculation going all right?" she asked.
+
+"I am hoping to get the money together this week," he replied.
+"If I get it, I shall be well off in a year, rich in five years."
+
+"There is just a doubt about your getting it, then?" she
+inquired.
+
+"Just a doubt," he admitted.  "I have a solicitor who is doing
+his best to raise a loan, but I have not heard from him for two
+days.  Then I have also a friend who has promised it to me, a
+friend upon whom I am not quite sure if I can rely."
+
+They turned into the Strand.
+
+"Tell me about my father, Leonard," she begged.
+
+He hesitated; it was hard to know exactly how to speak of the
+professor.
+
+"Perhaps if you have talked with him at all," she went on, "it
+will help you to understand one of the difficulties I had to face
+in life."
+
+"He is, I should imagine, a little weak," Tavernake suggested,
+hesitatingly.
+
+"Very," she answered.  "My mother left him in my charge, but I
+cannot keep him."
+
+"Your sister--" he began.
+
+She nodded.
+
+"My sister has more influence than I.  She makes life easier for
+him."
+
+They reached the restaurant and made their way upstairs.
+Tavernake appropriated the same table and once more the head
+waiter protested.
+
+"If the gentleman comes again to-night," Tavernake said, "you
+will find that he will be only too glad to have supper with us."
+
+Then the professor came.  He made his usual somewhat theatrical
+entrance, carrying his broad-brimmed hat in his hand, brandishing
+his silver-topped cane.  When he saw Tavernake and Beatrice, he
+stopped short.  Then he held out both hands, which Beatrice
+immediately seized.  There were tears in his eyes, tears running
+down his cheeks.  He sat down heavily in the chair which
+Tavernake was holding for him.
+
+"Beatrice," he exclaimed, "why, this is most affecting!  You have
+come here to have supper with your old father.  You trust me,
+then?"
+
+"Absolutely," she replied, still clasping his hands.  "If you
+give me away to Elizabeth, it will be the end.  The next time I
+shall never be found."
+
+"For some days," he assured her, "I have known exactly where you
+were to be found.  I have never spoken of it.  You are safe.  My
+meals up here," he added, with a little sigh, "have been sad
+feasts.  To-night we will be cheerful.  Some quails, I think,
+quails and some Clicquot for you, my dear.  You need it.  Ah,
+this is a happiness indeed!"
+
+"You know Mr. Tavernake, father," she remarked, after he had
+given a somewhat lengthy order to the waiter.
+
+"I met and talked with Mr. Tavernake here the other night," the
+professor admitted, with condescension.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake was very good to me at a time when I needed help,"
+Beatrice told him.
+
+The professor grasped Tavernake's hands.
+
+"You were good to my child," he said, "you were good to me.
+Waiter, three cocktails immediately," he ordered, turning round.
+"I must drink your health, Mr. Tavernake--I must drink your
+health at once."
+
+Tavernake leaned forward towards Beatrice.
+
+"I wonder," he suggested, "whether you would not rather be alone
+with your father."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"You know so much," she replied, "and it really doesn't seem to
+matter.  Tell me, father, how do you spend your time?"
+
+"I must confess, dear," the professor said, "that I have little
+to do.  Your sister Elizabeth is quite generous."
+
+Beatrice sat back in her chair as though she had been struck.
+
+"Father," she exclaimed, "listen!  You are living on that money!
+Doesn't it seem terrible to you?  Oh, how can you do it!"
+
+The professor looked at his daughter with an expression of pained
+surprise.
+
+"My dear," he explained, "your sister Elizabeth has always been
+the moneyed one of the family.  She has brains and I trust her.
+It is not for me to inquire as to the source of the comforts she
+provides for me.  I feel myself entitled to receive them, and so
+I accept."
+
+"But, father," she went on, "can't you see--don't you know that
+it's his money--Wenham's?"
+
+"It is not a matter, this, my child," the professor observed,
+sharply, "which we can discuss before strangers.  Some day we
+will speak of it, you and L"
+
+"Has he--been heard of?" she asked, in a whisper.
+
+The professor frowned.
+
+"A hot-tempered young man, my dear," he declared uneasily, "a hot
+tempered young man, indeed.  Elizabeth gives me to understand
+that it was just an ordinary quarrel and away he went."
+
+Beatrice was white to the lips.
+
+"An ordinary quarrel!" she muttered.
+
+She sat quite still.  Tavernake unconsciously found himself
+watching her.  There were things in her eyes which frightened
+him.  It seemed as though she were looking out of the gay little
+restaurant, with its lights and music and air of comfort, out
+into some distant quarter of the world, some other and very
+different place.  She was living through something which chilled
+her heart, something terrifying.  Tavernake saw those things in
+her face and his eyes spelt them out mercilessly.
+
+"Father," she whispered, leaning towards him, "do you believe
+what you have just been saying to me?"
+
+It was the professor's turn to be disturbed.  He concealed his
+discomfiture, however, with a gesture of annoyance.
+
+"That is scarcely a proper question, Beatrice," he answered
+sharply.  "Ah," he added, with more geniality, "the cocktails!
+My young friend Tavernake, I drink to our better acquaintance!
+You are English, as I can see, a real Britisher.  Some day you
+must come out to our own great country--my daughter, of course,
+has told you that we are Americans.  A great country, sir,--the
+greatest I have ever lived in--room to breathe, room to grow,
+room for a young man like you to plant his ambitions and watch
+them blossom.  To our better acquaintance, Mr. Tavernake, and may
+we meet some day in the United States!"
+
+Tavernake drank the first cocktail in his life and wiped the
+tears from his eyes.  The professor found safety in conversation.
+
+"You know," he went on, "that I am a man of science.  Physiognomy
+delights me.  Men and women as I meet them represent to me
+varying types of humanity, all interesting, all appealing to my
+peculiar love of the science of psychology.  You, my dear Mr.
+Tavernake, if I may venture to be so personal, represent to me,
+as you sit there, the exact prototype of the young working
+Englishman.  You are, I should judge, thorough, dogmatic, narrow,
+persistent, industrious, and bound to be successful according to
+the scope and nature of your ambitions.  In this country you will
+never develop.  In my country, sir, we should make a colossus of
+you.  We should teach you not to be content with small things; we
+should raise your hand which you yourself kept to your side, and
+we should point your finger to the skies.  Waiter," he added,
+turning abruptly round, "if the quails are not yet ready I will
+take another of these excellent cocktails."
+
+Tavernake was embarrassed.  He saw that Beatrice was anxious to
+talk to her father; he saw, also, that her father was determined
+not to talk to her.  With a little sigh, however, she resigned
+herself to the inevitable.
+
+"I have lectured, sir," the professor continued, "in most of the
+cities of the United States, upon the human race.  The tendencies
+of every unit of the human race are my peculiar study.  When I
+speak to you of phrenology, sir, you smile, and you think,
+perhaps, of a man who sits in a back room and takes your shilling
+for feeling the bumps of your head.  I am not of this order of
+scientific men, sir.  I have diplomas from every university worth
+mentioning.  I blend the sciences which treat with the human
+race.  I know something of all of them.  Character reading to me
+is at once a passion and a science.  Leave me alone with a man or
+a woman for five minutes, paint me a map of Life, and I will set
+the signposts along which that person will travel, and I shall
+not miss one."
+
+"You are doing no work over here, father, are you?" Beatrice
+asked.
+
+"None, my dear," he answered, with a faint note of regret in his
+tone.  "Your sister Elizabeth seemed scarcely to desire it.  Her
+movements are very uncertain and she likes to have me constantly
+at hand.  My daughter Elizabeth," he continued, turning to
+Tavernake, "is a very beautiful young woman, left in my charge
+under peculiar circumstances.  I feel it my duty, therefore, to
+be constantly at hand."
+
+Again there was a flash of that strange look in the girl's face.
+She leaned forward, but her father declined to meet her gaze.
+
+"May I ask one or two personal questions?" she faltered.
+"Remember, I have not seen or heard anything from either of you
+for seven months."
+
+"By all means, my dear," the professor declared.  "Your sister, I
+am glad to say, is well.  I myself am as you see me.  We have had
+a pleasant time and we have met some dear old friends from the
+other side.  Our greatest trouble is that you are temporarily
+lost to us."
+
+"Elizabeth doesn't guess--"
+
+"My child," the professor interrupted, "I have been loyal to you.
+If Elizabeth knew that I could tell her at any moment your exact
+whereabouts, I think that she would be more angry with me than
+ever she has been in her life, and, my dear," he added, "you
+know, when Elizabeth is angry, things are apt to be unpleasant.
+But I have been dumb.  I have not spoken, nor shall I.  Yet," the
+professor went on, "you must not think, Beatrice, that because I
+yield to your whim in this matter I recognize any sufficient
+cause why you should voluntarily estrange yourself from those
+whose right and privilege it is to look after you.  You are able,
+I am glad to see, to make your way in the world.  I have attended
+the Atlas Theatre, and I am glad to see that you have lost none
+of your old skill in the song and dance.  You are deservedly
+popular there.  Soon, I have no doubt, you will aspire to more
+important parts.  Still, my dear child," the professor continued,
+disposing of his second cocktail, "I see no reason why your very
+laudable desire to remain independent should be incompatible with
+a life under your sister's roof and my protection.  Mr. Tavernake
+here, with his British instincts, will, I am sure, agree with me
+that it is not well for a young lady--my own daughter, sir, but I
+may say it--of considerable personal attractions, to live alone
+or under the chaperonage merely of these other young ladies of
+the theatre."
+
+"I think,", Tavernake said, "that your daughter must have very
+strong reasons for preferring to live alone."
+
+"Imaginary ones, my dear sir," the professor assured him,--
+"altogether imaginary.  The quails at last!  And the Clicquot!
+Now this is really a delightful little meeting.  I drink to its
+repetition.  This is indeed a treat for me.  Beatrice, my love to
+you!  Mr. Tavernake, my best respects!  The only vintage, sir,"
+he concluded, setting down his empty glass appreciatively.
+
+"To go back to what you were saying just now," Tavernake
+remarked, "I quite agree with you about Beatrice's living alone.
+I am very anxious for her to marry me."
+
+The professor set down his knife and fork.  His appearance was
+one of ponderous theatricality.
+
+"Sir," he declared, "this is indeed a most momentous statement.
+Am I to take it as a serious offer for my daughter's hand?"
+
+Beatrice leaned over and laid her fingers upon his.
+
+"Father," she said, "it doesn't matter please.  I am not willing
+to marry Mr. Tavernake."
+
+The professor looked from one to the other and coughed.
+
+"Are Mr. Tavernake's means," he asked, "of sufficient importance
+to warrant his entering into matrimony?"
+
+"I have no money at all to speak of," Tavernake answered.  "That
+really isn't important.  I shall very soon make all that your
+daughter can spend."
+
+"I agree with my daughter, sir," the professor declared.  "The
+subject might well be left until such time as you have improved
+your position.  We will dismiss it, therefore,--dismiss it at
+once.  We will talk--"
+
+"Father," Beatrice interrupted, "let us talk about yourself.
+Don't you think you would be more contented, happier, if you were
+to try to arrange for a few--a few demonstrations or lectures
+over here, as you at first intended?  I know that you must find
+having nothing to do such a strain upon you," she added.
+
+It was perhaps by accident that her eyes were fixed upon the
+glass which the professor was carrying to his lips.  He set it
+down at once.
+
+"My child," he said, in a low tone, " I understand you."
+
+"No, no," she insisted, "I didn't mean that, but you are always
+better when you are working.  A man like you," she went on, a
+little wistfully, "should not waste his talents."
+
+He sighed.
+
+"You are perhaps right, my child," he admitted.  "I will go and
+see my agents to-morrow.  Up till now," he went on, "I have
+refused all offers.  I have felt that Elizabeth, the care of
+Elizabeth in her peculiar position, demanded my whole attention.
+Perhaps you are right.  Perhaps I have over-estimated the
+necessity of being constantly at her right hand.  She is a very
+clever woman Elizabeth," he concluded, "very clever indeed."
+
+"Where is she now, father?" Beatrice asked.
+
+"She motored into the country early this morning with some
+friends," the professor said.  "They went to a party last night
+with Walter Crease, London correspondent to the New York
+Gazette," he explained, turning a little away from Tavernake.
+"They were all home very late, I understand, and Elizabeth
+complained of a headache this morning.  Personally, I regret to
+say that I was not up when they left."
+
+Beatrice leaned quite close to her father.
+
+"Do you see anything of the man Pritchard?" she inquired.
+
+The professor was suddenly flabby.  He set down his glass,
+spilling half its contents.  He stole a quick glance at
+Tavernake.
+
+"My child," he exclaimed, "you ought to consider my nerves!  You
+know very well that the sudden mention of any one whom I dislike
+so intensely is bad for me.  I am surprised at you, Beatrice.
+You show a culpable lack of consideration for my infirmities."
+
+"I am sorry, father," she whispered, "but is he here?"
+
+"He is," the professor admitted.  "Between ourselves," he added,
+a white, scared look upon his pale face, "he is spoiling my whole
+peace of mind.  My enjoyment of the comforts which Elizabeth is
+able to provide for me is interfered with by that man's constant
+presence.  He seldom speaks, and yet he seems always to be
+watching.  I do not trust him, Beatrice.  I am a judge of men and
+I tell you that I do not trust him."
+
+"I wish that Elizabeth would go away," Beatrice said in a low
+tone.  "Of course, I have no right--to say things.  Nothing
+serious has perhaps ever happened.  And yet--and yet, for her own
+sake, I do not think that she should stay here in London with
+Pritchard close at hand."
+
+The professor raised his glass with shaking fingers.
+
+"Elizabeth knows what is best," he declared, "I am sure that
+Elizabeth knows what is best, but I, too, am beginning to wish
+that she would go away.  Last night we met him at Walter
+Crease's."
+
+Once more he turned a little nervously towards Tavernake, who was
+looking down into the body of the restaurant with immovable face.
+
+"We tried to persuade him then to go away.  He is really in
+rather a dangerous position here.  Jimmy Post has sworn that he
+will not be taken back to New York, and there are one or two
+others--a pretty desperate crew.  We tried last night to reason
+with Pritchard."
+
+"It was no good?" she whispered.
+
+"No good at all," the professor answered, drily.  "Perhaps, if we
+had not been interrupted, we might have convinced him."
+
+"Tell me about it," she begged.
+
+The professor shook his head.  Tavernake still had that air of
+paying no attention whatever to their conversation.
+
+"It is not for you to know about, my dear," he concluded.  "You
+have chosen very wisely to keep out of these matters.  Elizabeth
+has such wonderful courage.  My own nerve, I regret to say, is
+not quite what it was.  Waiter, I will take a liqueur of the old
+brandy in a large glass."
+
+The brandy was brought, but the professor seemed haunted by
+memories and his spirits never wholly returned.  Not until the
+lights were turned down and Tavernake had paid the bill, did he
+partially recover his former manner.
+
+"Dear child," he said, as they stood up together, "I cannot tell
+you what the pleasure has been of this brief reunion."
+
+She rested her fingers upon his shoulders and looked up into his
+face.
+
+"Father," she begged, softly, "come to me.  I can keep you, if
+you don't mind for a short time being poor.  You shall have all
+my salary except just enough for my clothes, and anything will do
+for me to wear.  I will try so hard to make you comfortable."
+
+He looked at her with an air of offended dignity.
+
+"My child," he replied, "you must not talk to me like that.  If I
+did not feel that my duty lay with Elizabeth, I should insist
+upon your coming to me, and under those conditions it would be I
+who should provide, not you.  But for the moment I cannot leave
+your elder sister altogether.  She needs me."
+
+Beatrice turned away a little sadly.  They all three descended
+the stairs.
+
+"I shall leave our young friend, Mr. Tavernake, to escort you to
+your home," the professor announced.  "I myself shall telephone
+to see if Elizabeth has returned.  If she is still away, I shall
+spend an hour or two, I think, with my friends at the Blue Room
+Club.  Beatrice, this has been a joy to me, a joy soon, I hope,
+to be repeated."
+
+He took both her hands.  She smiled at him with an attempt at
+cheerfulness.
+
+"Good-night, father!" she said.
+
+"And to you, sir, also, good-night!" the professor added, taking
+Tavernake's hand and holding it for a minute in his, while he
+looked impressively in his face.  "I will not say too much, but I
+will say this: so much as I have seen of you, I like.
+Good-night!"
+
+He turned and strode away.  Both Beatrice and Tavernake watched
+him until he disappeared.  Then, with a sigh, she picked up her
+skirts with her right hand, and took Tavernake's arm.
+
+"Do you mind walking home?" she asked.  "My head aches."
+
+Tavernake looked for a moment wistfully across the road toward
+the Milan Court.  Beatrice's hand, however, only held his arm the
+tighter.
+
+"I am going to make you come with me every step of the way," she
+declared, "so you can just as well make the best of it.
+Afterwards--"
+
+"What about afterwards?" he interrupted.
+
+"Afterwards," she continued, with decision, "you are to go
+straight home!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+SOME EXCELLENT ADVICE
+
+
+Tavernake, in response to a somewhat urgent message, walked into
+his solicitor's office almost as soon as they opened on the
+following morning.  The junior partner of the firm, who took an
+interest in him, and was anxious, indeed, to invest a small
+amount in the Marston Rise Building Company, received him
+cordially but with some concern.
+
+"Look here, Tavernake," he said, "I thought I'd better write a
+line and ask you to come down.  You haven't forgotten, have you,
+that our option of purchase lasts only three days longer?"
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+"Well, what of it?" he asked.
+
+"It's just as well that you should understand the situation," the
+lawyer continued.  "Your old people are hard upon our heels in
+this matter, and there will be no chance of any extension--not
+even for an hour.  Mr. Dowling has already put in an offer a
+thousand pounds better than yours; I heard that incidentally
+yesterday afternoon; so you may be sure that the second your
+option has legally expired, the thing will be off altogether so
+far as you're concerned."
+
+"That's all very well," Tavernake remarked, "but what about the
+plots that already belong to me?"
+
+"They have some sort of scheme for leaving those high and dry,"
+the solicitor explained.  "You see, the drainage and lighting
+will be largely influenced by the purchaser of the whole estate.
+If Dowling gets it, he means to treat your plots so that they
+will become practically valueless.  It's rather a mean sort of
+thing, but then he's a mean little man."
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+"Well," he announced, "I was coming to see you, anyhow, this
+morning, to talk to you about the money."
+
+"Your friend isn't backing out?" the lawyer asked, quickly.
+
+"My friend has not said anything about backing out yet,"
+Tavernake replied, "but circumstances have arisen during the last
+few days which have altered my own views as to the expediency of
+business relations with this person.  I haven't any reason to
+suppose that the money won't be forthcoming, but if I could get
+it from any other source, I should prefer it."
+
+The solicitor looked blank.
+
+"Of course," he said, "I'll do what I can, if you like, but I may
+as well tell you at once that I don't think I should have a ghost
+of a chance of raising the whole amount."
+
+"I suppose," Tavernake inquired, thoughtfully, "your firm
+couldn't do anything?"
+
+"We could do something, certainly," the solicitor answered, "on
+account of our own clients.  We might, perhaps, manage up to five
+thousand pounds.  That would still leave us wanting seven,
+however, and I scarcely see where we could get it."
+
+Tavernake was silent for a few moments.
+
+"You haven't quarreled with your friend, have you?" the solicitor
+asked.
+
+"No, there has been no quarrel," Tavernake replied.  "I have
+another reason."
+
+"If I were you, I'd try and forget it," his friend advised.  "To
+tell you the truth, I have been feeling rather anxious about this
+affair.  It's a big thing, you know, and the profit is as sure as
+the dividend on Consols.  I should hate to have that little
+bounder Dowling get in and scoop it up."
+
+"It's a fine investment," admitted Tavernake, "and, as you say,
+there isn't the slightest risk.  That's why I was hoping you
+might have been able to manage it without my calling upon my
+friend."
+
+Mr. Martin shook his head.
+
+"It isn't so easy to convince other people.  All the same, I
+don't want to get left.  If you'll take my advice, you'll go and
+call on your friend at once, and see exactly how matters stand.
+If everything's O.K. and you can induce him to part a few hours
+before it is absolutely necessary, I must confess that it would
+take a load off my mind.  I don't like these affairs that have to
+be concluded at the last possible moment."
+
+"Well," Tavernake agreed, "I must try what I can do, then.  There
+is nothing else fresh, I suppose?"
+
+"Nothing," the solicitor answered.  "Come back, if you can make
+any definite arrangement, or telephone.  The matter is really
+bothering me a little.  I don't want to have the other people
+slip in now." . . .
+
+Tavernake, instead of obeying his first impulse and making his
+way direct to the Milan Court, walked to the flat in Kingsway,
+climbed up the stone steps, and asked for Beatrice.  She met him
+at her own door, fully dressed.
+
+"My dear Leonard!" she exclaimed, in surprise.  "What an early
+caller!"
+
+"I want a few words with you," he said.  "Can you spare me five
+minutes?"
+
+"You must walk with me to the theatre," she replied, "I am just
+off to rehearsal."
+
+They descended the stairs together.
+
+"I have something to tell you," Tavernake began, "something to
+tell you which you won't like to hear."
+
+"Something which I won't like to hear," she repeated, fearfully.
+"Go on, Leonard.  It can't be worse than it sounds."
+
+"I don't know why I've come to tell you," he went on.  "I never
+meant to.  It came into my mind all of a sudden and I felt that I
+must.  It has to do with your sister and the Marston Rise
+affair."
+
+"My sister and the Marston Rise affair!" Beatrice exclaimed,
+incredulously.
+
+Then a sudden light broke in upon her.  She stopped short and
+clutched at his hand.
+
+"You don't mean that it was Elizabeth who was going to find you
+the money?" she cried.
+
+"I do," he answered.  "She offered it of her own accord.  I do
+not know why I talked to her of my own affairs, but she led me on
+to speak of them.  Your sister is a wonderful person," he
+continued, dropping his voice.  "I don't know why, but she made
+me talk as no one else has ever made me talk before.  I simply
+had to tell her things.  Then, when I had finished, she showed me
+her bankbooks and suggested that she should invest some of her
+money in the Rise."
+
+"But do you mean to tell me," Beatrice persisted, "that it is her
+money upon which you are relying for this purchase?"
+
+Tavernake nodded.
+
+"You see," he explained, "Mr. Dowling dropped upon us before I
+was prepared.  As soon as he found out, he went to the owners of
+the estate and made them a bid for it.  The consequence was that
+they shortened my option and gave me very little chance indeed to
+find the money.  When your sister offered it, it certainly seemed
+a wonderful stroke of fortune.  I could give her eight or ten per
+cent, whereas she would only get four anywhere else, and I should
+make a profit for myself of over ten thousand pounds, which I
+cannot do unless I find the money to buy the estate."
+
+"But you mustn't touch that money, you mustn't have anything to
+do with it!" Beatrice exclaimed, walking very fast and looking
+straight ahead.  "You don't understand.  How should you?"
+
+"Do you mean that the money was stolen?" Tavernake asked, after a
+moment's pause.
+
+"No, not stolen," Beatrice replied, "but it comes--oh!  I can't
+tell you, only Elizabeth has no right to it.  My own sister!  It
+is all too awful!"
+
+"Do you think that she has come by this money dishonestly?"
+
+"I am not sure," Beatrice murmured.  "There are worse things,
+more terrible things even than theft."
+
+The practical side of Tavernake's nature was very much to the
+fore that morning.  He began to wonder whether women, after all,
+strange and fascinating creatures though they were, possessed
+judgment which could be relied upon--whether they were not swayed
+too much by sentiment.
+
+"Beatrice," he said, "you must understand this.  I have no time
+to raise the money elsewhere.  If I don't get it from your
+sister, supposing she is still willing to let me have it, my
+chance has gone.  I shall have to take a situation in some one
+else's office as a clerk--probably not so good a place as I held
+at Dowling & Spence's.  On the other hand, the use of that money
+for a very short time would be the start of my career.  All that
+you say is so vague.  Why need I know anything about it?  I met
+your sister in the ordinary way of business and she has made an
+ordinary business proposition to me, one by which she will be,
+incidentally, very greatly benefited.  I never thought of telling
+you this at all, but when the time came I hated to go and draw
+that money from your sister without having said anything to you.
+So I came this morning, but I want you, if you possibly can, to
+look at the matter from my point of view."
+
+She was silent for several moments.  Then she glanced at him
+curiously.
+
+"Why on earth," she asked, "should my sister make this offer to
+you?  She isn't a fool.  She doesn't usually trust strangers."
+
+"She trusted me, apparently," Tavernake answered.
+
+"Can you understand why?" Beatrice demanded.
+
+"I think that I can," he replied.  "If one can rely upon one's
+perception, she is surrounded by people whom she might find
+agreeable companions but whom she is scarcely likely to have much
+confidence in.  Perhaps she realized that I wasn't like them."
+
+"And you want very much to take this money?" she said, half to
+herself.
+
+"I want to very much indeed," Tavernake admitted.  "I was on my
+way to see her this morning and to ask her to let me have it a
+day or two before the time, but I felt, somehow, that there
+seemed to be a certain amount of deceit in going to her and
+taking it without saying a word to you.  I felt that I had to
+come here first.  But Beatrice, don't ask me to give it up.  It
+means such a long time before I can move again.  It's the first
+step that's so difficult, and I must--I must make a start.  It's
+such a chance, this.  I have spent so many hours thinking about
+it.  I have planned and worked and sketched it all out as no one
+else could do.  I must have that money."
+
+They walked on in silence until they reached the stage door.
+Beatrice was thinking of her companion as she had seen him so
+often, poring over his plans, busy with ruler and india-rubber,
+absolutely absorbed in the interest of his task.  She remembered
+the first time he had talked about this scheme of his, how his
+whole face had changed, the almost passionate interest with which
+he had worked the thing out even to its smallest details.  She
+realized how great a part of his life the thing had become, what
+a terrible blow it would be to him to have to abandon it.  She
+turned and faced him.
+
+"Leonard," she said, "perhaps, after all, you are right.  Perhaps
+I give way too much to what, after all, is only a sentimental
+feeling.  I am thankful that you came and told me; I shall always
+be thankful for that.  Take the money, but pay it back as soon as
+you can."
+
+"I shall do that," he answered.  "I shall do that you may rely
+upon it."
+
+She laid her hand upon his arm.
+
+"Leonard," she begged, "I know that Elizabeth is very beautiful
+and very fascinating, and I don't wonder that you like to go and
+see her, but I want to ask you to promise me one thing."
+
+He felt as though he were suddenly turned into stone.  It was not
+possible--it could not be possible that she had guessed his
+secret!
+
+"Well?" he demanded.
+
+"Don't let her introduce you to her friends; don't spend too much
+time there," she continued.  "Elizabeth is my sister and I don't
+--really I don't want to say anything that doesn't sound kind,
+but her friends are not fit people for you to know, and Elizabeth
+--well she hasn't very much heart."
+
+He was silent for several moments.
+
+"How did you know I liked going to see your sister?  " he asked,
+abruptly.
+
+She smiled.
+
+"My dear Leonard," she said, "you are not very clever at hiding
+your feelings.  When you came to see me the other day, do you
+imagine I believed for a single moment that you asked me to marry
+you simply because you cared?  I think, Leonard, that it was
+because you were afraid, you were afraid of something coming into
+your life so big, so terrifying, that you were ready to clutch at
+the easiest chance of safety."
+
+"Beatrice, this is absurd!" he exclaimed.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"No, it isn't that," she declared.  "Do you know, my dear
+Leonard, what there was about you from the very first which
+attracted me?"
+
+"No," he answered.
+
+"It was your honesty," she continued.  "You remember that night
+upon the roof at Blenheim House?  You were going to tell a lie
+for me, and I know how you hated it.  You love the truth, you are
+truthful naturally; I would rely upon you wherever I was.  I know
+that you would keep your word, I know that you would be honest.
+A woman loves to feel that about a man--she loves it--and I don't
+want you to be brought near the people who sneer at honesty and
+all good things.  I don't want you to hear their point of view.
+You may be simple and commonplace in some respects; I want you to
+stay just as you are.  Do you understand?"
+
+"I understand," Tavernake replied gravely.
+
+A call boy shouted her name down the stone passage.  She patted
+him on the shoulder and turned away.
+
+"Run along now and get the money," she said.  "Come and see me
+when it's all over."
+
+Tavernake left her with a long breath of relief and made his way
+towards the Strand.  At the corner of Wellington Street he came
+face to face with Pritchard.  They stopped at once.  There seemed
+to be something embarrassing about this meeting.  lPritchard
+patted him familiarly on the shoulder.
+
+"How goes it, old man?" he asked.
+
+"I am all right," Tavernake answered, somewhat awkwardly.  "How
+are you?"
+
+"I guess I'd be the better for a drink," Pritchard declared.
+"Come along.  Pretty well done up the other night, weren't we?
+We'll step into the American Bar here and try a gin fizz."
+
+They found themselves presently perched upon two high stools in a
+deserted corner of the bar to which Pritchard had led the way.
+Tavernake sipped his drink tentatively.
+
+"I should like," he said, "to ask you a question or two about
+Wednesday night."
+
+Pritchard nodded.
+
+"Go right ahead," he invited.
+
+"You seem to take the whole affair as a sort of joke," Tavernake
+remarked.
+
+"Well, isn't that what it was?" the detective asked, smiling.
+
+Tavernake shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"There didn't seem to me to be much joke about it!" he exclaimed.
+
+Pritchard laughed gayly.
+
+"You are not used to Americans, my young friend," he said.  "Over
+on this side you are all so fearfully literal.  You are not
+seriously supposing that they meant to dose me with that stuff
+the other night, eh?"
+
+"I never thought that there was any doubt about it at all,"
+Tavernake declared deliberately.
+
+Pritchard stroked his moustache meditatively.
+
+"Well," he remarked, "you are certainly green, and yet I don't
+know why you shouldn't be.  Americans are always up to games of
+that sort.  I am not saying that they didn't mean to give me a
+scare, if they could, or that they wouldn't have been glad to get
+a few words of information out of me, or a paper or two that I
+keep pretty safely locked up.  It would have been a better joke
+on me then.  But as for the rest, as for really trying to make me
+take that stuff, of course, that was all bunkum."
+
+Tavernake sat quite still in his chair for several minutes.
+
+"Will you take another gin fizz, Mr. Pritchard?" he asked.
+
+"Why not?"
+
+Tavernake gave the order.  He sat on his stool whistling softly
+to himself.
+
+"Then I suppose," he said at last, "I must have looked a pretty
+sort of an ass coming through the wall like a madman."
+
+Pritchard shook his head.
+
+"You looked just about what you were," he answered, "a d----d
+good sort.  I'm not playing up to you that it was all pretense.
+You can never trust that gang.  The blackguard outside was in
+earnest, anyway.  After all, you know, they wouldn't miss me if I
+were to drop quietly out.  There 's no one else they 're quite so
+much afraid of.  There 's no one else knows quite as much about
+them."
+
+"Well, we'll let it go at that," Tavernake declared.  "You know
+so much of all these people, though, that I rather wish you 'd
+tell me something I want very much to know."
+
+"It's by telling nothing," the detective replied quickly, "that I
+know as much as I do.  Just one cocktail, eh?"
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+"I drank my first cocktail last night," he remarked.  "I had
+supper with the professor and his daughter."
+
+"Not Elizabeth?" Pritchard asked swiftly.
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+"With Miss Beatrice," he answered.
+
+Pritchard set down his glass.
+
+"Say, Tavernake," he inquired, "you are friendly with that young
+lady, Miss Beatrice, aren't you?"
+
+"I certainly am," Tavernake answered.  "I have a very great
+regard for her."
+
+"Then I can tell you how to do her a good turn," Pritchard
+continued, earnestly.  "Keep her away from that old blackguard.
+Keep her away from all the gang.  Believe me, she is looking for
+trouble by even speaking to them."
+
+"But the man's her father," Tavernake objected, "and he seems
+fond of her."
+
+"Don't you believe it," Pritchard went on.  "He's fond of nothing
+and nobody but himself and easy living.  He's soft, mind you,
+he's got plenty of sentiment, he 'll squeeze a tear out of his
+eye, and all that sort of thing, but he'd sell his soul, or his
+daughter's soul, for a little extra comfort.  Now Elizabeth
+doesn't know exactly where her sister is, and she daren't seem
+anxious, or go around making inquiries.  Beatrice has her chance
+to keep away, and I can tell you it will be a thundering sight
+better for her if she does."
+
+"Well, I don't understand it at all," Tavernake declared.  "I
+hate mysteries."
+
+Pritchard set down his empty glass.
+
+"Look here," he remarked, "this affair is too serious, after all,
+for us to talk round like a couple of gossips.  I have given you
+your warning, and if you're wise you 'll remember it."
+
+"Tell me this one thing," Tavernake persisted.  "Tell me what is
+the cause of the quarrel between the two?  Can't something be
+done to bring them together again?"
+
+Pritchard shook his head.
+
+"Nothing," he answered.  "As things are at present, they are
+better apart.  Coming my way?"
+
+Tavernake followed him out of the place.  Pritchard took his arm
+as he turned down toward the Strand.
+
+"My young friend," he said, "here is a word of advice for you.
+The Scriptures say that you cannot serve God and mammon.
+Paraphrase that to the present situation and remember that you
+cannot serve Elizabeth and Beatrice."
+
+"What then?" Tavernake demanded.
+
+The detective waited until he had lit the long black cigar
+between his teeth.
+
+"I guess you'd better confine your attentions to Beatrice," he
+concluded."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+DINNER WITH ELIZABETH
+
+
+The rest of that day was for Tavernake a period of feverish
+anxieties.  He received two telegrams from Mr. Martin, his
+solicitor, and he himself was more uneasy than he cared to admit.
+At three o'clock in the afternoon, at eight in the evening, and
+again at eleven o'clock at night, he presented himself at the
+Milan Court, always with the same inquiry.  On the last occasion,
+the hall porter had cheering news for him.
+
+"Mrs. Wenham Gardner returned from the country an hour ago, sir,"
+he announced.  "I can send your name up now, if you wish to see
+her."
+
+Tavernake was conscious of a sense of immense relief.  Of course,
+he had known that she had not really gone away for good, but all
+the same her absence, especially after the event of the night
+before last, was a little disquieting.
+
+"My name is Tavernake," he said.  "I do not wish to intrude at
+such an hour, but if she could see me for a moment, I should be
+glad."
+
+He sat down and waited patiently.  Soon a message came that Mr.
+Tavernake was to go up.  He ascended in the lift and knocked at
+the door of her suite.  Her maid opened it grudgingly.  She
+scarcely took the pains to conceal her disapproval of this young
+man--so ordinary, so gauche.  Why Madame should waste her time
+upon such a one, she could not imagine!
+
+"Mrs. Gardner will see you directly," she told him.  "Madame is
+dressing now to go out for supper.  She will be able to spare you
+only a few seconds."
+
+Tavernake remained alone in the luxurious little sitting-room for
+nearly ten minutes.  Then the door of the inner room was opened
+and Elizabeth appeared.  Tavernake, rising slowly to his feet,
+looked at her for a moment in reluctant but wondering admiration.
+She was wearing an ivory satin gown, without trimming or lace of
+any sort, a gown the fit of which seemed to him almost a miracle.
+Her only jewelry was a long rope of pearls and a small tiara.
+Tavernake had never been brought into close contact with any one
+quite like this.
+
+She was putting on her gloves as she entered and she gave him her
+left hand.
+
+"What an extraordinary person you are, Mr. Tavernake!" she
+exclaimed.  "You really do seem to turn up at the most
+astonishing times."
+
+"I am very sorry to have intruded upon you to-night," he said.
+"As regards the last occasion, however, upon which I made an
+unexpected appearance, I make no apologies whatever," he added
+coolly.
+
+She laughed softly.  She was looking full into his eyes and yet
+he could not tell whether she was angry with him or only amused.
+
+"You were by way of being a little melodramatic, were you not?"
+she remarked.  "Still, you were very much in earnest, and one
+forgives a great deal to any one who is really in earnest.  What
+do you want with me now?  I am just going downstairs to supper."
+
+"It is a matter of business," Tavernake replied.  "I have a
+friend who is a partner with me in the Marston Rise building
+speculation, and he is worried because there is some one else in
+the field wanting to buy the property, and the day after
+to-morrow is our last chance of paying over the money."
+
+She looked at him as though puzzled.
+
+"What money?"
+
+"The money which you agreed to lend me, or rather to invest in
+our building company," he reminded her.
+
+She nodded.
+
+"Of course!  Why, I had forgotten all about it for the moment.
+You are going to give me ten per cent interest or something
+splendid, aren't you?  Well, what about it?  You don't want to
+take it away with you now, I suppose?"
+
+"No," he answered, "it isn't that.  To be honest with you, I came
+to make sure that you hadn't changed your mind."
+
+"And why should I change my mind?"
+
+"You might be angry with me," he said, "for interfering in your
+concerns the night before last."
+
+"Perhaps I am," she remarked, indifferently.
+
+"Do you wish to withdraw from your promise?" he asked.
+
+"I really haven't thought much about it," she replied,
+carelessly.  "By-the-bye, have you seen Beatrice lately?"
+
+"We agreed, I think," he reminded her, "that we would not talk
+about your sister."
+
+She looked at him over her shoulder.
+
+"I do not remember that I agreed to anything of the sort," she
+declared.  "I think it was you who laid down the law about that.
+As a matter of fact, I think that your silence about her is very
+unkind.  I suppose you have seen her?"
+
+"Yes, I have seen her," Tavernake admitted.
+
+"She continues to be tragic," Elizabeth asked, "whenever my name
+is mentioned?"
+
+"I should not call it tragic," Tavernake answered, reluctantly.
+"One gathers, however, that something transpired between you
+before she left, of a serious nature."
+
+She looked at him earnestly.
+
+"Really," she said, "you are a strange, stolid young man.  I
+wonder," she went on, smiling into his face, "are you in love
+with my sister?"
+
+Tavernake made no immediate response, only something flashed for
+a moment in his eyes which puzzled her.
+
+"Why do you look at me like that?" she demanded.  "You are not
+angry with me for asking?"
+
+"No, I am not angry," he replied.  "It isn't that.  But you must
+know--you must see!"
+
+Then she indeed did see that he was laboring under a very great
+emotion.  She leaned towards him, laughing softly.
+
+"Now you are really becoming interesting," she murmured.  "Tell
+me--tell me all about it."
+
+"I don't know what love is!" Tavernake declared fiercely.  "I
+don't know what it means to be in love!"
+
+Again she laughed in his face.
+
+"Are you so sure?" she whispered.
+
+She saw the veins stand out upon his temples, watched the passion
+which kept him at first tongue-tied.
+
+"Sure!" he muttered.  "Who can be sure when you look like that!"
+
+He held out his arms.  With a swift little backward movement she
+flitted away and leaned against the table.
+
+"What a brother-in-law you would make!" she laughed.  "So steady,
+so respectable, alas!  so serious!  Dear Mr. Tavernake, I wish
+you joy.  As a matter of fact, you and Beatrice are very well
+suited for one another."
+
+The telephone bell rang.  She moved over and held the receiver to
+her ear.  Her face changed.  After the first few words to which
+she listened, it grew dark with anger.
+
+"You mean to say that Professor Franklin has not been in since
+lunch-time?" she exclaimed.  "I left word particularly that I
+should require him to-night.  Is Major Post there, then?  No?
+Mr. Crease--no?  Nor Mr. Faulkes?  Not one of them!  Very well,
+ring me up directly the professor comes in, or any of them."
+
+She replaced the receiver with a gesture of annoyance.  Tavernake
+was astonished at the alteration in her expression.  The smile
+had gone, and with its passing away lines had come under her eyes
+and about her mouth.  Without a word to him she strode away into
+her bedroom.  Tavernake was just wondering whether he should
+retire, when she came back.
+
+"Listen, Mr. Tavernake," she said, "how far away are your rooms?"
+
+"Down at Chelsea," he answered, "about two miles and a half."
+
+"Take a taxi and drive there," she commanded, "or stop.  You will
+find my car outside.  I will telephone down to say that you are
+to use it.  Change into your evening clothes and come back for
+me.  I want you to take me out to supper."
+
+He looked at her in amazement.  She stamped her foot.
+
+"Don't stand there hesitating!" she ordered.  "Do as I say!  You
+don't expect I am going to help you to buy your wretched property
+if you refuse me the simplest of favors?  Hurry, I say!  Hurry!"
+
+"I am really very sorry," Tavernake interposed, "but I do not
+possess a dress suit.  I would go, with pleasure, but I haven't
+got such a thing."
+
+She looked at him for a moment incredulously.  Then she broke
+into a fit of uncontrollable laughter.  She sat down upon the
+edge of a couch and wiped the tears from her eyes.
+
+"Oh, you strange, you wonderful person!" she exclaimed.  "You
+want to buy an estate and you want to borrow twelve thousand
+pounds, and you know where Beatrice is and you won't tell me, and
+you are fully convinced, because you burst into a house through
+the wall, that you saved poor Pritchard from being poisoned, and
+you don't possess a dress suit!  Never mind, as it happens it
+doesn't matter about the dress suit.  You shall take me out as
+you are."
+
+Tavernake felt in his pockets and remembered that he had only
+thirty shillings with him.
+
+"Here, carry my purse," she said carelessly.  "We are going
+downstairs to the smaller restaurant.  I have been traveling
+since six o'clock, and I am starving."
+
+"But how about my clothes?" Tavernake objected.  "Will they be
+all right?"
+
+"It doesn't matter where we are going," she answered.  "You look
+very well as you are.  Come and let me put your tie straight."
+
+She came close to him and her fingers played for a moment with
+his tie.  She was very near to him and she laughed deliberately
+into his face.  Tavernake held himself quite stiff and felt
+foolish.  He also felt absurdly happy.
+
+"There," she remarked, when she had arranged it to her
+satisfaction, "you look all right now.  I wonder," she added,
+half to herself, "what you do look like.  Something Colonial and
+forceful, I think.  Never mind, help me on with my cloak and come
+along.  You are a most respectable-looking escort, and a very
+useful one."
+
+
+Although Tavernake was nominally the host, it was Elizabeth who
+selected the table and ordered the supper.  There were very few
+other guests in the room, the majority being down in the larger
+restaurant, but among these few Tavernake noticed two of the
+girls from the chorus at the Atlas.  Elizabeth had chosen a table
+from which she had a view of the door, and she took the seat
+facing it.  From the first Tavernake felt certain that she was
+watching for some one.
+
+"Talk to me now, please, about this speculation," she insisted.
+"I should like to know all about it, and whether you are sure
+that I shall get ten per cent for my money."
+
+Tavernake was in no way reluctant.  It was a safe topic for
+conversation, and one concerning which he had plenty to say.  But
+after a time she stopped him.
+
+"Well," she said, "I have discovered at any rate one subject on
+which you can be fluent.  Now I have had enough of building
+properties, please, and house building.  I should like to hear a
+little about Beatrice."
+
+Tavernake was dumb.
+
+"I do not wish to talk about Beatrice," he declared, "until I
+understand the cause of this estrangement between you."
+
+Her eyes flashed angrily and her laugh sounded forced.
+
+"Not even talk of her!  My dear friend," she protested, "you
+scarcely repay the confidence I am placing in you!"
+
+"You mean the money?"
+
+"Precisely," she continued.  "I trust you, why I do not know--I
+suppose because I am something of a physiognomist--with twelve
+thousand pounds of my hard-earned savings.  You refuse to trust
+me with even a few simple particulars about the life of my own
+sister.  Come, I don't think that things are quite as they should
+be between us."
+
+"Do you know where I first met your sister?" Tavernake asked.
+
+She shook her head pettishly.
+
+"How should I?  You told me nothing."
+
+"She was staying in a boarding-house where I lived," Tavernake
+went on.  "I think I told you that but nothing else.  It was a
+cheap boarding-house but she had not enough money to pay for her
+meals.  She was tired of life.  She was in a desperate state
+altogether."
+
+"Are you trying to tell me, or rather trying not to tell me, that
+Beatrice was mad enough to think of committing suicide?"
+Elizabeth inquired.
+
+"She was in the frame of mind when such a step was possible," he
+answered, gravely.  "You remember that night when I first saw you
+in the chemist's shop across the street?  She had been very ill
+that evening, very ill indeed.  You could see for yourself the
+effect meeting you had upon her."
+
+Elizabeth nodded, and crumbled a little piece of roll between her
+fingers.  Then she leaned over the table towards Tavernake.
+
+"She seemed terrified, didn't she?  She hurried you away--she
+seemed afraid."
+
+"It was very noticeable," he admitted.  "She was terrified.  She
+dragged me out of the place.  A few minutes later she fainted in
+the cab."
+
+Elizabeth smiled.
+
+"Beatrice was always over-sensitive," she remarked.  "Any sudden
+shock unnerved her altogether.  Are you terrified of me, too, Mr.
+Tavernake?"
+
+"I don't know," he answered, frankly.  "Sometimes I think that I
+am."
+
+She laughed softly.
+
+"Why?" she whispered.
+
+He looked into her eyes and he felt abject.  How was it possible
+to sit within a few feet of her and remain sane!
+
+"You are so wonderful," he said, in a low tone, "so different
+from any one else in the world!"
+
+"You are glad that you met me, then--that you are here?" she
+asked.
+
+He raised his eyes once more.
+
+"I don't know," he answered simply.  "If I really believed--if
+you were always kind like this--but, you see, you make two men of
+me.  When I am with you I am a fool, your fool, to do as you will
+with.  When I am away, some glimmerings of common sense come
+back, and I know."
+
+"You know what?" she murmured.
+
+"That you are not honest," he added.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake!" she exclaimed, lifting her head a little.
+
+"Oh, I don t mean dishonest in the ordinary way!" he protested,
+eagerly.  "What I mean is that you look things which you don't
+feel, that you are willing for any one who can't help admiring
+you very much to believe for a moment that you, too, feel more
+kindly than you really do.  This is so clumsy," he broke off,
+despairingly, "but you understand what I mean!"
+
+"You have an adorable way of making yourself understood," she
+laughed.  "Come, do let us talk sense for a minute or two.  You
+say that when you are with me you are my slave.  Then why is it
+that you do not bring Beatrice here when I beg you to?"
+
+"I am your slave," he answered, "in everything that has to do
+with myself and my own actions.  In that other matter it is for
+your sister to decide."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"Well," she said, "I suppose I shall be able to endure life
+without her.  At any rate, we will talk of something else.  Tell
+me, are you not curious to know why I insisted upon bringing you
+here?"
+
+"Yes," he admitted, "I am."
+
+"Spoken with your usual candor, my dear Briton!" she exclaimed.
+"Well, I will gratify your curiosity.  This, as you see, is not a
+popular supping place.  A few people come in--mostly those who
+for some reason or other don't feel smart enough for the big
+restaurants.  The people from the theatres come in here who have
+not time to change their clothes.  As you perceive; the place has
+a distinctly Bohemian flavor."
+
+Tavernake looked around.
+
+"They seem to come in all sorts of clothes," he remarked.  "I am
+glad."
+
+"There is a man now in London," Elizabeth continued, "whom I am
+just as anxious to see as I am to find my sister.  I believe that
+this is the most likely place to find him.  That is why I have
+come.  My father was to have been here to take me, but as you
+heard he has gone out somewhere and not returned.  None of my
+other friends were available.  You happened to come in just in
+time."
+
+"And this man whom you want to see," Tavernake asked, "is he
+here?"
+
+"Not yet," she answered.
+
+There were, indeed, only a few scattered groups in the place, and
+most of these were obviously theatrical.  But even at that moment
+a man came in alone through the circular doors, and stood just
+inside, looking around him.  He was a man of medium height, thin,
+and of undistinguished appearance.  His hair was light-colored
+and plastered a little in front over his forehead.  His face was
+thin and he walked with a slight stoop.  Something about his
+clothes and his manner of wearing them stamped him as an
+American.  Tavernake glanced at his companion, wondering whether
+this, perhaps, might not be the person for whom she was watching.
+His first glance was careless enough, then he felt his heart
+thump against his ribs.  A tragedy had come into the room!  The
+woman at his side sat as though turned to stone.  There was a
+look in her face as of one who sees Death.  The small patch of
+rouge, invisible before, was now a staring daub of color in an
+oasis of ashen white.  Her eyes were as hard as stones; her lips
+were twitching as though, indeed, she had been stricken with some
+disease.  No longer was he sitting with this most beautiful lady
+at whose coming all heads were turned in admiration.  It was as
+though an image of Death sat there, a frozen presentment of
+horror itself!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+ON AN ERRAND OF CHIVALRY
+
+
+The seconds passed; the woman beside him showed no sign of life.
+Tavernake felt a fear run cold in his blood, such as in all his
+days he had never known.  This, indeed, was something belonging
+to a world of which he knew nothing.  What was it?  Illness?
+Pain?  Surprise?  There was only his instinct to tell him.  It
+was terror, the terror of one who looks beyond the grave.
+
+"Mrs. Gardner!" he exclaimed.  "Elizabeth!"
+
+The sound of his voice seemed to break the spell.  A half-choked
+sob came through her teeth; the struggle for composure commenced.
+
+"I am ill," she murmured.  "Give me my glass.  Give it to me."
+
+Her fingers were feeling for it but it seemed as though she dared
+not move her head.  He filled it with wine and placed the stem in
+her hand.  Even then she spilled some of it upon the tablecloth.
+As she raised it to her lips, the man who stood still upon the
+threshold of the restaurant looked into her face.  Slowly, as
+though his quest were over, he came down the room.
+
+"Go away," she said to Tavernake.  "Go away, please.  He is
+coming to speak to me.  I want to be alone with him."
+
+Strangely enough, at that moment Tavernake saw nothing out of the
+common in her request.  He rose at once, without any formal
+leave-taking, and made his way toward the other end of the caf�.
+As he turned the corner towards the smoking-room, he glanced once
+behind.  The man had approached quite close to Elizabeth; he was
+standing before her table, they seemed to be exchanging
+greetings.
+
+Tavernake went on into the smoking-room and threw himself into an
+easy-chair.  He had been there perhaps for ten minutes when
+Pritchard entered.  Certainly it was a night of surprises!  Even
+Pritchard, cool, deliberate, slow in his movements and speech,
+seemed temporarily flurried.  He came into the room walking
+quickly.  As the door swung back, he turned round as though to
+assure himself that he was not being followed.  He did not at
+first see Tavernake.  He sat on the arm of an easy-chair, his
+hands in his pockets, his eternal cigar in the corner of his
+mouth, his eyes fixed upon the doors through which he had issued.
+Without a doubt, something had disturbed him.  He had the look of
+a man who had received a blow, a surprise of some sort over which
+he was still ruminating.  Then he glanced around the room and saw
+Tavernake.
+
+"Hullo, young man!" he exclaimed.  "So this is the way you follow
+my advice!"
+
+"I never promised to follow it," Tavernake reminded him.
+
+Pritchard wheeled an easy-chair across the room and called to the
+waiter.
+
+"Come," he said, "you shall stand me a drink.  Two whiskies and
+sodas, Tim.  And now, Mr. Leonard Tavernake, you are going to
+answer me a question."
+
+"Am I?" Tavernake muttered.
+
+"You came down in the lift with Mrs. Wenham Gardner half an hour
+ago, you went into the restaurant and ordered supper.  She is
+there still and you are here.  Have you quarreled?"
+
+"No, we did not quarrel," Tavernake answered.  "She explained
+that she was supping in the caf� only for the sake of meeting one
+man.  She wanted an escort.  I filled that post until the man
+came."
+
+"He is there now?" Pritchard asked.
+
+"He is there now," Tavernake assented.
+
+Pritchard withdrew the cigar from his mouth and watched it for a
+moment.
+
+"Say, Tavernake," he went on, "is that man who is now having
+supper with Mrs. Wenham Gardner the man whom she expected?"
+
+"I imagine so," Tavernake replied.
+
+"Didn't she seem in any way scared or disturbed when he first
+turned up?"
+
+"She looked as I have seen no one else on earth look before,"
+Tavernake admitted.  "She seemed simply terrified to death.  I do
+not know why--she didn't explain--but that is how she looked."
+
+"Yet she sent you away!"
+
+"She sent me away.  She didn't care what became of me.  She was
+watching the door all the time before he came.  Who is he,
+Pritchard?"
+
+"That sounds a simple question," Pritchard answered gravely, "but
+it means a good deal.  There's mischief afoot to-night,
+Tavernake."
+
+"You seem to thrive on it," Tavernake retorted, drily.  "Any more
+bunkum?"
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"Come," he said," you're a sensible chap.  Take these things for
+what they're worth.  Believe me when I tell you now that there is
+a great deal more in the coming of this man than Mrs. Wenham
+Gardner ever bargained for."
+
+"I wish you'd tell me who he is," Tavernake begged.  "All this
+mystery about Beatrice and her sister, and that lazy old hulk of
+a father, is most irritating."
+
+Pritchard nodded sympathetically.
+
+"You'll have to put up with it a little longer, I'm afraid, my
+young friend," he declared.  "You've done me a good turn; I'll do
+you one.  I'll give you some good advice.  Keep out of this place
+so long as the old man and his daughter are hanging out here.
+The girl 's clever--oh, she's as clever as they make them--but
+she's gone wrong from the start.  They ain't your sort,
+Tavernake.  You don't fit in anywhere.  Take my advice and hook
+it altogether."
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+"I can't do that just now," he said.  "Good-night!  I'm off for
+the present, at any rate."
+
+Pritchard, too, rose to his feet.  He passed his arm through
+Tavernake's.
+
+"Young man," he remarked, "there are not many in this country
+whom I can trust.  You're one of them.  There's a sort of
+solidity about you that I rather admire.  You are not likely to
+break out and do silly things.  Do you care for adventures?"
+
+"I detest them," Tavernake answered, "especially the sort I
+tumbled into the other night."
+
+Pritchard laughed softly.  They had left the room now and were
+walking along the open space at the end of the restaurant,
+leading to the main exit.
+
+"That's the difference between us," he declared thoughtfully.
+"Now adventures to me are the salt of my life.  I hang about here
+and watch these few respectable-looking men and women, and there
+doesn't seem to be much in it to an outsider, but, gee whiz!
+there's sometimes things underneath which you fellows don't
+tumble to.  A man asks another in there to have a drink.  They
+make a cheerful appointment to meet for lunch, to motor to
+Brighton.  It all sounds so harmless, and yet there are the seeds
+of a conspiracy already sown.  They hate me here, but they know
+very well that wherever they went I should be around.  I suppose
+some day they'll get rid of me."
+
+"More bunkum!" Tavernake muttered.
+
+They stood in front of the door and passed through into the
+courtyard.  On their right, the interior of the smaller
+restaurant was shielded from view by a lattice-work, covered with
+flowers and shrubs.  Pritchard came to a standstill at a certain
+point, and stooping down looked through.  He remained there
+without moving for what seemed to Tavernake an extraordinarily
+long time.  When he stood up again, there was a distinct change
+in his face.  He was looking more serious than Tavernake had ever
+seen him.  But for the improbability of the thing, Tavernake
+would have thought that he had turned pale.
+
+"My young friend," he said, "you've got to see me through this.
+You 've a sort of fancy for Mrs. Wenham Gardner, I know.
+To-night you shall be on her side."
+
+"I don't want any more mysteries," Tavernake protested.  "I'd
+rather go home."
+
+"It can't be done," Pritchard declared, taking his arm once more.
+"You've got to see me through this.  Come up to my rooms for a
+minute."
+
+They entered the Court and ascended to the eighth floor.
+Pritchard turned on the lights in his room, a plainly furnished
+and somewhat bare apartment.  From a cupboard he took out a pair
+of rubber-soled shoes and threw them to Tavernake.
+
+"Put those on," he directed.
+
+"What are we going to do?" Tavernake asked.
+
+"You are going to help me," Pritchard answered.  "Take my word
+for it, Tavernake, it's all right.  I could tackle the job alone,
+but I'd rather not.  Now drink this whiskey and soda and light a
+cigarette.  I shall be ready in five minutes."
+
+"But where are we going?" Tavernake demanded.
+
+"You are going," Pritchard replied, "on an errand of chivalry.
+You are going to become once more a rescuer of woman in distress.
+You are going to save the life of your beautiful friend
+Elizabeth."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+CLOSE TO TRAGEDY
+
+
+The actual words of greeting which passed between Elizabeth and
+the man whose advent had caused her so much emotion were
+unimpressive.  The newcomer, with the tips of his fingers resting
+upon the tablecloth, leaned slightly towards her.  At close
+quarters, he was even more unattractive than when Tavernake had
+first seen him.  He was faultily shaped; there was something a
+little decadent about his deep-set eyes and receding forehead.
+Neither was his expression prepossessing.  He looked at her as a
+man looks upon the thing he hates.
+
+"So, Elizabeth," he said, "this pleasure has come at last!"
+
+"I heard that you were back in England," she replied.  "Pray sit
+down."
+
+Even then her eyes never left his.  All the time they seemed to
+be fiercely questioning, seeking for something in his features
+which eluded them.  It was terrible to see the change which the
+last few minutes had wrought in her.  Her smooth, girlish face
+had lost its comeliness.  Her eyes, always a little narrow,
+seemed to have receded.  It was such a change, this, as comes to
+a brave man who, in the prime of life, feels fear for the first
+time.
+
+"I am glad to find you at supper," he declared, taking up the
+menu.  "I am hungry.  You can bring me some grilled cutlets at
+once," he added to the waiter who stood by his side, "and some
+brandy.  Nothing else."
+
+The waiter bowed and hurried off.  The woman played with her fan
+but her fingers were shaking.
+
+"I fear," he remarked, "that my coming is rather a shock to you.
+I am sorry to see you looking so distressed."
+
+"It is not that," she answered with some show of courage.  "You
+know me too well to believe me capable of seeking a meeting which
+I feared.  It is the strange thing which has happened to you
+during these last few months--this last year.  Do you know--has
+any one told you--that you seem to have become even more like
+--the image of--"
+
+He nodded understandingly.
+
+"Of poor Wenham!  Many people have told me that.  Of course, you
+know that we were always appallingly alike, and they always said
+that we should become more so in middle-age.  After all, there is
+only a year between us.  We might have been twins."
+
+"It is the most terrible thing in likenesses I have ever seen,"
+the woman continued slowly.  "When you entered the room a few
+seconds ago, it seemed to me that a miracle had happened.  It
+seemed to me that the dead had come to life."
+
+"It must have been a shock," the man murmured, with his eyes upon
+the tablecloth.
+
+"It was," she agreed, hoarsely.  "Can't you see it in my face?  I
+do not always look like a woman of forty.  Can't you see the gray
+shadows that are there?  You see, I admit it frankly.  I was
+terrified--I am terrified!"
+
+"And why?" he asked.
+
+"Why?" she repeated, looking at him wonderingly.  "Doesn't it
+seem to you a terrible thing to think of the dead coming back to
+life?"
+
+He tapped lightly upon the tablecloth for a minute with the
+fingers of one hand.  Then he looked at her again.
+
+"It depends," he said, "upon the manner of their death."
+
+An executioner of the Middle Ages could not have played with his
+victim more skillfully.  The woman was shivering now, preserving
+some outward appearance of calm only by the most fierce and
+unnatural effort.
+
+"What do you mean by that, Jerry?" she asked.  "I was not even
+with--Wenham, when he was lost.  You know all about it, I
+suppose,--how it happened?"
+
+The man nodded thoughtfully.
+
+"I have heard many stories," he admitted.  "Before we leave the
+subject for ever, I should like to hear it from you, from your
+own lips."
+
+There was a bottle of champagne upon the table, ordered at the
+commencement of the meal.  She touched her glass; the waiter
+filled it.  She raised it to her lips and set it down empty.  Her
+fingers were clutching the tablecloth.
+
+"You ask me a hard thing, Jerry," she said.  "It is not easy to
+talk of anything so painful.  From the moment we left New York,
+Wenham was strange.  He drank a good deal upon the steamer.  He
+used to talk sometimes in the most wild way.  We came to London.
+He had an attack of delirium tremens.  I nursed him through it
+and took him into the country, down into Cornwall.  We took a
+small cottage on the outskirts of a fishing village--St.
+Catherine's, the place was called.  There we lived quietly for a
+time.  Sometimes he was better, sometimes worse.  The doctor in
+the village was very kind and came often to see him.  He brought
+a friend from the neighboring town and they agreed that with
+complete rest Wenham would soon be better.  All the time my life
+was a miserable one.  He was not fit to be alone and yet he was a
+terrible companion.  I did my best.  I was with him half of every
+day, sometimes longer.  I was with him till my own health began
+to suffer.  At last I could stand the solitude no longer.  I sent
+for my father.  He came and lived with us."
+
+"The professor," her listener murmured.
+
+She nodded.
+
+"It was a little better then for me," she went on, "except that
+poor Wenham seemed to take such a dislike to my father.  However,
+he hated every one in turn, even the doctors, who always did
+their best for him.  One day, I admit, I lost my temper.  We
+quarreled; I could not help it--life was becoming insupportable.
+He rushed out of the house--it was about three o'clock in the
+afternoon.  I have never seen him since."
+
+The man was looking at her, looking at her closely although he
+was blinking all the time.
+
+"What do you think became of him?" he asked.  "What do people
+think?  "
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"The only thing he cared to do was swim," she said.  "His clothes
+and hat were found down in the little cove near where we had a
+tent."
+
+"You think, then, that he was drowned?" the man asked.
+
+She nodded.  Speech seemed to be becoming too painful.
+
+"Drowning," her companion continued, helping himself to brandy,
+"is not a pleasant death.  Once I was nearly drowned myself.  One
+struggles for a short time and one thinks--yes, one thinks!" he
+added.
+
+He raised his glass to his lips and set it down.
+
+"It is an easy death, though," he went on, "quite an easy death.
+By the way, were those clothes that were found of poor Wenham's
+identified as the clothes he wore when he left the house?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"One could not say for certain," she answered.  "I never noticed
+how he was dressed.  He wore nearly always the same sort of
+things, but he had an endless variety."
+
+"And this was seven months ago -seven months."
+
+She assented.
+
+"Poor Wenham," he murmured.  "I suppose he is dead.  What are you
+going to do, Elizabeth?"
+
+"I do not know," she replied.  "Soon I must go to the lawyers and
+ask for advice.  I have very little more money left.  I have
+written several times to New York to you, to his friends, but I
+have had no answer.  After all, Jerry, I am his wife.  No one
+liked my marrying him, but I am his wife.  I have a right to a
+share of his property if he is dead.  If he has deserted me,
+surely I shall be allowed something.  I do not even know how rich
+he was."
+
+The man at her side smiled.
+
+"Much better off than I ever was," he declared.  "But,
+Elizabeth!"
+
+"Well?"
+
+"There were rumors that, before you left New York, Wenham
+converted very large sums of money into letters of credit and
+bonds, very large sums indeed."  She shook her head.  "He had a
+letter of credit for about a thousand pounds, I think," she said.
+"There is very little left of the money he had with him."
+
+"And you find living here expensive, I dare say?"
+
+"Very expensive indeed," she agreed, with a sigh.  "I have been
+looking forward to seeing you, Jerry.  I thought, perhaps, for
+the sake of old times you might advise me."
+
+"Of old times," he repeated to himself softly.  "Elizabeth, do
+you think of them sometimes?"
+
+She was becoming more herself.  This was a game she was used to
+playing.  Of old times, indeed!  It seemed only yesterday that
+these two brothers, who had the reputation in those days of being
+the richest young men in New York, were both at her feet.  So
+far, she had scarcely been fortunate.  There was still a chance,
+however.  She looked up.  It seemed to her that he was losing his
+composure.  Yes, there was something of the old gleam in his
+eyes!  Once he had been madly enough in love with her.  It ought
+not to be impossible!
+
+"Jerry," she said, "I have told you these things.  It has been so
+very, very painful for me.  Won't you try now and be kind?
+Remember that I am all alone and it is all very difficult for me.
+I have been looking forward to your coming.  I have thought so
+often of those times we spent together in New York.  Won't you be
+my friend again?  Won't you help me through these dark days?"
+
+Her hand touched his.  For a moment he snatched his away as
+though stung.  Then he caught her fingers in his and held them as
+though in a vice.  She smiled, the smile of conscious power.  The
+flush of beauty was streaming once more into her face.  Poor
+fellow, he was still in love, then!  The fingers which had closed
+upon hers were burning.  What a pity that he was not a little
+more presentable!
+
+"Yes," he muttered, "we must be friends, Elizabeth.  Wenham had
+all the luck at first.  Perhaps it's going to be my turn now,
+eh?"
+
+He bent towards her.  She laughed into his face for a moment and
+then was once more suddenly colorless, the smile frozen upon her
+lips.  She began to shiver.
+
+"What is it?" he asked.  "What is it, Elizabeth?"
+
+"Nothing," she faltered, "only I wish--I do wish that you were
+not so much like Wenham.  Sometimes a trick of your voice, the
+way you hold your head--it terrifies me!"
+
+He laughed oddly.
+
+"You must get used to that, Elizabeth," he declared.  "I can't
+help being like him, you know.  We were great friends always
+until you came.  I wonder why you preferred Wenham."
+
+"Don't ask me--please don't ask me that," she begged.  "Really, I
+think he happened to be there just at the moment I felt like
+making a clean sweep of everything, of leaving New York and every
+one and starting life again, and I thought Wenham meant it.  I
+thought I should be able to keep him from drinking and to help
+him start a new life altogether over here or on the Continent."
+
+"Poor little woman," he said, "you have been disappointed, I am
+afraid."
+
+She sighed.
+
+"I am only human, you know," she went on.  "Every one told me
+that Wenham was a millionaire, too.  See how much I have
+benefited by it.  I am almost penniless, I do not know whether he
+is dead or alive, I do not know what to do to get some money.
+Was Wenham very rich, Jerry?"
+
+The man laughed.
+
+"Oh, he was very rich indeed!" he assured her.  "It is terrible
+that you should be left like this.  We will talk about it
+together presently, you and I.  In the meantime, you must let me
+be your banker."
+
+"Dear Jerry," she whispered, "you were always generous."
+
+"You have not spoken of the little prude--dear Miss Beatrice," he
+reminded her suddenly.
+
+Elizabeth sighed.
+
+"Beatrice was a great trial from the first," she declared.  "You
+know how she disliked you both--she was scarcely even civil to
+Wenham, and she would never have come to Europe with us if father
+hadn't insisted upon it.  We took her down to Cornwall with us
+and there she became absolutely insupportable.  She was always
+interfering between Wenham and me and imagining the most absurd
+things.  One day she left us without a word of warning.  I have
+never seen her since."
+
+The man stared gloomily into his plate.
+
+"She was a queer little thing," he muttered.  "She was good, and
+she seemed to like being good."
+
+Elizabeth laughed, not quite pleasantly.
+
+"You speak as though the rest of us," she remarked, "were
+qualified to take orders in wickedness."
+
+He helped himself to more brandy.
+
+"Think back," he said.  "Think of those days in New York, the
+life we led, the wild things we did week after week, month after
+month, the same eternal round of turning night into day, of
+struggling everywhere to find new pleasures, pulling vice to
+pieces like children trying to find the inside of their
+playthings."
+
+"I don't like your mood in the least," she interrupted.
+
+He drummed for a moment upon the tablecloth with his fingers.
+
+"We were talking of Beatrice.  You don't even know where she is
+now, then?"
+
+"I have no idea," Elizabeth declared.
+
+"She was with you for long in Cornwall?" he asked.
+
+Elizabeth toyed with her wineglass for a minute.
+
+"She was there about a month," she admitted.
+
+"And she didn't approve of the way you and Wenham behaved?" he
+demanded.
+
+"Apparently not.  She left us, anyway.  She didn't understand
+Wenham in the least.  I shouldn't be surprised," Elizabeth went
+on, "to hear that she was a hospital nurse, or learning typing,
+or a clerk in an office.  She was a young woman of gloomy ideas,
+although she was my sister."
+
+He came a little closer towards her.
+
+"Elizabeth," he said, "we will not talk any more about Beatrice.
+We will not talk any more about anything except our two selves."
+
+"Are you really glad to see me again, Jerry?" she asked softly.
+
+"You must know it, dear," he whispered.  "You must know that I
+loved you always, that I adored you.  Oh, you knew it!  Don't
+tell me you didn't.  You knew it, Elizabeth!"
+
+She looked down at the tablecloth.
+
+"Yes, I knew it," she admitted, softly.
+
+"Can't you guess what it is to me to see you again like this?" he
+continued.
+
+She sighed.
+
+"It is something for me, too, to feel that I have a friend close
+at hand."
+
+"Come," he said, "they are turning out the lights here.  You want
+to know about Wenham's property.  Let me come upstairs with you
+for a little time and I will tell you as much as I can from
+memory."
+
+He paid the bill, helped her on with her cloak.  His fingers
+seemed like burning spots upon her flesh.  They went up in the
+lift.  In the corridors he drew her to him and she began to
+tremble.
+
+"What is there strange about you, Jerry?" she faltered, looking
+into his face.  "You terrify me!"
+
+"You are glad to see me?  Say you are glad to see me?"
+
+"Yes, I am glad," she whispered.
+
+Outside the door of her rooms, she hesitated.
+
+"Perhaps," she suggested, faintly,--"wouldn't it be better if you
+came to-morrow morning?"
+
+Once more his fingers touched her and again that extraordinary
+sense of fear seemed to turn her blood cold.
+
+"No," he replied, "I have been put off long enough!  You must let
+me in, you must talk with me for half an hour.  I will go then, I
+promise.  Half an hour!  Elizabeth, haven't I waited an eternity
+for it?"
+
+He took the keys from her fingers and opened the door, closing it
+again behind them.  She led the way into the sitting-room.  The
+whole place was in darkness but she turned on the electric light.
+The cloak slipped from her shoulders.  He took her hands and
+looked at her.
+
+"Jerry," she whispered, "you mustn't look at me like that.  You
+terrify me!  Let me go!"
+
+She wrenched herself free with an effort.  She stepped back to
+the corner of the room, as far as she could get from him.  Her
+heart was beating fiercely.  Somehow or other, neither of these
+two young men, over whose lives she had certainly brought to bear
+a very wonderful influence, had ever before stirred her pulses
+like this.  What was it, she wondered?  What was the meaning of
+it?  Why didn't he speak?  He did nothing but look, and there
+were unutterable things in his eyes.  Was he angry with her
+because she had married Wenham, or was he blaming her because
+Wenham had gone?  There was passion in his face, but such
+passion!  Desire, perhaps, but what else?  She caught up a
+telegram which lay upon her writing desk, and tore it open.  It
+was an escape for a moment.  She read the words, stared, and read
+them aloud incredulously.  It was from her father.
+
+"Jerry Gardner sailed for New York to-day."
+
+She looked up at the man, and as she looked her face grew gray
+and the thin sheet went quivering from her lifeless fingers to
+the floor.  Then he began to laugh, and she knew.
+
+"Wenham!" she shrieked.  "Wenham!"
+
+There was murder in his face, murder almost in his laugh.
+
+"Your loving husband!" he answered.
+
+She sprang for the door but even as she moved she heard the click
+of the bolt shot back.  He touched the electric switch and the
+room was suddenly in darkness.  She heard him coming towards her,
+she felt his hot breath upon her cheek.
+
+"My loving wife!" he whispered.  "At last!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+THE MADMAN TALKS
+
+
+Tavernake turned on the light.  Pritchard, with a quick leap
+forward, seized Wenham around the waist and dragged him away.
+Elizabeth had fainted; she lay upon the floor, her face the color
+of marble.
+
+"Get some water and throw over her," Pritchard ordered.
+
+Tavernake obeyed.  He threw open the window and let in a current
+of air.  In a moment or two the woman stirred and raised her
+head.
+
+"Look after her for a minute," Pritchard said.  "I Il lock this
+fierce little person up in the bathroom."
+
+Pritchard carried his prisoner out.  Tavernake leaned over the
+woman who was slowly coming back to consciousness.
+
+"Tell me about it," she asked, hoarsely.  "Where is he?"
+
+"Locked up in the bathroom," Tavernake answered.  "Pritchard is
+taking care of him.  He won't be able to get out."
+
+"You know who it was?" she faltered.
+
+"I do not," Tavernake replied.  "It isn't my business.  I'm only
+here because Pritchard begged me to come.  He thought he might
+want help."
+
+She held his fingers tightly.
+
+"Where were you?" she asked.
+
+"In the bathroom when you arrived.  Then he bolted the door
+behind and we had to come round through your bedroom."
+
+"How did Pritchard find out?"
+
+"I know nothing about it," Tavernake replied.  "I only know that
+he peered through the latticework and saw you sitting there at
+supper."
+
+She smiled weakly.
+
+"It must have been rather a shock to him," she said.  "He has
+been convinced for the last six months that I murdered Wenham, or
+got rid of him by some means or other.  Help me up."
+
+She staggered to her feet.  Tavernake assisted her to an easy
+chair.  Then Pritchard came in.
+
+"He is quite safe," he announced, "sitting on the edge of the
+bath playing with a doll."
+
+She shivered.
+
+"What is he doing with it?" she asked.
+
+"Showing me exactly, with a shawl pin, where he meant to have
+stabbed you," Pritchard answered, drily.  "Now, my dear lady," he
+continued, "it seems to me that I have done you one injustice, at
+any rate.  I certainly thought you'd helped to relieve the world
+of that young person.  Where did he come from?  Perhaps you can
+tell me that."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"I suppose I may as well," she said.  "Listen, you have seen what
+he was like to-night, but you don't know what it was to live with
+him.  It was Hell!"--she sobbed--"absolute Hell!  He drank, he
+took drugs, it was all his servant could do to force him even to
+make his toilet.  It was impossible.  It was crushing the life
+out of me."
+
+"Go on," Pritchard directed.
+
+"There isn't much more to tell," she continued.  "I found an old
+farmhouse--the loneliest spot in Cornwall.  We moved there and I
+left him--with Mathers.  I promised Mathers that he should have
+twenty pounds a week for every week he kept his master away from
+me.  He has kept him away for seven months."
+
+"What about that story of yours--about his having gone in
+swimming?" Pritchard asked.
+
+"I wanted people to believe that he was dead," she declared
+defiantly.  "I was afraid that if you or his relations found him,
+I should have to live with him or give up the money."
+
+Pritchard nodded.
+
+"And to-night you thought--"
+
+"I thought he was his brother Jerry," she went on.  "The likeness
+was always amazing, you know that.  I was told that Jerry was in
+town.  I felt nervous, somehow, and wired to Mathers.  I had his
+reply only last night.  He wired that Wenham was quite safe and
+contented, not even restless."
+
+"That telegram was sent by Wenham himself," Pritchard remarked.
+"I think you had better hear what he has to say."
+
+She shrank back.
+
+"No.  I couldn't bear the sight of him again!"
+
+"I think you had better," Pritchard insisted.  "I can assure you
+that he is quite harmless.  I will guarantee that."
+
+He left the room.  Soon he returned, his arm locked in the arm of
+Wenham Gardner.  The latter had the look of a spoilt child who is
+in disgrace.  He sat sullenly upon a chair and glared at every
+one.  Then he produced a small crumpled doll, with a thread of
+black cotton around its neck, and began swinging it in front of
+him, laughing at Elizabeth all the time.
+
+"Tell us," Pritchard asked, "what has become of Mathers?"
+
+He stopped swinging the doll, shivered for a moment, and then
+laughed.
+
+"I don't mind," he declared.  "I guess I don't mind telling.  You
+see, whatever I was when I did it, I am mad now--quite mad.  My
+friend Pritchard here says I am mad.  I must have been mad or I
+shouldn't have tried to hurt that dear beautiful lady over
+there."
+
+He leered at Elizabeth, who shrank back.
+
+"She ran away from me some time ago," he went on, "sick to death
+of me she was.  She thought she'd got all my money.  She hadn't.
+There's plenty more, plenty more.  She ran away and left me with
+Mathers.  She was paying him so much a week to keep me quiet, not
+to let me go anywhere where I should talk, to keep me away from
+her so that she could live up here and see all her friends and
+spend my money.  And at first I didn't mind, and then I did mind,
+and I got angry with Mathers, and Mathers wouldn't let me come
+away, and three nights ago I killed Mathers."
+
+There was a little thrill of horror.  He looked from one to the
+other.  By degrees their fear seemed to become communicated to
+him.
+
+"What do you mean by looking like that, all of you?" he
+exclaimed.  "What does it matter?  He was only my man-servant.  I
+am Wenham Gardner, millionaire.  No one will put me in prison for
+that.  Besides, he shouldn't have tried to keep me away from my
+wife.  Anyway, it don't matter.  I am quite mad.  Mad people can
+do what they like.  They have to stop in an asylum for six
+months, and then they're quite cured and they start again.  I
+don't mind being mad for six months.  Elizabeth," he whined,
+"come and be mad, too.  You haven't been kind to me.  There's
+plenty more money--plenty more.  Come back for a little time and
+I'll show you."
+
+"How did you kill Mathers?" Pritchard asked.
+
+"I stabbed him when he was stooping down," Wenham Gardner
+explained.  "You see, when I left college my father thought it
+would be good for me to do something.  I dare say it would have
+been but I didn't want to.  I studied surgery for six months.
+The only thing I remember was just where to kill a man behind the
+left shoulder.  I remembered that.  Mathers was a fat man, and he
+stooped so that his coat almost burst.  I just leaned over,
+picked out the exact spot, and he crumpled all up.  I expect," he
+went on, "you'll find him there still.  No one comes near the
+place for days and days.  Mathers used to leave me locked up and
+do all the shopping himself.  I expect he's lying there now.
+Some one ought to go and see."
+
+Elizabeth was sobbing quietly to herself.  Tavernake felt the
+perspiration break out upon his forehead.  There was something
+appalling in the way this young man talked.
+
+"I don't understand why you all look so serious," he continued.
+"No one is going to hurt me for this.  I am quite mad now.  You
+see, I am playing with this doll.  Sane men don't play with
+dolls.  I hope they'll try me in New York, though.  I am
+well-known in New York.  I know all the lawyers and the jurymen.
+Oh, they're up to all sorts of tricks in New York!  Say, you
+don't suppose they'll try me over here?" he broke off suddenly,
+turning to Pritchard.  "I shouldn't feel so much at home here."
+
+"Take him away," Eizabeth begged.  "Take him away."  Pritchard
+nodded.
+
+"I thought you'd better hear," he said.  "I am going to take him
+away now.  I shall send a telegram to the police-station at St.
+Catherine's.  They had better go up and see what's happened."
+
+Pritchard took his captive once more by the arm.  The young man
+struggled violently.
+
+"I don't like you, Pritchard," he shrieked.  "I don't want to go
+with you.  I want to stay with Elizabeth.  I am not really afraid
+of her.  She'd like to kill me, I know, but she's too clever
+--oh, she's too clever!  I'd like to stay with her."
+
+Pritchard led him away.
+
+"We'll see about it later on," he said.  "You'd better come with
+me just now."
+
+The door closed behind them.  Tavernake staggered up.
+
+"I must go," he declared.  "I must go, too."
+
+Elizabeth was sobbing quietly to herself.  She seemed scarcely to
+hear him.  On the threshold Tavernake turned back.
+
+"That money," he asked, "the money you were going to lend me--was
+that his?"
+
+She looked up and nodded.  Tavernake went slowly out.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+A CRISIS
+
+
+Pritchard was the first visitor who had ever found his way into
+Tavernake's lodgings.  It was barely eight o'clock on the same
+morning.  Tavernake, hollow-eyed and bewildered, sat up upon the
+sofa and gazed across the room.
+
+"Pritchard!" he exclaimed.  "Why, what do you want?"
+
+Pritchard laid his hat and gloves upon the table.  Already his
+first swift glance had taken in the details of the little
+apartment.  The overcoat and hat which Tavernake had worn the
+night before lay by his side.  The table was still arranged for
+some meal of the previous day.  Apart from these things, a single
+glance assured him that Tavernake had not been to bed.
+
+Pritchard drew up an easy-chair and seated himself deliberately.
+
+"My young friend," he announced, "I have come to the conclusion
+that you need some more advice."
+
+Tavernake rose to his feet.  His own reflection in the
+looking-glass startled him.  His hair was crumpled, his tie
+undone, the marks of his night of agony were all too apparent.
+He felt himself at a disadvantage.
+
+"How did you find me out?" he asked.  "I never gave you my
+address."
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"Even in this country, with a little help," he said, "those
+things are easy enough.  I made up my mind that this morning
+would be to some extent a crisis with you.  You know, Tavernake,
+I am not a man who says much, but you are the right sort.  You've
+been in with me twice when I should have missed you if you hadn't
+been there."
+
+Tavernake seemed to have lost the power of speech.  He had
+relapsed again into his place upon the sofa.  He simply waited.
+
+"How in the name of mischief," Pritchard continued, impressively,
+"you came to be mixed up in the lives of this amiable trio, I
+cannot imagine!  I am not saying a word against Miss Beatrice,
+mind.  All that surprises me is that you and she should ever have
+come together, or, having come together, that you should ever
+have exchanged a word.  You see, I am here to speak plain truths.
+You are, I take it, a good sample of the hard, stubborn,
+middle-class Briton.  These three people of whom I have spoken,
+belong--Miss Beatrice, perhaps, by force of circumstances--but
+still they do belong to the land of Bohemia.  However, when one
+has got over the surprise of finding you on intimate terms with
+Miss Beatrice, there comes a more amazing thing.  You, with hard
+common sense written everywhere in your face, have been prepared
+at any moment, for all I know are prepared now, to make an utter
+and complete idiot of yourself over Elizabeth Gardner."
+
+Still Tavernake did not speak.  Pritchard looked at him
+curiously.
+
+"Say," he went on, "I have come here to do you a service, if I
+can.  So far as I know at present, this very wonderful young lady
+has kept on the right side of the law.  But see here, Tavernake,
+she's been on the wrong side of everything that's decent and
+straight all her days.  She married that poor creature for his
+money, and set herself deliberately to drive him off his head.
+Last night's tragedy was her doing, not his, though he, poor
+devil, will have to end his days in an asylum, and the lady will
+have his money to make herself more beautiful than ever with.
+Now I am going to let you behind the scenes, my young friend."
+
+Then Tavernake rose to his feet.  In the shabby little room he
+seemed to have grown suddenly taller.  He struck the crazy table
+with his clenched fist so that the crockery upon it rattled.
+Pritchard was used to seeing men--strong men, too--moved by
+various passions, but in Tavernake's face he seemed to see new
+things.
+
+"Pritchard," Tavernake exclaimed, "I don't want to hear another
+word!"
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"Look here," he said, "what I am going to tell you is the truth.
+What I am going to tell you I'd as soon say in the presence of
+the lady as here."
+
+Tavernake took a step forward and Pritchard suddenly realized the
+man who had thrown himself through that little opening in the
+wall, one against three, without a thought of danger.
+
+"If you say a single word more against her," Tavernake shouted
+hoarsely, "I shall throw you out of the room!"
+
+Pritchard stared at him.  There was something amazing about this
+young man's attitude, something which he could not wholly grasp.
+He could see, too, that Tavernake's words were so few simply
+because he was trembling under the influence of an immense
+passion.
+
+"If you won't listen," Pritchard declared, slowly, "I can't talk.
+Still, you've got common sense, I take it.  You've the ordinary
+powers of judging between right and wrong, and knowing when a man
+or a woman's honest.  I want to save you--"
+
+"Silence!" Tavernake exclaimed.  "Look here, Pritchard," he went
+on, breathing a little more naturally now, "you came here meaning
+to do the right thing--I know that.  You're all right, only you
+don't understand.  You don't understand the sort of person I am.
+I am twenty-four years old, I have worked for my own living up
+here in London since I was twelve.  I was a man, so far as work
+and independence went, at fifteen.  Since then I have had my
+shoulder to the wheel; I have lived on nothing; I have made a
+little money where it didn't seem possible.  I have worried my
+way into posts which it seemed that no one could think of giving
+me, but all the time I have lived in a little corner of the world
+--like that."
+
+His finger suddenly described a circle in the air.
+
+"You don't understand--you can't," he went on, "but there it is.
+I never spoke to a woman until I spoke to Beatrice.  Chance made
+me her friend.  I began to understand the outside of some of
+those things which I had never even dreamed of before.  She set
+me right in many ways.  I began to read, think, absorb little
+bits of the real world.  It was all wonderful.  Then Elizabeth
+came.  I met her, too, by accident--she came to my office for a
+house--Elizabeth!"
+
+Pritchard found something almost pathetic in the sudden dropping
+of Tavernake's voice, the softening of his face.
+
+"I don't know how to talk about these things," Tavernake said,
+simply.  "There's a literature that's reached from before the
+Bible to now, full of nothing else.  It's all as old as the
+hills.  I suppose I am about the only sane man in this city who
+knew nothing of it; but I did know nothing of it, and she was the
+first woman.  Now you understand.  I can't hear a word against
+her--I won't!  She may be what you say.  If so, she's got to tell
+me so herself!"
+
+"You mean that you are going to believe any story she likes to
+put up?"
+
+"I mean that I am going to her," Tavernake answered, "and I have
+no idea in the world what will happen--whether I shall believe
+her or not.  I can see what you think of me," he went on,
+becoming a little more himself as the stress of unaccustomed
+speech passed him by.  "I will tell you something that will show
+you that I realize a good deal.  I know the difference between
+Beatrice and Elizabeth.  Less than a week ago, I asked Beatrice
+to marry me.  It was the only way I could think of, the only way
+I could kill the fever."
+
+"And Beatrice?" Pritchard asked, curiously.
+
+"She wouldn't," Tavernake replied.  "After all, why should she?
+I have my way to make yet.  I can't expect others to believe in
+me as I believe in myself.  She was kind but she wouldn't."
+
+Pritchard lit a cigar.
+
+"Look here, Tavernake," he said, "you are a young man, you've got
+your life before you and life's a biggish thing.  Empty out those
+romantic thoughts of yours, roll up your shirt sleeves and get at
+it.  You are not one of these weaklings that need a woman's
+whispers in their ears to spur them on.  You can work without
+that.  It's only a chapter in your life--the passing of these
+three people.  A few months ago, you knew nothing of them.  Let
+them go.  Get back to where you were."
+
+Then Tavernake for the first time laughed--a laugh that sounded
+even natural.
+
+"Have you ever found a man who could do that?" he asked.  "The
+candle gives a good light sometimes, but you'll never think it
+the finest illumination in the world when you've seen the sun.
+Never mind me, Pritchard.  I'm going to do my best still, but
+there's one thing that nothing will alter.  I am going to make
+that woman tell me her story, I am going to listen to the way she
+tells it to me.  You think that where women are concerned I am a
+fool.  I am, but there is one great boon which has been
+vouchsafed to fools--they can tell the true from the false.  Some
+sort of instinct, I suppose.  Elizabeth shall tell me her story
+and I shall know, when she tells it, whether she is what you say
+or what she has seemed to me."
+
+Pritchard held out his hand.
+
+"You're a queer sort, Tavernake," he declared.  "You take life
+plaguy seriously.  I only hope you 'll get all out of it you
+expect to.  So long!"
+
+Tavernake opened the window after his visitor had gone, and
+leaned out for some few minutes, letting the fresh air into the
+close, stifling room.  Then he went upstairs, bathed and changed
+his clothes, made some pretense at breakfast, went through his
+letters with methodical exactness.  At eleven o'clock he set out
+upon his pilgrimage.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+TAVERNAKE CHOOSES
+
+
+Tavernake was kept waiting in the hall of the Milan Court for at
+least half an hour before Elizabeth was prepared to see him.  He
+wandered aimlessly about watching the people come and go, looking
+out into the flower-hung courtyard, curiously unconscious of
+himself and of his errand, unable to concentrate his thoughts for
+a moment, yet filled all the time with the dull and uneasy
+sensation of one who moves in a dream.  Every now and then he
+heard scraps of conversation from the servants and passers-by,
+referring to the last night's incident.  He picked up a paper but
+threw it down after only a casual glance at the paragraph.  He
+saw enough to convince him that for the present, at any rate,
+Elizabeth seemed assured of a certain amount of sympathy.  The
+career of poor Wenham Gardner was set down in black and white,
+with little extenuation, little mercy.  His misdeeds in Paris,
+his career in New York, spoke for themselves.  He was quoted as a
+type, a decadent of the most debauched instincts, to whom crime
+was a relaxation and vice a habit.  Tavernake would read no more.
+He might have been all these things, and yet she had become his
+wife!
+
+At last came the message for which he was waiting.  As usual, her
+maid met him at the door of her suite and ushered him in.
+Elizabeth was dressed for the part very simply, with a suggestion
+even of mourning in her gray gown.  She welcomed him with a
+pathetic smile.
+
+"Once more, my dear friend," she said, "I have to thank you."
+
+Her fingers closed upon his and she smiled into his face.
+Tavernake found himself curiously unresponsive.  It was the same
+smile, and he knew very well that he himself had not changed, yet
+it seemed as though life itself were in a state of suspense for
+him.
+
+"You, too, are looking grave this morning, my friend," she
+continued.  "Oh, how horrible it has all been!  Within the last
+two hours I have had at least five reporters, a gentleman from
+Scotland Yard, another from the American Ambassador to see me.
+It is too terrible, of course," she went on.  "Wenham's people
+are doing all they can to make it worse.  They want to know why
+we were not together, why he was living in the country and I in
+town.  They are trying to show that he was under restraint there,
+as if such a thing were possible!  Mathers was his own servant--
+poor Mathers!
+
+She sighed and wiped her eyes.  Still Tavernake said nothing.
+She looked at him, a little surprised.
+
+"You are not very sympathetic," she observed.  "Please come and
+sit down by my side and I will show you something."
+
+He moved towards her but he did not sit down.  She stretched out
+her hand and picked something up from the table, holding it
+towards him.  Tavernake took it mechanically and held it in his
+fingers.  It was a cheque for twelve thousand pounds.
+
+"You see," she said, "I have not forgotten.  This is the day,
+isn't it?  If you like, you can stay and have lunch with me up
+here and we will drink to the success of our speculation."
+
+Tavernake held the cheque in his fingers; he made no motion to
+put it in his pocket.  She looked at him with a puzzled frown
+upon her face.
+
+"Do talk or say something, please!" she exclaimed.  "You look at
+me like some grim figure.  Say something.  Sit down and be
+natural."
+
+"May I ask you some questions?"
+
+"Of course you may," she replied.  "You may do anything sooner
+than stand there looking so grim and unbending.  What is it you
+want to know?"
+
+"Did you understand that Wenham Gardner was this sort of man when
+you married him?"
+
+She shrugged her shoulders slightly.
+
+"I suppose I did," she admitted.
+
+"You married him, then, only because he was rich?"
+
+She smiled.
+
+"What else do women marry for, my dear moralist?" she demanded.
+"It isn't my fault if it doesn't sound pretty.  One must have
+money!"
+
+Tavernake inclined his head gravely; he made no sign of dissent.
+
+"You two came over to England," he went on, "with Beatrice and
+your father.  Beatrice left you because she disapproved of
+certain things."
+
+Elizabeth nodded.
+
+"You may as well know the truth," she said.  "Beatrice has the
+most absurd ideas.  After a week with Wenham, I knew that he was
+not a person with whom any woman could possibly live.  His valet
+was really only his keeper; he was subject to such mad fits that
+he needed some one always with him.  I was obliged to leave him
+in Cornwall.  I can't tell you everything, but it was absolutely
+impossible for me to go on living with him."
+
+"Beatrice," Tavernake remarked, "thought otherwise."
+
+Elizabeth looked at him quickly from below her eyelids.  It was
+hard, however, to gather anything from his face.
+
+"Beatrice thought otherwise," Elizabeth admitted.  "She thought
+that I ought to nurse him, put up with him, give up all my
+friends, and try and keep him alive.  Why, it would have been
+absolute martyrdom, misery for me," she declared.  "How could I
+be expected to do such a thing?"
+
+Tavernake nodded gravely.
+
+"And the money?" he asked.
+
+"Well, perhaps there I was a trifle calculating," she confessed.
+"But you," she added, nodding at the cheque in his hand,
+"shouldn't grumble at that.  I knew when we were married that I
+should have trouble.  His people hated me, and I knew that in the
+event of anything happening like this thing which has happened,
+they would try to get as little as possible allowed me.  So
+before we left New York, I got Wenham to turn as much as ever he
+could into cash.  That we brought away with us."
+
+"And who took care of it?"
+
+Elizabeth smiled.
+
+"I did," she answered, "naturally."
+
+"Tell me about last night," Tavernake said.  "I suppose I am
+stupid but I don't quite understand."
+
+"How should you?" she answered.  "Listen, then.  Wenham, I
+suppose got tired of being shut up with Mathers, although I am
+sure I don't see what else was possible.  So he waited for his
+opportunity, and when the man wasn't looking--well, you know what
+happened," she added, with a shiver.  "He got up to London
+somehow and made his way to Dover Street."
+
+"Why Dover Street?"
+
+"I suppose you know," Elizabeth explained, "that Wenham has a
+brother--Jerry--who is exactly like him.  These two had rooms in
+Dover Street always, where they kept some English clothes and a
+servant.  Jerry Gardner was over in London.  I knew that, and was
+expecting to see him every day.  Wenham found his way to the
+rooms, dressed himself in his brother's clothes, even wore his
+ring and some of his jewelry, which he knew I should recognize,
+and came here.  I believed--yes, I believed all the time," she
+went on, her voice trembling, "that it was Jerry who was sitting
+with me.  Once or twice I had a sort of terrible shiver.  Then I
+remembered how much they were alike and it seemed to me
+ridiculous to be afraid.  It was not till we got upstairs, till
+the door was closed behind me, that he turned round and I knew!"
+
+Her head fell suddenly into her hands.  It was almost the first
+sign of emotion.  Tavernake analyzed it mercilessly.  He knew
+very well that it was fear, the coward's fear of that terrible
+moment.
+
+"And now?"
+
+"Now," she went on, more cheerfully, "no one will venture to deny
+that Wenham is mad.  He will be placed under restraint, of
+course, and the courts will make me an allowance.  One thing is
+absolutely certain, and that is that he will not live a year."
+
+Tavernake half closed his eyes.  Was there no sign of his
+suffering, no warning note of the things which were passing out
+of his life!  The woman who smiled upon him seemed to see
+nothing.  The twitching of his fingers, the slight quivering of
+his face, she thought was because of his fear for her.
+
+"And now," she declared, in a suddenly altered tone, "this is all
+over and done with.  Now you know everything.  There are no more
+mysteries," she added, smiling at him delightfully.  "It is all
+very terrible, of course, but I feel as though a great weight had
+passed away.  You and I are going to be friends, are we not?"
+
+She rose slowly to her feet and came towards him.  His eyes
+watched her slow, graceful movements as though fascinated.  He
+remembered on that first visit of his how wonderful he had
+thought her walk.  She was still smiling up at him; her fingers
+fell upon his shoulders.
+
+"You are such a strange person," she murmured.  "You aren't a
+little bit like any of the men I've ever known, any of the men I
+have ever cared to have as friends.  There is something about you
+altogether different.  I suppose that is why I rather like you.
+Are you glad?"
+
+For a single wild moment Tavernake hesitated.  She was so close
+to him that her hair touched his forehead, the breath from her
+upturned lips fell upon his cheeks.  Her blue eyes were half
+pleading, half inviting.
+
+"You are going to be my very dear friend, are you not--Leonard?"
+she whispered.  "I do feel that I need some one strong like you
+to help me through these days."
+
+Tavernake suddenly seized the hands that were upon his shoulders,
+and forced them back.  She felt herself gripped as though by a
+vice, and a sudden terror seized her.  He lifted her up and she
+caught a glimpse of his wild, set face.  Then the breath came
+through his teeth.  He shook all over but the fit had passed.  He
+simply thrust her away from him.
+
+"No," he said, "we cannot be friends!  You are a woman without a
+heart, you are a murderess!"
+
+He tore her cheque calmly in pieces and flung them scornfully
+away.  She stood looking at him, breathing quickly, white to the
+lips though the murder had gone from his eyes.
+
+"Beatrice warned me," he went on; "Pritchard warned me.  Some
+things I saw for myself, but I suppose I was mad.  Now I know!"
+
+He turned away.  Her eyes followed him wonderingly.
+
+"Leonard," she cried out, "you are not going like this?  You
+don't mean it!"
+
+Ever afterwards his restraint amazed him.  He did not reply.  He
+closed both doors firmly behind him and walked to the lift.  She
+came even to the outside door and called down the corridor.
+
+"Leonard, come back for one moment!"
+
+He turned his head and looked at her, looked at her from the
+corner of the corridor, steadfastly and without speech.  Her
+fingers dropped from the handle of the door.  She went back into
+her room with shaking knees, and began to cry softly.  Afterwards
+she wondered at herself.  It was the first time she had cried for
+many years.
+
+
+Tavernake walked to the city and in less than half an hour's time
+found himself in Mr. Martin's office.  The lawyer welcomed him
+warmly.
+
+"I'm jolly glad to see you, Tavernake," he declared.  "I hope
+you've got the money.  Sit down."
+
+Tavernake did not sit down; he had forgotten, indeed, to take of
+his hat.
+
+"Martin," he said, "I am sorry for you.  I have been fooled and
+you have to pay as well as I have.  I can't take up the option on
+the property.  I haven't a penny toward it except my own money,
+and you know how much that is.  You can sell my plots, if you
+like, and call the money your costs.  I've finished."
+
+The lawyer looked at him with wide-open mouth.
+
+"What on earth are you talking about, Tavernake?" he exclaimed.
+"Are you drunk, by any chance?"
+
+"No, I am quite sober," Tavernake answered.  "I have made one or
+two bad mistakes, that's all.  You have a power of attorney for
+me.  You can do what you like with my land, make any terms you
+please.  Good-day!"
+
+"But, Tavernake, look here!" the lawyer protested, springing to
+his feet.  "I say, Tavernake!" he called out.
+
+But Tavernake heard nothing, or, if he heard, he took no notice.
+He walked out into the street and was lost among the hurrying
+throngs upon the pavements.
+
+
+
+
+BOOK TWO
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+NEW HORIZONS
+
+
+Towards the sky-line, across the level country, stumbling and
+crawling over the deep-hewn dikes, wading sometimes through the
+mud-oozing swamp, Tavernake, who had left the small railway
+terminus on foot, made his way that night steadily seawards, as
+one pursued by some relentless and indefatigable enemy.  Twilight
+had fallen like a mantle around him, fallen over that great flat
+region of fens and pastureland and bog.  Little patches of mist,
+harbingers of the coming obscurity, were being drawn now into the
+gradual darkness.  Lights twinkled out from the far-scattered
+homesteads.  Here and there a dog barked, some lonely bird
+seeking shelter called to its mate, but of human beings there
+seemed to be no one in sight save the solitary traveler.
+
+Tavernake was in grievous straits.  His clothes were caked with
+mud, his hair tossed with the wind, his cheeks pale, his eyes set
+with the despair of that fierce upheaval through which he had
+passed.  For many hours the torture which had driven him back
+towards his birthplace had triumphed over his physical
+exhaustion.  Now came the time, however, when the latter asserted
+itself.  With a half-stifled moan he collapsed.  Sheer fatigue
+induced a brief but merciful spell of uneasy slumber.  He lay
+upon his back near one of the broader dikes, his arms
+outstretched, his unseeing eyes turned toward the sky.  The
+darkness deepened and passed away again before the light of the
+moon.  When at last he sat up, it was a new world upon which he
+looked, a strange land, moonlit in places, yet full of shadowy
+somberness.  He gazed wonderingly around--for the moment he had
+forgotten.  Then memory came, and with memory once more the stab
+at his heart.  He rose to his feet and went resolutely on his
+way.
+
+Almost until the dawn he walked, keeping as near as he could to
+that long monotonous line of telegraph posts, yet avoiding the
+road as much as possible.  With the rising of the sun, he crept
+into a wayside hovel and lay there hidden for hours.  Hunger and
+thirst seemed like things which had passed him by.  It was sleep
+only which he craved, sleep and forgetfulness.
+
+Dusk was falling again before he found himself upon his feet,
+starting out once more upon this strangely thought-of pilgrimage.
+This time he kept to the road, plodding along with tired,
+dejected footsteps, which had in them still something of that
+restless haste which drove him ceaselessly onward as though he
+were indeed possessed of some unquiet spirit.  He was recovering
+now, however, a little of his natural common sense.  He
+remembered that he must have food and drink, and he sought them
+from the wayside public-house like an ordinary traveler,
+conquering without any apparent effort that first invincible
+repugnance of his toward the face of any human being.  Then on
+again across this strange land of windmills and spreading plains,
+until the darkness forced him to take shelter once more.  That
+night he slept like a child.  With the morning, the fever had
+passed from his blood.  A great wind blew in his face even as he
+opened his eyes, touched to wakefulness by the morning sun, a
+wind that came booming over the level places, salt with the touch
+of the ocean and fragrant with the perfume of many marsh plants.
+He was coming toward the sea now, and within a very short
+distance from where he had spent the night, he found a broad,
+shining river stealing into the land.  With eager fingers he
+stripped himself and plunged in, diving again and again below the
+surface, swimming with long, lazy strokes backwards and forwards.
+Afterwards he lay down in the warm, dry grass, dressed himself
+slowly, and went on his way.  The wind, which had increased now
+since the early morning, came thundering across the level land,
+bending the tops of the few scattered trees, sending the sails of
+the windmills spinning, bringing on its bosom now stronger than
+ever the flavor of the sea itself, salt and stimulating.
+Tavernake told himself that this was a new world into which he
+was coming.  He would pass into its embrace and life would become
+a new thing.
+
+Towards evening with many a thrill of reminiscence, he descended
+a steep hill and walked into a queer time-forgotten village,
+whose scattered red-tiled cottages were built around an arm of
+the sea.  Boldly enough now he entered the one inn which flaunted
+its sign upon the cobbled street, and, taking a seat in the
+stone-floored kitchen, ate and drank and bespoke a bed.  Later
+on, he strolled down to the quay and made friends with the few
+fishermen who were loitering there.  They answered his questions
+readily, although he found it hard at first to pick up again the
+dialect of which he himself had once made use.  The little place
+was scarcely changed.  All progress, indeed, seemed to have
+passed it by.  There were a handful of fishermen, a boat-builder
+and a fish-curer in the village.  There was no other industry
+save a couple of small farmhouses on the outskirts of the place,
+no railway within twelve miles.  Tourists came seldom,
+excursionists never.  In the half contented, half animal-like
+expression which seemed common to all the inhabitants, Tavernake
+read easily enough the history of their uneventful days.  It was
+such a shelter as this, indeed, for which he had been searching.
+
+On the second night after his arrival, he walked with the
+boatbuilder upon the wooden quay.  The boatbuilder's name was
+Nicholls, and he was a man of some means, deacon of the chapel,
+with a fair connection as a jobbing carpenter, and possessor of
+the only horse and cart in the place.
+
+"Nicholls," Tavernake said, "you don't remember me, do you?"
+
+The boat-builder shook his head slowly and ponderously.
+
+"There was Richard Tavernake who farmed the low fields," he
+remarked, reminiscently.  "Maybe you're a son of his.  Now I come
+to think of it, he had a boy apprenticed to the carpentering."
+
+"I was the boy," Tavernake answered.  "I soon had enough of it
+and went to London."
+
+"You'm grown out of all knowledge," Nicholls declared, "but I
+mind you now.  So you've been in London all these years?"
+
+"I've been in London," Tavernake admitted, "and I think, of the
+two, that Sprey-by-the-Sea is the better place."
+
+"Sprey is well enough," the boat-builder confessed, "well enough
+for a man who isn't set on change."
+
+"Change," Tavernake asserted, grimly, "is an overrated joy.  I
+have had too much of it in my life.  I think that I should like
+to stay here for some time."
+
+The boat-builder was surprised, but he was a man of heavy and
+deliberate turn of mind and he did not commit himself to speech.
+Tavernake continued.
+
+"I used to know something of carpentering in my younger days," he
+said, "and I don't think that I have forgotten it all.  I wonder
+if I could find anything to do down here?"
+
+Matthew Nicholls stroked his beard thoughtfully.
+
+"The folk round about are not over partial to strangers," he
+observed, "and you'm been away so long I reckon there's not many
+as'd recollect you.  And as for carpentering jobs, there's Tom
+Lake over at Lesser Blakeney and his brother down at Brancaster,
+besides me on the spot, as you might say.  It's a poor sort of
+opening there'd be, if you ask my opinion, especially for one
+like yourself, as 'as got education."
+
+"I should be satisfied with very little," Tavernake persisted.
+"I want to work with my hands.  I should like to forget for a
+time that I have had any education at all."
+
+"That do seem mightily queer to me," Nicholls remarked,
+thoughtfully.
+
+Tavernake smiled.
+
+"Come," he said, "it isn't altogether unnatural.  I want to make
+something with my hands.  I think that I could build boats.  Why
+do you not take me into your yard?  I could do no harm and I
+should not want much pay."
+
+Matthew Nicholls stroked his beard once more and this time he
+counted fifty, as was his custom when confronted with a difficult
+matter.  He had no need to do anything of the sort, for nothing
+in the world would have induced him to make up his mind on the
+spot as to so weighty a proposal.
+
+"It's not likely that you're serious," he objected.  "You are a
+young man and strong-limbed, I should imagine, but you've
+education--one can tell it by the way you pronounce your words.
+It's but a poor living, after all, to be made here."
+
+"I like the place," Tavernake declared doggedly.  "I am a man of
+small needs.  I want to work all through the day, work till I am
+tired enough to sleep at night, work till my bones ache and my
+arms are sore.  I suppose you could give me enough to live on in
+a humble way?"
+
+"Take a bite of supper with me," Nicholls answered.  "In these
+serious affairs, my daughter has always her say.  We will put the
+matter before her and see what she thinks of it."
+
+They lingered about the quay until the light from Wells
+Lighthouse flashed across the sea, and until in the distance they
+could hear the moaning of the incoming tide as it rippled over
+the bar and began to fill the tidal way which stretched to the
+wooden pier itself.  Then the two men made their way along the
+village street, through a field, and into the little yard over
+which stood the sign of "Matthew Nicholls, Boat-Builder."  At one
+corner of the yard was the cottage in which he lived.
+
+"You'll come right in, Mr. Tavernake," he said, the instincts of
+hospitality stirring within him as soon as they had passed
+through the gate.  "We will talk of this matter together, you and
+me and the daughter."
+
+Tavernake seemed, on his introduction to the household, like a
+man unused to feminine society.  Perhaps he did not expect to
+find such a type of her sex as Ruth Nicholls in such a remote
+neighborhood.  She was thin, and her cheeks were paler than those
+of any of the other young women whom he had seen about the
+village.  Her eyes, too, were darker, and her speech different.
+There was nothing about her which reminded him in the least of
+the child with whom he had played.  Tavernake watched her
+intently.  Presently the idea came to him that she, too, was
+seeking shelter.
+
+Supper was a simple meal, but it was well and deftly served.  The
+girl had the gift of moving noiselessly.  She was quick without
+giving the impression of haste.  To their guest she was
+courteous, but her recollection of him appeared to be slight, and
+his coming but a matter of slight interest.  After she had
+cleared the cloth, however, and produced a jar of tobacco, her
+father bade her sit down with them.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," he began, ponderously, "is thinking some of
+settling down in these parts, Ruth."
+
+She inclined her head gravely.
+
+"It appears," her father continued, "that he is sick and tired of
+the city and of head-work.  He is wishful to come into the yard
+with me, if so be that we could find enough work for two."
+
+The girl looked at their visitor, and for the first time there
+was a measure of curiosity in her earnest gaze.  Tavernake was,
+in his way, good enough to look upon.  He was well-built, his
+shoulders and physique all spoke of strength.  His features were
+firmly cut, although his general expression was gloomy.  But for
+a certain moroseness, an uncouthness which he seemed to
+cultivate, he might even have been deemed good-looking.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake would make a great mistake," she said,
+hesitatingly.  "It is not well for those who have brains to work
+with their hands.  It is not a place for those to live who have
+been out in the world.  At most seasons of the year it is but a
+wilderness.  Sometimes there is little enough to do, even for
+father."
+
+"I am not ambitious for over-much work or for over-much money,
+Miss Nicholls," Tavernake replied.  "I will be frank with you
+both.  Things out in the world there went ill with me; it was not
+my fault, but they went ill with me.  What ambitions I had are
+finished--for the present, at any rate.  I want to rest, I want
+to work with my hands, to grow my muscles again, to feel my
+strength, to believe that there is something effective in the
+world I can do.  I have had a shock, a disappointment,--call it
+what you like."
+
+The old man Nicholls nodded deliberately.
+
+"Well," he pronounced, "it's a big change to make.  I never
+thought of help in the yard before.  When there's been more than
+I could do, I've just let it go.  Come for a week on trial,
+Leonard Tavernake.  If we are of any use to one another, we shall
+soon know of it."
+
+The girl, who had been looking out into the night, came back.
+
+"You are making a mistake, Mr. Tavernake," she said.  "You are
+too young and strong to have finished your battle."
+
+He looked at her steadily and sighed.  It was only too obvious
+that hers had been fought and lost.
+
+"Perhaps," he replied softly, "you are right.  Perhaps it is only
+the rest I want.  We shall see."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE SIMPLE LIFE
+
+
+So Tavernake became a boat-builder.  Summer passed into winter
+and this hamlet by the sea seemed, indeed, as though it might
+have been one of the forgotten spots upon the earth.  Save for
+that handful of cottages, the two farmhouses a few hundred yards
+inland, and the deserted Hall half-hidden in its grove of pine
+trees, there was no dwelling-place nor any sign of human
+habitation for many miles.  For eight hours a day Tavernake
+worked, mostly out of doors, in the little yard which hung over
+the beach.  Sometimes he rested from his labors and looked
+seaward, looked around him as though rejoicing in that unbroken
+solitude, the emptiness of the gray ocean, the loneliness of the
+land behind.  What things there were which lay back in the cells
+of his memory, no person there knew, for he spoke of his past to
+no one, not even to Ruth.  He was a good workman, and he lived
+the simple life of those others without complaint or weariness.
+There was nothing in his manner to denote that he had been used
+to anything else.  The village had accepted him without question.
+It was only Ruth who still, gravely but kindly enough,
+disapproved of his presence.
+
+One day she came and sat with him as he smoked his after-dinner
+pipe, leaning against an overturned boat, with his eyes fixed
+upon that line of gray breakers.
+
+"You spend a good deal of your time thinking, Mr. Tavernake," she
+remarked quietly.
+
+"Too much," he admitted at once, "too much, Miss Nicholls.  I
+should be better employed planing down that mast there."
+
+"You know that I did not mean that," she said, reprovingly, "only
+sometimes you make me--shall I confess it?--almost angry with
+you."
+
+He took his pipe from his mouth and knocked out the ashes.  As
+they fell on the ground so he looked at them.
+
+"All thought is wasted time," he declared, grimly, "all thought
+of the past.  The past is like those ashes; it is dead and
+finished."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"Not always," she replied.  "Sometimes the past comes to life
+again.  Sometimes the bravest of us quit the fight too soon."
+
+He looked at her questioningly, almost fiercely.  Her words,
+however, seemed spoken without intent.
+
+"So far as mine is concerned," he pronounced, "it is finished.
+There is a memorial stone laid upon it, and no resurrection is
+possible."
+
+"You cannot tell," she answered.  "No one can tell."
+
+He turned back to his work almost rudely, but she stayed by his
+side.
+
+"Once," she remarked, reflectively, "I, too, went a little way
+into the world.  I was a school-teacher at Norwich.  I was very
+fond of some one there; we were engaged.  Then my mother died and
+I had to come back to look after father."
+
+He nodded.
+
+"Well"
+
+"We are a long way from Norwich," she continued, quietly.  "Soon
+after I left, the man whom I was fond of grew lonely.  He found
+some one else."
+
+"You have forgotten him?" Tavernake asked, quickly.
+
+"I shall never forget him," she replied.  "That part of life is
+finished, but if ever my father can spare me, I shall go back to
+my work again.  Sometimes those work the best and accomplish the
+most who carry the scars of a great wound."
+
+She turned away to the house, and after that it seemed to him
+that she avoided him for a time.  At any rate, she made no
+further attempt to win his confidence.  Propinquity, however, was
+too much for both of them.  He was a lodger under her father's
+roof.  It was scarcely possible for them to keep apart.
+Saturdays and Sundays they walked sometimes for miles across the
+frost-bound marshes, in the quickening atmosphere of the
+darkening afternoons, when the red sun sank early behind the
+hills, and the twilight grew shorter every day.  They watched the
+sea-birds together and saw the wild duck come down to the pools;
+felt the glow of exercise burn their cheeks; felt, too, that
+common and nameless exultation engendered by their loneliness in
+the solitude of these beautiful empty places.  In the evenings
+they often read together, for Nicholls, although no drinker,
+never missed his hour or so at the village inn.  Tavernake, in
+time, began to find a sort of comfort in her calm, sexless
+companionship.  He knew very well that he was to her as she was
+to him, something human, something that filled an empty place,
+yet something without direct personality.  Little by little he
+felt the bitterness in his heart grow less.  Then a late spring
+--late, at any rate, in this quaint corner of the world--stole
+like some wonderful enchantment across the face of the moors and
+the marshes.  Yellow gorse starred with golden clumps the brown
+hillside; wild lavender gleamed in patches across the
+silver-streaked marshes; the dead hedges came blossoming into
+life.  Crocuses, long lines of yellow and purple crocuses, broke
+from waxy buds into starlike blossoms along the front of Matthew
+Nicholls's garden.  And with the coming o spring, Tavernake found
+himself suddenly able to thin of the past.  It was a new phase of
+life.  He could sit down and think of those things that had
+happened to him, without fearing to be wrecked by the storm.
+Often he sat out looking seaward, thinking of the days when he
+had first met Beatrice, of those early days of pleasant
+companionship, of the marvelous avidity with which he had learned
+from her.  Only when Elizabeth's face stole into the foreground
+did he spring from his place and turn back to his work.
+
+One day Tavernake sat poring over the weekly local paper, reading
+it more out of curiosity than from any real interest.  Suddenly a
+familiar name caught his eye.  His heart seemed to stop beating
+for a moment, and th page swam before his eyes.  Quickly he
+recovered hill self and read:
+
+      THE QUEEN'S HALL, UNTHANK ROAD,
+                  NORWICH
+
+                TWICE DAILY.
+             PROFESSOR FRANKLIN
+          assisted by his daughter,
+           MISS BEATRICE FRANKLIN,
+     will give his REFINED and MARVELOUS
+     ENTERTAINMENT, comprising HYPNOTISM, feats
+     Of SECOND SIGHT never before attempted on
+     any stage, THOUGHT-READING, and a BRIEF
+     LECTURE upon the connection between ANCIENT
+     SUPERSTITIONS and the EXTRAORDINARY
+     DEVELOPMENTS OF THE NEW SCIENCE.
+
+     PROFESSOR FRANKLIN Can be CONSULTED PRIVATELY,
+     by letter or by appointment.  Address for this
+     week--The Golden Cow, Bell's Lane, Norwich.
+
+Twice Tavernake read the announcement.  Then he went out and
+found Ruth.
+
+"Ruth," he told her, "there is something calling me back, perhaps
+for good."
+
+For the first time she gave him her hand.
+
+"Now you are talking like a man once more," she declared.  "Go
+and seek it.  Comeback and say good-bye to us, if you will, but
+throw your tools into the sea."
+
+Tavernake laughed and looked across at his workshop.
+
+"I don't believe," he said, "that you've any confidence in my
+boat."
+
+"I'm not sure that I would sail with you," she answered, "even if
+you ever finished it.  A laborer's work for a laborer's hand.
+You must go back to the other things."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+OLD FRIENDS MEET
+
+
+The professor set down his tumbler upon the zinc-rimmed counter.
+He was very little changed except that he had grown a shade
+stouter, and there was perhaps more color in his cheeks.  He
+carried himself, too, like a man who believes in himself.  In the
+small public-house he was, without doubt, an impressive figure.
+
+"My friends," he remarked, "our host's whiskey is good.  At the
+same time, I must not forget--"
+
+"You'll have one with me, Professor," a youth at his elbow
+interrupted.  "Two special whiskies, miss, if you please."
+
+The professor shrugged his shoulders--it was a gesture which he
+wished every one to understand.  He was suffering now the penalty
+for a popularity which would not be denied!
+
+"You are very kind, sir," he said, "very kind, indeed.  As I was
+about to say, I must not forget that in less than half an hour I
+am due upon the stage.  It does not do to disappoint one's
+audience, sir.  It is a poor place, this music-hall, but it is
+full, they tell me packed from floor to ceiling.  At eight-thirty
+I must show myself."
+
+"A marvelous turn, too, Professor," declared one of the young men
+by whom he was surrounded.
+
+"I thank you, sir," the professor replied, turning towards the
+speaker, glass in hand.  "There have been others who have paid me
+a similar compliment; others, I may say, not unconnected with the
+aristocracy of your country--not unconnected either, I might
+add," he went on, "with the very highest in the land, those who
+from their exalted position have never failed to shower favors
+upon the more fortunate sons of our profession.  The science of
+which I am to some extent the pioneer--not a drop more, my young
+friend.  Say, I'm in dead earnest this time!  No more, indeed."
+
+The young man in knickerbockers who had just come in banged the
+head of his cane upon the counter.
+
+"You'll never refuse me, Professor," he asserted, confidently.
+"I'm an old supporter, I am.  I've seen you in Blackburn and
+Manchester, and twice here.  Just as wonderful as ever!  And that
+young lady of yours, Professor, begging your pardon if she is
+your daughter, as no doubt she is, why, she's a nut and no
+mistake."
+
+The professor sighed.  He was in his element but he was getting
+uneasy at the flight of time.
+
+"My young friend," he said, "your face is not familiar to me but
+I cannot refuse your kindly offer.  It must be the last, however,
+absolutely the last."
+
+Then Tavernake, directed here from the music-hall, pushed open
+the swing door and entered.  The professor set down his glass
+untasted.  Tavernake came slowly across the room.
+
+"You haven't forgotten me, then, Professor?" he remarked, holding
+out his hand.
+
+The professor welcomed him a little limply; something of the
+bombast had gone out of his manner.  Tavernake's arrival had
+reminded him of things which he had only too easily forgotten.
+
+"This is very surprising," he faltered, "very surprising indeed.
+Do you live in these parts?"
+
+"Not far away," Tavernake answered.  "I saw your announcement in
+the papers."
+
+The professor nodded.
+
+"Yes," he said, "I am on the war-path again.  I tried resting but
+I got fat and lazy, and the people wouldn't have it, sir," he
+continued, recovering very quickly something of his former
+manner.  "The number of offers I got through my agents by every
+post was simply astounding--astounding!"
+
+"I am looking forward to seeing your performance this evening,"
+Tavernake said politely.  "In the meantime--"
+
+"I know what you are thinking of," the professor interrupted.
+"Well, well, give me your arm and we will walk down to the hall
+together.  My friends," the professor added, turning round, "I
+wish you all a good-night!"
+
+Then the door was pushed half-way open and Tavernake's heart gave
+a jump.  It was Beatrice who stood there, very pale, very tired,
+and much thinner even than the Beatrice of the boardinghouse, but
+still Beatrice.
+
+"Father," she exclaimed, "do you know that it is nearly--"
+
+Then she saw Tavernake and said no more.  She seemed to sway a
+little, and Tavernake, taking a quick step forward, grasped her
+by the hands.
+
+"Dear sister," he cried, "you have been ill!"
+
+She was herself again almost in a moment.
+
+"Ill?  Never in my life," she replied.  "Only I have been
+hurrying--we are late already for the performance--and seeing you
+there, well, it was quite a shock, you know.  Walk down with us
+and tell me all about it.
+
+Tell us what you are doing here--or rather, don't talk for a
+moment!  It is all so amazing."
+
+They turned down the narrow cobbled street, the professor walking
+in the middle of the roadway, swinging his cane, a very imposing
+and wonderful figure, with the tails of his frock-coat streaming
+in the wind, his long hair only half-hidden by his hat.  He
+hummed a tune to himself and affected not to take any notice of
+the other two.  Then Tavernake suddenly realized that he had done
+a cowardly action in leaving her without a word.
+
+"There is so much to ask," she began at last, "but you have come
+back."
+
+She looked at his workman's clothes.
+
+"What have you been doing?" she asked, sharply.
+
+"Working," Tavernake answered, "good work, too.  I am the better
+for it.  Don't mind my clothes, Beatrice.  I have been mad for a
+time, but after all it has been a healthy madness."
+
+"It was a strange thing that you did," she said,--"you
+disappeared."
+
+He nodded.
+
+"Some day," he told her, "I may, perhaps, be able to make you
+understand.  Just now I don't think that I could."
+
+"It was Elizabeth?" she whispered, softly.
+
+"It was Elizabeth," he admitted.
+
+They said no more then till they reached the hall.  She stopped
+at the door and put out her hand timidly.
+
+"I shall see you afterwards?" she ventured.
+
+"Do you mind my coming to the performance?" he asked.
+
+She hesitated.
+
+"A few moments ago," she remarked, smiling, "I was dreading your
+coming.  Now I think that you had better.  It will be all over at
+ten o'clock, and I shall look for you outside.  You are living in
+Norwich?"
+
+"I shall be here for to-night, at any rate," he answered.
+
+"Very well, then," she said, "afterwards we will have a talk."
+
+Tavernake passed through the scattered knot of loiterers at the
+door and bought a seat for himself in the little music-hall,
+which, notwithstanding the professor's boast, was none too well
+filled.  It was a place of the old-fashioned sort, with small
+tables in the front, and waiters hurrying about serving drinks.
+The people were of the lowest order, and the atmosphere of the
+room was thick with tobacco smoke.  A young woman in a flaxen wig
+and boy's clothes was singing a popular ditty, marching up and
+down the stage, and interspersing the words o f her song with
+grimaces and appropriate action.  Tavernake sat down with a
+barely-smothered groan.  He was beginning to realize the tragedy
+upon which he had stumbled.  A comic singer followed, who in a
+dress suit several sizes too large for him gave an imitation of a
+popular Irish comedian.  Then the curtain went up and the
+professor was seen, standing in front of the curtain and bowing
+solemnly to a somewhat unresponsive audience.  A minute later
+Beatrice came quietly in and sat by his side.  There was nothing
+new about the show.  Tavernake had seen the same thing before,
+with the exception that the professor was perhaps a little behind
+the majority of his fellow-craftsmen.  The performance was
+finished in dead silence, and after it was over, Beatrice came to
+the front and sang.  She was a very unusual figure in such a
+place, in a plain black evening gown, with black gloves and no
+jewelry, but they encored her heartily, and she sang a song from
+the musical comedy in which Tavernake had first seen her.  A
+sudden wave of reminiscence stirred within him.  His thoughts
+seemed to go back to the night when he had waited for her outside
+the theatre and they had had supper at Imano's, to the day when
+he had left the boarding-house and entered upon his new life.  It
+was more like a dream than ever now.
+
+He rose and quitted the place immediately she had finished,
+waiting in the street until she appeared.  She came out in a few
+minutes.
+
+"Father is going to a supper," she announced, "at the inn where
+he has a room for receiving people.  Will you come home with me
+for an hour?  Then we can go round and fetch him."
+
+"I should like to," Tavernake answered.
+
+Her lodgings were only a few steps away--a strange little house
+in a narrow street.  She opened the front door and ushered him
+in.
+
+"You understand, of course," she said, smiling, "that we have
+abandoned the haunts of luxury altogether."
+
+He looked around at the tiny room with its struggling fire and
+horsehair sofa, linoleum for carpet, oleographs for pictures, and
+he shivered, not for his own sake but for hers.  On the sideboard
+were some bread and cheese and a bottle of ginger beer.
+
+"Please imagine," she begged, taking the pins from her hat, "that
+you are in those dear comfortable rooms of ours down at Chelsea.
+Draw that easy-chair up to what there is of the fire, and listen.
+You smoke still?"
+
+"I have taken to a pipe," he admitted.
+
+"Then light it and listen," she went on, smoothing her hair for a
+minute in front of the looking-glass.  "You want to know about
+Elizabeth, of course."
+
+"Yes," he said, "I want to know."
+
+"Elizabeth, on the whole," Beatrice continued, "got out of all
+her troubles very well.  Her husband's people were wild with her,
+but Elizabeth was very clever.  They were never able to prove
+that she had exercised more than proper control over poor Wenham.
+He died two months after they took him to the asylum.  They
+offered Elizabeth a lump sum to waive all claims to his estate,
+and she accepted it.  I think that she is now somewhere on the
+Continent."
+
+"And you?" he asked.  "Why did you leave the theatre?"
+
+"It was a matter of looking after my father," she explained.
+"You see, while he was there with Elizabeth he had too much money
+and nothing to do.  The consequence was that he was always
+--well, I suppose I had better say it--drinking too much, and he
+was losing all his desire for work.  I made him promise that if I
+could get some engagements he would come away with me, so I went
+to an agent and we have been touring like this for quite a long
+time."
+
+"But what a life for you!" Tavernake exclaimed.  "Couldn't you
+have stayed on at the theatre and found him something in London?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"In London," she said, "he would never have got out of his old
+habits.  And then," she went on, hesitatingly, "you understand
+that the public want something else besides the hypnotism--"
+
+Tavernake interrupted her ruthlessly.
+
+"Of course I understand," he declared, "I was there to-night.  I
+understood at once why you were not very anxious for me to go.
+The people cared nothing at all about your father's performance.
+They simply waited for you.  You would get the same money if you
+went round without him."
+
+She nodded, a trifle shamefacedly.
+
+"I am so afraid some one will tell him," she confessed.  "They
+nearly always ask me to leave out his part of the performance.
+They have even offered me more money if I would come alone.  But
+you see how it is.  He believes in himself, he thinks he is very
+clever and he believes that the public like his show.  It is the
+only thing which helps him to keep a little self-respect.  He
+thinks that my singing is almost unnecessary."
+
+Tavernake looked into that faint glimmer of miserable fire.  He
+was conscious of a curious feeling in his throat.  How little he
+knew of life!  The pathos of what she had told him, the thought
+of her bravely traveling the country and singing at third-rate
+music-halls, never taking any credit to herself, simply that her
+father might still believe himself a man of talent, appealed to
+him irresistibly.  He suddenly held out his hand.
+
+"Poor little Beatrice!" he exclaimed.  "Dear little sister!"
+
+The hand he gripped was cold, she avoided his eyes.
+
+"You--you mustn't," she murmured.  "Please don't!"
+
+He held out his other hand and half rose, but her lips suddenly
+ceased to quiver and she waved him back.
+
+"No, Leonard," she begged, "please don't do or say anything
+foolish.  Since we do meet again, though, like this, I am going
+to ask you one question.  What made you come to me and ask me to
+marry you that day?"
+
+He looked away; something in her eyes accused him.
+
+"Beatrice," he confessed, "I was a thick-headed ignorant fool,
+without understanding.  I came to you for safety.  I was afraid
+of Elizabeth, I was afraid of what I felt for her.  I wanted to
+escape from it."
+
+She smiled piteously.
+
+"It wasn't a very brave thing to do, was it?" she faltered.
+
+"It was mean," he admitted.  "It was worse than that.  But,
+Beatrice," he went on, "I was missing you horribly.  You did
+leave a big empty place when you went away.  I am not going to
+excuse myself about Elizabeth.  I lived through a time of the
+strangest, most marvelous emotions one could dream of.  Then the
+thing came to an end and I felt as though the bottom had gone out
+of life.  I suppose--I loved her," he continued hesitatingly.  "I
+don't know.  I only know that she filled every thought of my
+brain, that she lived in every beat of my heart, that I would
+have gone down into Hell to help her.  And then I understood.
+That morning she told me something of the truth about herself,
+not meaning to--unconsciously - justifying herself all the time,
+not realizing that every word she said was damnable.  And then
+there didn't seem to be anything else left, and I had only one
+desire.  I turned my back upon everything and I went back to the
+place where I was born, a little fishing village.  For the last
+thirty miles I walked.  I shall never forget it.  When I got
+there, what I wanted was work, work with my hands.  I wanted to
+build something, to create anything that I could labor upon.  I
+became a boat builder--I have been a boatbuilder ever since."
+
+"And now?" she asked.
+
+"Beatrice!"
+
+She turned and faced him.  She looked into his eyes very
+searchingly, very wistfully.
+
+"Beatrice," he said, "I ask you once more, only differently.
+Will you marry me now?  I'll find some work, I'll make enough
+money for us.  Do you remember," he went on, "how I used to talk,
+how I used to feel that I had only to put forth my strength and I
+could win anything?  I'll feel like that again, Beatrice, if
+you'll come to me."
+
+She shook her head slowly.  She looked away from him with a sigh.
+She had the air of one who has sought for something which she has
+failed to find.
+
+"You mustn't think of that again, Leonard," she told him.  "It
+would be quite impossible.  This is the only way I can save my
+father.  We have a tour that will take us the best part of
+another year."
+
+"But you are sacrificing yourself!" he declared.  "I will keep
+your father."
+
+"It isn't that only," she replied.  "For one thing, I couldn't
+let you; and for another, it isn't only the money, it's the work.
+As long as he's made to think that the public expect him every
+night, he keeps off drinking too much.  There is nothing else in
+the whole world which would keep him steady.  Don't look as
+though you didn't understand, Leonard.  He is my father, you
+know, and there isn't anything more terrible than to see any one
+who has a claim on us give way to anything like that.  You mayn't
+quite approve, but please believe that I am doing what I feel to
+be right."
+
+The little fire had gone out.  Beatrice glanced at the clock and
+put on her jacket again.
+
+"I am sorry, Leonard," she said, "but I think I must go and fetch
+father now.  You can walk with me there, if you will.  It has
+been very good to see you again.  For the rest I don't know what
+to say to you.  Do you think that it is quite what you were meant
+for--to build boats?"
+
+"I don't seem to have any other ambition," he answered, wearily.
+"When I read in the paper this morning that you and your father
+were here, things seemed suddenly different.  I came at once.  I
+didn't know what I wanted until I saw you, but I know now, and it
+isn't any good."
+
+"No good at all," she declared cheerfully.  "It won't be very
+long, Leonard, before something else comes along to stir you.  I
+don't think you were meant to build boats all your life."
+
+He rose and took up his hat.  She was waiting for him at the
+door.  Again they passed down the narrow street.
+
+"Tell, me, Beatrice," he begged, "is it because you don't like me
+well enough that you won't listen to what I ask?"
+
+For a moment she half closed her eyes as though in pain.  Then
+she laughed, not perhaps very naturally.  They were standing now
+by the door of the public house.
+
+"Leonard," she said, "you are very young in years but you are a
+baby in experience.  Mind, there are other reasons why I could
+not--would not dream of marrying you, other reasons which are
+absolutely sufficient, but--do you know that you have asked me
+twice and you have never once said that you cared, that you have
+never once looked as though you cared?  No, don't, please," she
+interrupted, "don't explain anything.  You see, a woman always
+knows--too well, sometimes."
+
+She nodded, and passed in through the swinging-doors.  Standing
+out there in the narrow, crooked street, Tavernake heard the
+clapping and applause which greeted her entrance, he heard her
+father's voice.  Some one struck a note at the piano--she was
+going to sing.  Very slowly he turned away and walked down the
+cobbled hill.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+PRITCHARD'S GOOD NEWS
+
+
+Late in the afternoon of the following day, Ruth came home from
+the village and found Tavernake hard at work on his boat.  She
+put down her basket and stopped by his side.
+
+"So you are back again," she remarked.
+
+"Yes, I am back again."
+
+"And nothing has happened?"
+
+"Nothing has happened," he assented, wearily.  "Nothing ever will
+happen now."
+
+She smiled.
+
+"You mean that you will stay here and build boats all your life?"
+
+"That is what I mean to do," he announced.
+
+She laid her hand upon his shoulder.
+
+"Don't believe it, Leonard," she said.  "There is other work for
+you in the world somewhere, just as there is for me."
+
+He shook his head and she picked up her basket again, smiling.
+
+"Your time will come as it comes to the rest of us," she
+declared, cheerfully.  "You won't want to sit here and bury your
+talents in the sands all your days.  Have you heard what is going
+to happen to me?"
+
+"No!  Something good, I hope."
+
+"My father's favorite niece is coming to live with us--there are
+seven of them altogether, and farming doesn't pay like it used
+to, so Margaret is coming here.  Father says that if she is as
+handy as she used to be I may go back to the schools almost at
+once."
+
+Tavernake was silent for a moment.  Then he got up and threw down
+his tools.
+
+"Great Heavens!" he exclaimed.  "If I am not becoming the most
+selfish brute that ever breathed!  Do you know, the first thought
+I had was that I should miss you?  You are right, young woman, I
+must get out of this."
+
+She disappeared into the house, smiling, and Tavernake called out
+to Nicholls, who was sitting on the wall.
+
+"Mr. Nicholls," he asked, "how much notice do you want?"
+
+Matthew Nicholls removed his pipe from his mouth.
+
+"Why, I don't know that I'm particular," he replied, "being as
+you want to go.  Between you and me, I'm gettin' fat and lazy
+since you came.  There ain't enough work for two, and that's all
+there is to it, and being as you're young and active, why, I've
+left it to you, and look at my arms."
+
+He held them up.
+
+"Used to be all muscle, now they're nothin' but bloomin' pap.
+And no' but two glasses of beer a day extra have I drunk, just to
+pass the time.  You can stay if you will, young man, but you can
+go out fishin' and leave me the work, and I'll pay you just the
+same, for I'm not saying that I don't like your company.  Or you
+can go when you please, and that's the end of it."
+
+Matthew Nicholls spat upon the stones and replaced his pipe in
+his mouth.  Tavernake came in and sat down by his side.
+
+"Look here," he said, "I believe you are right.  I'll stay
+another week but I'll take things easy.  You get on with the boat
+now.  I'll sit here and have a smoke."
+
+Nicholls grunted but obeyed, and for the next few days Tavernake
+loafed.  On his return one afternoon from a long walk, he saw a
+familiar figure sitting upon the sea wall in front of the
+workshop, a familiar figure but a strange one in these parts.  It
+was Mr. Pritchard, in an American felt hat, and smoking a very
+black cigar.  He leaned over and nodded to Tavernake, who was
+staring at him aghast.
+
+"Hallo, old man!" he called out.  "Run you to earth, you see!"
+
+"Yes, I see!" Tavernake exclaimed.
+
+"Come right along up here and let's talk," Pritchard continued.
+
+Tavernake obeyed.  Pritchard looked him over approvingly.
+Tavernake was roughly dressed in those days, but as a man he had
+certainly developed.
+
+"Say, you're looking fine," his visitor remarked.  "What wouldn't
+I give for that color and those shoulders!"
+
+"It is a healthy life," Tavernake admitted.  "Do you mean that
+you've come down here to see me?"
+
+"That's so," Pritchard announced; "down here to see you, and for
+no other reason.  Not but that the scenery isn't all it should
+be, and that sort of thing," he went on, "but I am not putting up
+any bluff about it.  It's you I am here to talk to.  Are you
+ready?  Shall I go straight ahead?"
+
+"If you please," Tavernake said, slowly filling his pipe.
+
+"You dropped out of things pretty sudden," Pritchard continued.
+"It didn't take me much guessing to reckon up why.  Between you
+and me, you are not the first man who's been up against it on
+account of that young woman.  Don't stop me," he begged.  "I know
+how you've been feeling.  It was a right good idea of yours to
+come here.  Others before you have tried the shady side of New
+York and Paris, and it's the wrong treatment.  It's Hell, that's
+what it is, for them.  Now that young woman--we got to speak of
+her--is about the most beautiful and the most fascinating of her
+sex--I'll grant that to start with--but she isn't worth the life
+of a snail, much less the life of a strong man."
+
+"You are, quite right," Tavernake confessed, shortly.  "I know I
+was a fool--a fool!  If I could think of any adjective that would
+meet the case, I'd use it, but there it is.  I chucked things and
+I came here.  You haven't come down to tell me your opinion of
+me, I suppose?"
+
+"Not by any manner of means," Pritchard admitted.  "I came down
+first to tell you that you were a fool, if it was necessary.
+Since you know it, it isn't.  We'll pass on to the next stage,
+and that is, what are you going to do about it?"
+
+"It is in my mind at the present moment," Tavernake announced,
+"to leave here.  The only trouble is, I am not very keen about
+London."
+
+Pritchard nodded thoughtfully.
+
+"That's all right," he agreed.  "London's no place for a man,
+anyway.  You don't want to learn the usual tricks of
+money-making.  Money that's made in the cities is mostly made
+with stained fingers.  I have a different sort of proposal to
+make."
+
+"Go ahead," Tavernake said.  "What is it?"
+
+"A new country," Pritchard declared, altering the angle of his
+cigar, "a virgin land, mountains and valleys, great rivers to be
+crossed, all sorts of cold and heat to be borne with, a land rich
+with minerals--some say gold, but never mind that.  There is oil
+in parts, there's tin, there's coal, and there's thousands and
+thousands of miles of forest.  You're a surveyor?"
+
+"Passed all my exams," Tavernake agreed tersely.
+
+"You are the man for out yonder," Pritchard insisted.  "I've two
+years' vacation--dead sick of this city life I am--and I am going
+to put you on the track of it.  You don't know much about
+prospecting yet, I reckon?"
+
+"Nothing at all!"
+
+"You soon shall," Pritchard went on.  "We'll start from Winnipeg.
+A few horses, some guides, and a couple of tents.  We'll spend
+twenty weeks, my friend, without seeing a town.  What do you
+think of that?"
+
+"Gorgeous!" Tavernake muttered.
+
+"Twenty weeks we'll strike westward.  I know the way to set about
+the whole job.  I know one or two of the capitalists, too, and if
+we don't map out some of the grandest estates in British
+Columbia, why, my name ain't Pritchard."
+
+"But I haven't a penny in the world," Tavernake objected.
+
+"That's where you're lying," Pritchard remarked, pulling a
+newspaper from his pocket.  "See the advertisement for yourself:
+'Leonard Tavernake, something to his advantage.'  Well, down I
+went to those lawyers--your old lawyer it was--Martin.  I told
+him I was on your track, and he said--'For Heaven's sake, send
+the fellow along!'  Say, Tavernake, he made me laugh the way he
+described your bursting in upon him and telling him to take your
+land for his costs, and walking out of the room like something
+almighty.  Why, he worked that thing so that they had to buy your
+land, and they took him into partnership.  He's made a pot of
+money, and needs no costs from you, and there's the money for
+your land and what he had of yours besides, waiting for you."
+
+Tavernake smoked stolidly at his pipe.  His eyes were out
+seaward, but his heart was beating to a new and splendid music.
+To start life again, a man's life, out in the solitudes, out in
+the great open spaces!  It was gorgeous, this!  He turned round
+and grasped Pritchard by the shoulder.
+
+"I say," he exclaimed, "why are you doing all this for me,
+Pritchard?"
+
+Pritchard laughed.
+
+"You did me a good turn," he said, "and you're a man.  You've the
+pluck--that's what I like.  You knew nothing, you were as green
+and ignorant as a young man from behind the counter of a country
+shop, but, my God! you'd got the right stuff, and I meant getting
+even with you if I could.  You'll leave here with me to-morrow,
+and in three weeks we sail."
+
+Ruth came smiling out from the house.
+
+"Won't you bring your friend in to supper, Mr. Tavernake?" she
+begged.  "It's good news, I hope?" she added, lowering her voice
+a little.
+
+"It's the best," Tavernake declared, "the best!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+BEATRICE REFUSES
+
+
+A week later Tavernake was in London.  A visit to his friend Mr.
+Martin had easily proved the truth of Pritchard's words, and he
+found himself in possession of a sum of money at least twice as
+great as he had anticipated.  He stayed at a cheap hotel in the
+Strand and made purchases under Pritchard's supervision.  For the
+first few days he was too busy for reflection.  Then Pritchard
+let him alone while he ran over to Paris, and Tavernake suddenly
+realized that he was in the city to which he had thought never to
+return.  He passed the back of the theatre where he had waited
+for Beatrice, he looked up at the entrance of the Milan Court; he
+lunched alone, and with a curious mixture of feelings, at the
+little restaurant where he had supped with Beatrice.  It was
+over, that part of his life, over and finished.  Yet, with his
+natural truthfulness, he never attempted to disguise from himself
+the pain at his heart.  Three times in one day he found himself,
+under some pretext or another, in Imano's Restaurant.  Once, in
+the middle of the street, he burst into a fit of laughter.  It
+was while Pritchard was in London, and he asked him a question.
+
+"Pritchard," he remarked, "you area man of experience.  Did any
+one ever care for two women at the same time?"
+
+Pritchard removed his cigar from his teeth and stared at his
+companion.
+
+"Why, my young friend," he replied, "I've found no trouble myself
+in being fond of a dozen."
+
+Tavernake smiled and said no more.  Pritchard was one of the good
+fellows of the world, but there were things which were hidden
+from him.  Yet Tavernake, who had fallen into a habit, during his
+solitude, of analyzing his sensations, was puzzled by this one
+circumstance, that when he thought of Elizabeth, though his heart
+never failed to beat more quickly, the sense of shame generally
+stole over him; and when he thought of Beatrice, a curious
+loneliness, a loneliness that brought with it a pain, seemed
+suddenly to make the hours drag and his pleasures flavorless.
+For two days he was puzzled.  Then his habit of taking long walks
+helped him toward a solution.  In a small outlying music-hall in
+the east-end of London, he saw the same announcement that he had
+noticed in the Norfolk newspaper,--"Professor Franklin" in large
+type, and "Miss Beatrice Franklin" in small.
+
+That night he attended the music-hall.  The scene was practically
+a repetition of the one in Norwich, only with additions.  The
+professor's bombastic performance met with scarcely any applause.
+Its termination was, indeed, interrupted by catcalls and whistles
+from the gallery.  Beatrice's songs, on the other hand, were
+applauded more vociferously than ever.  She had hard work to
+avoid a third encore.
+
+At the end of the performance, Tavernake made his way to the
+stage-door and waited.  The neighborhood was an unsavory one, and
+the building itself seemed crowded in among a row of shops of the
+worst order, fish stalls, and a glaring gin palace.  Long before
+Beatrice came out, Tavernake could hear the professor's voice
+down the covered passage, the professor's voice apparently raised
+in anger.
+
+"Undutiful behavior, that's what I call it--undutiful!"
+
+They emerged into the street, the professor very much the same as
+usual; Beatrice paler, with a pathetic droop about her mouth.
+Tavernake came eagerly forward.
+
+"Beatrice!" he cried, holding out his hand.
+
+The professor drew back.  Beatrice stood still,--for a moment it
+seemed as though she were about to faint.  Tavernake grasped her
+hands.
+
+"I am so sorry!" he exclaimed, clumsily.  "I ought not to have
+come up like that."
+
+She smiled a little wan smile.
+
+"I am quite all right," she replied, "only the heat inside was
+rather trying, and even out here the atmosphere isn't too good,
+is it?  How did you find us out?"
+
+"By chance again," Tavernake answered.  "I have news.  May I walk
+with you a few steps?"
+
+She glanced timidly toward her father.  The professor was holding
+aloof in dignified silence.
+
+"Perhaps," Tavernake said quickly, "you would take supper with
+me?  I am going abroad, and I should like to say good-bye
+properly.  A bottle of champagne and some supper.  What do you
+say, Professor?"
+
+The professor suffered his features to relax.
+
+"A very admirable idea," he declared.  "Where shall we go?"
+
+"Is it too late to get to Imano's?" Tavernake suggested.
+
+The professor hesitated.
+
+"A taxicab," he remarked, "would do it, if--"
+
+He paused, and Tavernake smiled.
+
+"A taxicab it shall be," he decided.  "I am in funds just for the
+moment.  Come along, both of you, and I'll tell you all about
+it."
+
+He made her take his arm, although her fingers did no more than
+touch his coat sleeve.
+
+"Pritchard came and dug me out," he continued.  "I am going
+abroad with him.  It's sort of prospecting in some new country at
+the back of British Columbia.  We see what we can find and then
+go to a financier's and start companies, mining companies and oil
+fields--anything.  I am off in a week."
+
+Beatrice half closed her eyes.  They had hailed a passing cab and
+she sank back among the cushions with a sigh of relief.
+
+"Dear Leonard," she murmured, "I am so glad, so very happy for
+your sake.  This is the sort of thing which I hoped would
+happen."
+
+"And now tell me about yourselves," he went on.
+
+There was a sudden silence.  Tavernake was conscious that
+Beatrice's clothes were distinctly shabbier, that the professor's
+hat was shiny.  The professor cleared his throat.
+
+"I do not wish," he said, "to intrude our private matters upon
+one who, although I will not call him a stranger, is assuredly
+not one of our old friends.  At the same time, I admit that a
+little trouble has arisen between Beatrice and myself, and we
+were discussing it at the moment you arrived.  I shall appeal to
+you now.  As an unprejudiced member of the audience to-night, Mr.
+Tavernake, you will give me your honest opinion?"
+
+"Certainly," Tavernake promised, with a sinking premonition of
+what was to come.
+
+"What I complain of," the professor began, speaking with
+elaborate and impressive slowness, "is that my performance is
+hurried over and that too long a time is taken up by Beatrice's
+songs.  The management remark upon the applause which her efforts
+occasionally ensure, but, as I would point out to you, sir," he
+continued, "a performance such as mine makes too deep an
+impression for the audience to show their appreciation of it by
+such vulgar methods as hand-clapping and whistling.  You follow
+me, I trust, Mr. Tavernake?"
+
+Why, yes, of course," Tavernake admitted.
+
+"I take a sincere and earnest interest in my work," the professor
+declared, "and I feel that when it has to be scamped that my
+daughter may sing a music-hall ditty, the result is, to say the
+least of it, undignified.  For some reason or other, I have been
+unable to induce the management to see entirely with me, but my
+point is that Beatrice should sing one song only, and that the
+additional ten minutes should be occupied by me in either a
+further exposition of my extraordinary powers as a hypnotist, or
+in a little address to the audience upon the hidden sciences.
+Now I appeal to you, Mr. Tavernake, as a young man of common
+sense.  What is your opinion?"
+
+Tavernake, much too honest to be capable in a general way of
+duplicity, was on the point of giving it, but he caught
+Beatrice's imploring gaze.  Her lips were moving.  He hesitated.
+
+"Of course," he began, slowly, "you have to try and put yourself
+into the position of the major part of the audience, who are
+exceedingly uneducated people.  It is very hard to give an
+opinion, Professor.  I must say that your entertainment this
+evening was listened to with rapt interest."
+
+The professor turned solemnly towards his daughter.
+
+"You hear that, Beatrice?" he said severely.  "You hear what Mr.
+Tavernake says?  'With rapt interest!'"
+
+"At the same time," Tavernake went on, "without a doubt Miss
+Beatrice's songs were also extremely popular.  It is rather a
+pity that the management could not give you a little more time."
+
+"Failing that, sir," the professor declared, "my point is, as I
+explained before, that Beatrice should give up one of her songs.
+What you have said this evening more than ever confirms me in my
+view."
+
+Beatrice smiled thankfully at Tavernake.
+
+"Well," she suggested, "at any rate we will leave it for the
+present.  Sometimes I think, though, father, that you frighten
+them with some of your work, and you must remember that they come
+to be amused."
+
+"That," the professor admitted, "is the most sensible remark you
+have made, Beatrice.  There is indeed something terrifying in
+some of my manifestations, terrifying even to myself, who
+understand so thoroughly my subject.  However, as you say, we
+will dismiss the matter for the present.  The thought of this
+supper party is a pleasant one.  Do you remember, Mr. Tavernake,
+the night when you and I met in the balcony at Imano's?"
+
+"Perfectly well," Tavernake answered.
+
+"Now I shall test your memory," the professor continued, with a
+knowing smile.  "Can you remember, sir, the brand of champagne
+which I was then drinking, and which I declared, if you
+recollect, was the one which best agreed with me, the one brand
+worth drinking?"
+
+"I am afraid I don't remember that," Tavernake confessed.
+"Restaurant life is a thing I know so little of, and I have only
+drunk champagne once or twice in my life."
+
+"Dear, dear me!" the professor exclaimed.  "You do astonish me,
+sir.  Well, that brand was Veuve Clicquot, and you may take my
+word for it, Mr. Tavernake, and you may find this knowledge
+useful to you when you have made a fortune in America and have
+become a man of pleasure; there is no wine equal to it.  Veuve
+Clicquot, sir, if possible of the year 1899, though the year 1900
+is quite drinkable."
+
+"Veuve Clicquot," Tavernake repeated.  "I'll remember it for this
+evening."
+
+The professor beamed.
+
+"My dear," he said to Beatrice, "Mr. Tavernake will think that I
+had a purpose in testing his memory."
+
+Beatrice smiled.
+
+"And hadn't you, father?" she asked.
+
+They all laughed together.
+
+"Well, it is pleasant," the professor admitted, "to have one's
+weaknesses ministered to, especially when one is getting on in
+life," he added, with a ponderous sigh.  "Never mind, we will
+think only of pleasant subjects this evening.  It will be quite
+interesting, Mr. Tavernake, to hear you order the supper."
+
+"I sha'n't attempt it," Tavernake answered.  "I shall pass it on
+to you."
+
+"This reminds me," the professor declared, "of the old days.  I
+feel sure that this is going to be a thoroughly enjoyable
+evening.  We shall think of it often, Mr. Tavernake, when you lie
+sleeping under the stars.  Why, what a wonderful thing these
+taxicabs are!  You see, we have arrived."
+
+They secured a small table in a corner at Imano's, and Tavernake
+found himself curiously moved as he watched Beatrice take off her
+worn and much mended gloves and look around uneasily at the other
+guests.  Her clothes were indeed shabby, and there were hollows
+now in her cheeks.
+
+Again he felt that pain, a pain for which he could not account.
+Suddenly America seemed so far away, the loneliness of the great
+continent became an actual and appreciable thing.  The professor
+was very much occupied ordering the supper.  Tavernake leaned
+across the table.
+
+"Do you remember our first supper here, Beatrice?" he asked.
+
+She nodded, with an attempt at brightness which was a little
+pitiful.
+
+"Yes," she replied, "I remember it quite well.  And now, please,
+Leonard, don't talk to me again until I have had a glass of wine.
+I am tired and worn out, that is all."
+
+Even Tavernake knew that she was struggling against the tears
+which already dimmed her eyes.  He filled her glass himself.  The
+professor set his own down empty with the satisfied smile of a
+connoisseur.
+
+"I think," he said, "that you will agree with me about this
+vintage.  Beatrice, this is what will bring color into your
+cheeks.  My little girl," he continued, turning to Tavernake,
+"will soon need a holiday.  I am hoping presently to be able to
+arrange a short tour by myself, and if so, I shall send her to
+the seaside.  Now I want you particularly to try the fish salad
+--the second dish there.  Beatrice, let me help you."
+
+Presently the orchestra began to play.  The warmth of the room,
+the wine and the food--Tavernake had a horrible idea once that
+she had eaten nothing that day--brought back some of the color to
+Beatrice's cheeks and a little of the light to her eyes.  She
+began to talk something in the old fashion.  She avoided,
+however, any mention of that other supper they had had together.
+As time went on, the professor, who had drunk the best part of
+two bottles of wine and was talking now to a friend, became
+almost negligible.  Tavernake leaned across the table.
+
+"Beatrice," he whispered, "you are not looking well.  I am afraid
+that life is getting harder with you."
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"I am doing what I must," she answered.  "Please don't sympathize
+with me.  I am hysterical, I think, tonight.  It will pass off."
+
+"But, Beatrice," he ventured, timidly, "could one do nothing for
+you?  I don't like these performances, and between you and me, we
+know they won't stand your father's show much longer.  It will
+certainly come to an end soon.  Why don't you try and get back
+your place at the theatre?  You could still earn enough to keep
+him."
+
+"Already I have tried," she replied, sorrowfully.  "My place is
+filled up.  You see," she added, with a forced laugh, "I have
+lost some of my looks, Leonard.  I am thinner, too.  Of course, I
+shall be all right presently, but it's rather against me at these
+west-end places."
+
+Again he felt that pain at his heart.  He was sure now that he
+was beginning to understand!
+
+"Beatrice," he whispered, "give it up--marry me I will take care
+of him."
+
+The flush of color faded from her cheeks.  She shivered a little
+and looked at him piteously.
+
+"Leonard," she pleaded, "you mustn't.  I really am not very
+strong just now.  We have finished with all that--it distresses
+me."
+
+"But I mean it," he begged.  "Somehow, I have felt all sorts of
+things since we came in here.  I think of that night, and I
+believe--I do believe that what came to me before was madness.
+It was not the same."
+
+She was trembling now.
+
+"Leonard," she implored, "if you care for me at all, be quiet.
+Father will turn round directly and I can't bear it.  I shall be
+your very faithful friend; I shall think of you through the long
+days before we meet again, but don't--don't spoil this last
+evening."
+
+The professor turned round, his face mottled, his eyes moist, a
+great good-humor apparent in his tone.
+
+"Well, I must say," he declared, "that this has been a most
+delightful evening.  I feel immensely better, and you, too, I
+hope, Beatrice?"
+
+She nodded, smiling.
+
+"I trust that when Mr. Tavernake returns," the professor
+continued, "he will give us the opportunity of entertaining him
+in much the same manner.  It will give me very much pleasure,
+also Beatrice.  And if, sir," he proceeded, "during your stay in
+New York you will mention my name at the Goat's Club, or the
+Mosquito Club, you will, I think, find yourself received with a
+hospitality which will surprise you."
+
+Tavernake thanked him and paid the bill.  They walked slowly down
+the room, and Tavernake was curiously reluctant to release the
+little hand which clasped his.
+
+"I have kept this to the last," Beatrice said, in a low tone.
+"Elizabeth is in London."
+
+He was curiously unmoved.
+
+"Yes?" he murmured.
+
+"I should like you--I think it would be well for you to go and
+see her," she went on.  "You know, Leonard, you were such a
+strange person in those days.  You may imagine things.  You may
+not realize where you are.  I think that you ought to go and see
+her now, now that you have lived through some suffering, now that
+you understand things better.  Will you?"
+
+"Yes, I will go," Tavernake promised.
+
+Beatrice glanced round towards where her father was standing.
+
+"I don't want him to know," she whispered.  "I don't want either
+him or myself to be tempted to take any of her money.  She is
+living at Claridge's Hotel.  Go there and see her before you
+leave for your new life."
+
+He stood at the door and watched them go down the Strand, the
+professor, flamboyant, walking erect with flying coat-tails, and
+his big cigar held firmly between his teeth; Beatrice, a wan
+figure in her black clothes, clinging to his arm.  Tavernake
+watched them until they disappeared, conscious of a curious
+excitement, a strange pain, a sense of revelation.  When at last
+they were out of sight and he turned back for his coat and hat,
+his feet were suddenly leaden.  The band was playing the last
+selection--it was the air which Beatrice had sung only that night
+at the east-end music-hall.  With a sudden overpowering impulse
+he turned and strode down the Strand in the direction where they
+had vanished.  It was too late.  There was no sign of them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+UNDERSTANDING COMES TOO LATE
+
+
+Tavernake's first impression of Elizabeth was that he had never,
+even in his wildest thoughts, done her justice.  He had never
+imagined her so wonderfully, so alluringly beautiful.  She had
+received him, after a very long delay, in her sitting-room at
+Claridge's Hotel--a large apartment furnished more like a
+drawing-room.  She was standing, when he entered, almost in the
+center of the room, dressed in a long lace cloak and a hat with a
+drooping black feather.  She looked at him, as the door opened,
+as though for a moment half puzzled.  Then she laughed softly and
+held out her hands.
+
+"Why, of course I remember you!" she exclaimed.  "And to think
+that when I had your card I couldn't imagine where I had heard
+the name before!  You are my dear estate agent's clerk, who
+wouldn't take my money, and who was so wretchedly rude to me
+twelve months ago."
+
+Tavernake was quite cool.  He found himself wondering whether
+this was a pose, or whether she had indeed forgotten.  He decided
+that it was a pose.
+
+"I was also," he reminded her, "one night in your rooms at the
+Milan Court when your husband--"
+
+She stopped him with an imperative gesture.
+
+"Spare me, please," she begged.  "Those were such terrible days
+--so dull, too!  I remember that you were quite one of the
+brightest spots.  You were absolutely different from every one I
+had ever met before, and you interested me immensely."
+
+She looked at him and slowly shook her head.
+
+"You look very nice," she said.  "Your clothes fit you and you
+are most becomingly tanned, but you don't look half so awkward
+and so adorable."
+
+"I am sorry," he replied, shortly.
+
+"And you came to see me!" she went on.  "That was really nice of
+you.  You were quite fond of me, once, you know.  Tell me, has it
+lasted?"
+
+"That is exactly what I came to find out," he answered
+deliberately.  "So far, I am inclined to think that it has not
+lasted."
+
+She made a little wry face and drew his arm through hers.
+
+"Come and sit down and tell me why," she insisted.  "Be honest,
+now.  Is it because you think I am looking older?"
+
+"I have thought of you for many hours a day for months,"
+Tavernake said, slowly, "and I never imagined you so beautiful as
+you seem now."
+
+She clapped her hands.
+
+"And yon mean it, too!" she exclaimed.  "There is just the same
+delightfully convincing note in your tone.  I am sure that you
+mean it.  Please go on adoring me, Mr. Tavernake.  I have no one
+who interests me at all just now.  There is an Italian Count who
+wants to marry me, but he is terribly poor; and a young
+Australian, who follows me everywhere, but I am not sure about
+him.  There is an English boy, too, who is going to commit
+suicide if I don't say 'yes' to him this week.  On the whole, I
+think I am rather sorry that people know I am a widow.  Tell me,
+Mr. Tavernake, are you going to adore me, too?"
+
+"I don't think so," Tavernake answered.  "I rather believe that I
+am cured."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders and laughed musically.
+
+"But you say that you still think I am beautiful," she went on,
+"and I am sure my clothes are perfect--they came straight from
+Paris.  I hope you appreciate this lace," she added, drawing it
+through her fingers.  "My figure is just as good, too, isn't it?"
+
+She stood up and turned slowly round.  Then she sat down
+suddenly, taking his hand in hers.
+
+"Please don't say that you think I have grown less attractive,"
+she begged.
+
+"As regards your personal attractions," Tavernake replied, "I
+imagine that they are at least as great as ever.  If you want the
+truth, I think that the reason I do not adore you any longer is
+because I saw your sister last night."
+
+"Saw Beatrice!" she exclaimed.  "Where?"
+
+"She was singing at a miserable east-end music-hall so that her
+father might find some sort of employment," Tavernake said.  "The
+people only forbore to hiss her father's turn for her sake.  She
+goes about the country with him.  Heaven knows what they earn,
+but it must be little enough!  Beatrice is shabby and thin and
+pale.  She is devoting the best years of her life to what she
+imagines to be her duty."
+
+"And how does this affect me?" Elizabeth asked, coldly.
+
+"Only in this way," Tavernake answered.  "You asked me how it was
+that I could find you as beautiful as ever and adore you no
+longer.  The reason is because I know you to be wretchedly
+selfish.  I believed in you before.  Everything that you did
+seemed right.  That was because I was a fool, because you had
+filled my brain with impossible fancies, because I saw you and
+everything that you did through a distorted mirror."
+
+"Have you come here to be rude?" she asked him.
+
+"Not in the least," he replied.  "I came here to see whether I
+was cured."
+
+She began to laugh, very softly at first, but soon she threw
+herself back among the cushions and laid her hand caressingly
+upon his shoulder.
+
+"Oh, you are just the same!" she cried.  "Just the same dear,
+truthful bundle of honesty and awkwardness and ignorance.  So you
+are going to be victim of Beatrice's bow and spear, after all."
+
+"I have asked your sister to marry me," Tavernake admitted.  "She
+will not."
+
+"She was very wise," Elizabeth declared, wiping the tears from
+her eyes.  "As an experience you are delightful.  As a husband
+you would be terribly impossible.  Are you going to stay and take
+me out to dinner this evening?  I'm sure you have a dress suit
+now."
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+"I am sorry," he said.  "I have already an engagement."
+
+She looked at him curiously.  Was it really true that he had
+become indifferent?  She was not used to men who escaped.
+
+"Tell me," she asked, abruptly, "why did you come?  I don't
+understand.  You are here, and you pass your time being rude to
+me.  I ask you to take me to dinner and you refuse.  Do you know
+that scarcely a man in London would not have jumped at such a
+chance?"
+
+"Very likely," Tavernake answered.  "I have no experience in such
+matters.  I only know that I am going to do something else."
+
+"Something you want to do very much?" she whispered.
+
+"I am going down to a little music-hall in Whitechapel,"
+Tavernake said, "and I am going to meet your sister and I am
+going to put her in a cab and take her to have some supper, and I
+am going to worry her until she promises to be my wife."
+
+"You are certainly a devoted admirer of the family," she laughed.
+"Perhaps you were in love with her all the time."
+
+"Perhaps I was," he admitted.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"I don't believe it," she said.  "I think you were quite fond of
+me once.  You have such absurdly old-fashioned ideas or I think
+that you would be fond of me now."
+
+Tavernake rose to his feet.
+
+"I am going," he declared.  "This will be good-bye.  To-morrow I
+am going to British Columbia."
+
+The laughter faded for a moment from her face.  She was suddenly
+serious.
+
+"Don't go," she begged.  "Listen.  I know I am not good like
+Beatrice, but I do like you--I always did.  I suppose it is that
+wonderful truthfulness of yours.  You are a different type from
+the men one meets.  I am rather a reckless person.  It is such a
+comfort sometimes to meet any one like you.  You seem such an
+anchorage.  Stay and talk to me for a little time.  Take me out
+to-night.  You asked me to go with you once, you know, and I
+would not.  To-night it is I who ask you."
+
+He shook his head slowly.
+
+"This is good-bye!" he said, firmly.  "I suppose, after all, you
+were not unkind to me in those days, but you taught me a very
+bitter lesson.  I came to you to-day in fear and trembling.  I
+was afraid, perhaps, that the worst was not over, that there was
+more yet to come.  Now I know that I am free."
+
+She stamped her foot.
+
+"You shall not go away like that," she declared.
+
+He smiled.
+
+"Do you think I do not understand?" he continued.  "It is only
+because I am able to go, because the touch of your fingers, that
+look in your eyes, do not drive me half mad now, that you want me
+to stay.  You would like to try your powers once more.  I think
+not.  I am satisfied that I am cured indeed, but perhaps it is
+safer to risk nothing."
+
+She pointed to the door.
+
+"Very well, then," she ordered, "you can go."
+
+He bowed, and already his fingers were on the handle.  Suddenly
+she called to him.
+
+"Leonard!  Leonard!"
+
+He turned round.  She was coming towards him with her arms
+outstretched, her eyes were full of tears, there were sobs in her
+voice.
+
+"I am so lonely," she begged.  "I have thought of you so much.
+Don't go away unkindly.  Stay with me for this evening, at any
+rate.  You can see Beatrice at any time.  It is I who need you
+most now."
+
+He looked around at the splendid apartment; he looked at the
+woman whose fingers, glittering with jewels, rested upon his
+shoulders.  Then he thought of Beatrice in her shabby black gown
+and wan little face, and very gently he removed her hands.
+
+"No," he said, "I do not think that you need me any more than I
+need you.  This is a caprice of yours.  You know it and I know
+it.  Is it worth while to play with one another?"
+
+Her hands fell to her sides.  She turned half away but she said
+nothing.  Tavernake, with a sudden impulse which had in it
+nothing of passion--very little, indeed, of affection--lifted her
+fingers to his lips and passed out of the room.  He descended the
+stairs, filled with a wonderful sense of elation, a buoyancy of
+spirit which he could not understand.  As he walked blithely to
+his hotel, however, he began to realize how much he had dreaded
+this interview.  He was a free man, after all.  The spell was
+broken.  He could think of her now as she deserved to be thought
+of, as a consummate woman of the world, selfish, heartless,
+conscienceless.  He was well out of her toils.  It was nothing to
+him if even he had known that at that moment she was lying upon
+the sofa to which she had staggered as he left the room, weeping
+bitterly.
+
+For over an hour Tavernake endured the smells and the bad
+atmosphere of that miserable little music-hall, watching eagerly
+each time the numbers were changed.  Then at last, towards the
+end of the program, the manager appeared in front.
+
+"Ladies and gentlemen," he announced, "I regret very much to
+inform you that owing to the indisposition of the young lady,
+Miss Beatrice Franklin and her father are unable to appear
+to-night.  I have pleasure in announcing an extra turn, namely
+the Sisters De Vere in their wonderful burlesque act."
+
+There was a murmur of disapprobation mingled with some cheering.
+Tavernake left his place and walked around to the back of the
+hall.  Presently the manager came out to him.
+
+"I am sorry to trouble you, sir," Tavernake said,"but I heard
+your announcement just now from the front.  Can you give me the
+address of Professor Franklin?  I am a friend, and I should like
+to go and see them."
+
+The manager pointed to the stage-doorkeeper.
+
+"This man will give it you," he announced, shortly.  "It's quite
+close.  I shall look in myself after the show to know how the
+young lady is."
+
+Tavernake procured the address and set out in the taxicab which
+he had kept waiting.  The driver listened to the direction
+doubtfully.
+
+"It's a poor sort of neighborhood, sir," he remarked.
+
+"We've got to go there," Tavernake told him.
+
+They reached it in a few minutes, a miserable street indeed.
+Tavernake knocked at the door of the house to which he was
+directed, with sinking heart.  A man, collarless and half
+dressed, in carpet slippers, opened the door after a few moments'
+waiting.
+
+"Well, what is it?" he asked, gruffly.
+
+"Is Professor Franklin here?" Tavernake inquired.
+
+The man seemed as though he were about to slam the door, but
+thought better of it.
+
+"If you're a friend of the professor's, as he calls himself," he
+said, "and you've any money to shell out, why, you're welcome,
+but if you're only asking out of curiosity, let me tell you that
+he used to lodge here but he's gone, and if I'd had my way he'd
+have gone a week ago, him and his daughter, too."
+
+"I don't understand," Tavernake protested.  "I thought the young
+lady was ill."
+
+"She may be ill or she may not," the man replied, sulkily.  "All
+I know is that they couldn't pay their rent, couldn't pay their
+food bill, couldn't pay for the drinks the old man was always
+sending out for.  So tonight I spoke up and they've gone."
+
+"At least you know where to!" Tavernake exclaimed.
+
+"I ain't no sort of an idea," the man declared.  "Take my word
+for it straight, guvnor, I know no more about where they went to
+than the man in the moon, except that I'm well shut of them, and
+there's a matter of eighteen and sixpence, if you care to pay
+it."
+
+"I'll give you a sovereign," Tavernake promised, "if you will
+tell me where they are now."
+
+"What's the good of making silly conditions like that!" the man
+grumbled.  "If I knew where they were, I'd earn the quid soon
+enough, but I don't, and that's the long and the short of it!
+And if you ain't going to pay the eighteen and six, well, I've
+answered all the questions I feel inclined to."
+
+"I'll make it two pounds," Tavernake promised.  "I'm going to
+sail for America to-morrow morning early, and I must see them
+first."
+
+The man leaned forward.
+
+"Look here," he said, "if I knew where they was, a quid would be
+quite good enough for me, but I don't, and that's straight.  If
+you want to look for them, I should try one of the doss houses.
+As likely there as anywhere."
+
+He slammed the door and Tavernake turned away.  A sudden despair
+had seized him.  He looked up and down the street, he looked away
+beyond and thought of the miles and miles of streets, the myriads
+of chimneys, the huge branches of the great city stretching far
+and wide.  At eight o'clock the next morning, he must leave for
+Southampton.  Was it too late, after all, that he had discovered
+the truth?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+IN A VIRGIN COUNTRY
+
+
+One night Tavernake began to laugh.  He had grown a long brown
+beard and the hair was over his ears.  He was wearing a gray
+flannel shirt, a handkerchief tied around his neck, and a pair of
+worn riding breeches held up by a belt.  He had kicked his boots
+off at the end of a long day, and was lying in the moonlight
+before a fire of pine logs, whose smoke went straight to the
+star-hung sky.  No word had been spoken for the last hour.
+Tavernake's fit of mirth came with as little apparent reason as
+the puffs of wind which every now and then stole down from the
+mountain side and made faint music in the virgin forests.
+
+Pritchard turned over on his side and looked at him.  Cigars had
+for many weeks been an unknown thing, and he was smoking a
+corn-cob pipe full of coarse tobacco.
+
+"Stumbled across a joke anywhere?" he asked.
+
+"I'm afraid no one but myself would see the humor of it,"
+Tavernake answered.  "I was thinking of those days in London; I
+was thinking of Beatrice's horror when she discovered that I was
+wearing ready-made clothes, and the amazement of Elizabeth when
+she found that I hadn't a dress suit.  It's odd how cramped life
+gets back there."
+
+Pritchard nodded, pressing the tobacco down into the bowl of his
+pipe with his forefinger.
+
+"You're right, Tavernake," he agreed.  "One loses one's sense of
+proportion.  Men in the cities are all alike.  They go about in
+disguise."
+
+"I should like," Tavernake said, inconsequently, "to have Mr.
+Dowling out here."
+
+"Amusing fellow?" Pritchard inquired.
+
+Tavernake shook his head, smiling.
+
+"Not in the least," he answered, "only he was a very small man.
+Out here it is difficult to keep small.  Don't you feel it,
+Pritchard?  These mountains make our hills at home seem like
+dust-heaps.  The skies seem loftier.  Look down into that valley.
+It's gigantic, immense."
+
+Pritchard yawned.
+
+"There's a little place in the Bowery," he began,--
+
+"Oh, I don't want to know any more about New York," Tavernake
+interrupted.  "Lean back and close your eyes, smell the cinnamon
+trees, listen to that night bird calling every now and then
+across the ravine.  There's blackness, if you like; there's
+depth.  It's like a cloak of velvet to look into.  But you can't
+see the bottom--no, not in the daytime.  Listen!"
+
+Pritchard sat up.  For a few moments neither spoke.  A dozen
+yards or so off, a scattered group--the rest of the party--were
+playing cards around a fire.  The green wood crackled, an
+occasional murmur of voices, a laugh or an exclamation, came to
+their ears, but for the rest, an immense, a wonderful silence, a
+silence which seemed to spread far away over that weird, half-
+invisible world!  Tavernake listened reverently.
+
+"Isn't it marvelous!" he exclaimed.  "We haven't seen a human
+being except our own party, for three days.
+
+There probably isn't one within hearing of us now.  Very likely
+no living person has ever set foot in this precise spot."
+
+"Oh, it's big," Pritchard admitted, "it's big and it's restful,
+but it isn't satisfying.  It does for you for a time because you
+started life wrong and you needed a reaction.  But for me--ah,
+well!" he added, "I hear the call right across these thousands of
+miles of forests and valley and swamp.  I hear the electric cars
+and the clash of the overhead railway, I see the flaring lights
+of Broadway and I hear the babel of tongues.  I am going back to
+it, Tavernake.  There's plenty to go on with.  We've done more
+than carry out our program."
+
+"Back to New York!" Tavernake muttered, disconsolately.
+
+"So you're not ready yet?" Pritchard demanded.
+
+"Heavens, no!" Tavernake answered.  "Who would be?  What is there
+in New York to make up for this?"
+
+Pritchard was silent for a moment.
+
+"Well," he said, "one of us must be getting back near
+civilization.  The syndicate will be expecting to hear from us.
+Besides, we've reports enough already.  It's time something was
+decided about that oil country.  We've done some grand work
+there, Tavernake."
+
+Tavernake nodded.  He was lying on his side and his eyes were
+fixed wistfully southward, over the glimmering moonlit valley,
+over the great wilderness of virgin pine woods which hung from
+the mountains on the other side, away through the cleft in the
+hills to the plains beyond, chaotic, a world unseen.
+
+"If you like to go on for a bit," Pritchard suggested, slowly,
+"there's no reason why you shouldn't take McCleod and Richardson
+with you, and Pete and half the horses, and strike for the tin
+country on the other side of the Yolite Hills.  So long as we are
+here, it's quite worth it, if you can stick it out."
+
+Tavernake drew a long breath.
+
+"I'd like to go," he admitted, simply.  "I know McCleod is keen
+about prospecting further south.  You see, most of our finds so
+far have been among the oil fields."
+
+"Settled," Pritchard declared.  "To-morrow, then, we part.  I'm
+for the valley, and I reckon I'll strike the railway to Chicago
+in a week.  Gee whiz!  New York will seem good!"
+
+"You think that the syndicate will be satisfied with what we have
+done so far?" Tavernake asked.
+
+His companion smiled.
+
+"If they aren't, they'll be fools.  I reckon there's enough oil
+fields here for seven companies.  There'll be a bit for us, too,
+Tavernake, I guess.  Don't you want to come back to New York and
+spend it?"
+
+Tavernake laughed once more, but this time his laugh was not
+wholly natural.
+
+"Spend it!" he repeated.  "What is there to spend it on?
+Uncomfortable clothes, false plays, drinks that are bad for you,
+food that's half poisoned, atmosphere that stifles.  My God,
+Pritchard, is there anything in the world like this!  Stretch out
+your arms, man.  Lie on your back, look up at the stars, let that
+wind blow over your face.  Listen."
+
+They listened, and again they heard nothing, yet again there
+seemed to be that peculiar quality about the silence which spoke
+of the vastness of space.
+
+Pritchard rose to his feet.
+
+"New York and the fleshpots for me," he declared.  "Keep in
+touch, and good luck old man!"
+
+Next day at dawn they parted, and Tavernake, with his three
+companions, set his face towards an almost undiscovered tract of
+land.  Their progress was slow, for they were all the time in a
+country rich with possibilities.  For weeks they climbed, climbed
+till they reached the snows and the wind stung their faces and
+they shivered in their rugs at night.  They came to a land of
+sparser vegetation, of fewer and wilder animals, where they heard
+the baying of wolves at night, and saw the eyes of strange
+animals glisten through the thicket as the flames of their
+evening fire shot up toward the sky.  Then the long descent
+began, the long descent to the great plain.  Now their faces were
+bronzed with a sun ever hotter, ever more powerful.  No longer
+the snow flakes beat their cheeks.  They came slowly down into a
+land which seemed to Tavernake like the biblical land of Canaan.
+Three times in ten days they had to halt and make a camp, while
+Tavernake prepared a geographical survey of likely-looking land.
+
+McCleod came up to Tavernake one day with a dull-looking lump in
+his hand, glistening in places.
+
+"Copper," he announced, shortly.  "It's what I've been looking
+for all the time.  No end to it.  There's something bigger than
+oil here."
+
+They spent a month in the locality, and every day McCleod became
+more enthusiastic.  After that it was hard work to keep him from
+heading homeward at once.
+
+"I tell you, sir," he explained to Tavernake, "there's millions
+there, millions between those four stakes of yours.  What's the
+good of more prospecting?  There's enough there in a square acre
+to pay the expenses of our expedition a thousand times over.
+Let's get back and make reports.  We can strike the railway in
+ten days from here--perhaps sooner."
+
+"You go," Tavernake said.  "Leave me Pete and two of the horses."
+
+The man stared at him in surprise.
+
+"What's the good of going on alone?" he asked.  "You're not a
+mining expert or an oil man.  You can't go prospecting by
+yourself."
+
+"I can't help it," Tavernake answered.  "It's something in my
+blood, I suppose.  I am going on.  Think!  You'll strike that
+railway and in a month you will be back in New York.  Don't you
+imagine, when you're there, when you hear the clatter and turmoil
+of it, when you see the pale crowds chivvying one another about
+to pick the dollars from each other's pockets,--don't you believe
+you'll long for these solitudes, the big empty places, great
+possibilities, the silence?  Think of it, man.  What is there
+beyond those mountains, I wonder?"
+
+McCleod sighed.
+
+"You're right," he said.  "One may never get so far out again.
+Our fortunes will keep, I suppose, and anyhow we ought to strike
+a telegraph station in about a fortnight.  We'll go right ahead,
+then."
+
+In ten days they dropped ten thousand feet.  They came to a land
+where their throats were always dry, where the trees and shrubs
+seemed like property affairs from a theatre, where they plunged
+their heads into every pool that came to wash their noses and
+mouths from the red dust that seemed to choke them up.  They
+found tin and oil and more copper.  Then, by slow stages, they
+passed on to a land of great grassy plains, of blue grass, miles
+and miles of it, and suddenly one day they came to the telegraph
+posts, rough pine trees unstripped of their bark, with a few
+sagging wires.  Tavernake looked at them as Robinson Crusoe might
+have looked at Man Friday's footsteps.  It was the first sign of
+human life which they had seen for months.
+
+"It's a real world we are in, after all!" he sighed.  "Somehow or
+other, I thought--I thought we'd escaped."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+BACK TO CIVILIZATION
+
+
+Pritchard, trim and neat, a New Yorker from the careful
+arrangement of his tie to the tips of his patent boots, gazed
+with something like amazement at the man whom he had come to meet
+at the Grand Central Station.  Tavernake looked, indeed, like
+some splendid bushman whose life has been spent in the kingdom of
+the winds and the sun and the rain.  He was inches broader round
+the chest, and carried himself with a new freedom.  His face was
+bronzed right down to the neck.  His beard was fullgrown, his
+clothes travel-stained and worn.  He seemed like a breath of real
+life in the great New York depot, surrounded by streams of
+black-coated, pale-cheeked men.
+
+Pritchard laughed softly as he passed his arm through his
+friend's.
+
+"Come, my Briton," he said, "my primitive man, I have rooms for
+you in a hotel close here.  A bath and a mint julep, then I'll
+take you to a tailor's.  What about the big country?  It's better
+than your salt marshes, eh?  Better than your little fishing
+village?  Better than building boats?"
+
+"You know it," Tavernake answered.  "I feel as though I'd been
+drawing in life for month after month.  Have I got to wear boots
+like yours--patent?"
+
+"Got to be done," Pritchard declared.
+
+"And the hat--oh, my Heavens!" Tavernake groaned.  "I'll never
+become civilized again."
+
+"We'll see," Pritchard laughed.  "Say, Tavernake, it was a great
+trip of ours.  Everything's turning out marvelously.  The oil and
+the copper are big, man--big, I tell you.  I reckon your five
+thousand dollars will be well on the way to half a million.  I'm
+pretty near there myself."
+
+It was not until later on, when he was alone, that Tavernake
+realized with how little interest he listened to his companion's
+talk of their success.  It was so short a time ago since the
+building up of a fortune had been the one aim upon which every
+nerve of his body was centered.  Curiously enough, now he seemed
+to take it as a matter of course.
+
+"On second thoughts, I'll send a tailor round to the hotel,"
+Pritchard declared.  "I've rooms myself next yours.  We can go
+out and buy boots and the other things afterwards."
+
+By nightfall, Tavernake's wardrobe was complete.  Even Pritchard
+regarded him with a certain surprise.  He seemed, somehow, to
+have gained a new dignity.
+
+"Say, but you look great!" he exclaimed.  "They won't believe it
+at the meeting to-morrow that you are the man who crossed the
+Yolite Mountains and swam the Peraneek River.  That's a wonderful
+country you were in, Tavernake, after you left the tracks."
+
+They were in Broadway, with the roar of the city in their ears,
+and Tavernake, lifting his face starwards, suddenly seemed to
+feel the silence once more, the perfume of the pine woods, the
+scent of nature herself, freed through all these generations of
+any presence of man.
+
+"I'll never keep away from it," he said, softly.  "I'll have to
+go back."
+
+Pritchard smiled.
+
+"When your report's in shape and the dollars are being scooped
+in, they'll send you back fast enough--that is, if you still want
+to go," he remarked.  "I tell you, Leonard Tavernake, our city
+men here are out for the dollars.  Over on your side, a man makes
+a million or so and he's had enough.  One fortune here only seems
+to whet the appetite of a New Yorker.  By the way," he added,
+after a moment's hesitation, "does it interest you to know that
+an old friend of yours is in New York?"
+
+Tavernake's head went round swiftly.
+
+"Who is it?" he asked.
+
+"Mrs. Wenham Gardner."
+
+Tavernake set his teeth.
+
+"No," he said, slowly, "I don't know that that interests me."
+
+"Glad of it," Pritchard went on.  "I can tell you I don't think
+things have been going extra well with the lady.  She's spent
+most of what she got from the Gardner family, and she doesn't
+seem to have had the best of luck with it, either.  I came across
+her by accident.  She is staying at a flashy hotel, but it's in
+the wrong quarter--second-rate--quite second-rate."
+
+"I wonder whether we shall see anything of her," Tavernake
+remarked.
+
+"Do you want to?" Pritchard asked.  "She'll probably be at
+Martin's for lunch, at the Plaza for tea, and Rector's for
+supper.  She's not exactly the lady to remain hidden, you know."
+
+"We'll avoid those places, then, if you are taking me around,"
+Tavernake said.
+
+"You're cured, are you?" Pritchard inquired.
+
+"Yes, I am cured," Tavernake answered, "cured of that and a great
+many other things, thanks to you.  You found me the right tonic."
+
+"Tonic," Pritchard repeated, meditatively.  "That reminds me.
+This way for the best cocktail in New York." . . .
+
+The night was not to pass, however, without its own especial
+thrill for Tavernake.  The two men dined together at Delmonico's
+and went afterwards to a roof garden, a new form of entertainment
+for Tavernake, and one which interested him vastly.  They secured
+one of the outside tables near the parapets, and below them New
+York stretched, a flaming phantasmagoria of lights and crude
+buildings.  Down the broad avenues with their towering blocks,
+their street cars striking fire all the time like toys below, the
+people streamed like insects away to the Hudson, where the great
+ferry boats, ablaze with lights, went screaming across the dark
+waters.  Tavernake leaned over and forgot.  There was so much
+that was amazing in this marvelous city for a man who had only
+just begun to find himself.
+
+The orchestra, stationed within a few yards of him, commenced to
+play a popular waltz, and Pritchard to talk.  Tavernake turned
+his fascinated eyes from the prospect below.
+
+"My young friend," Pritchard said, "you are up against it
+to-night.  Take a drink of your wine and then brace yourself."
+
+Tavernake did as he was told.
+
+"What is this danger?" he asked.  "What's wrong, anyway?"
+
+Pritchard had no need to answer.  As Tavernake set his glass
+down, his eyes fell upon the little party who had just taken the
+table almost next to theirs.  There were Walter Crease, Major
+Post, two men whom he had never seen before in his life--heavy of
+cheek, both, dull-eyed, but dressed with a rigid observance of
+the fashion of the city, in short dinner coats and black ties.
+And between them was Elizabeth.  Tavernake gripped the sides of
+his chair and looked.  Yes, she had altered.  Her eyebrows were a
+trifle made up, there was a tinge in her hair which he did not
+recognize, a touch of color in her cheeks which he doubted.  Yet
+her figure and her wonderful presence remained, that art of
+wearing her clothes as no other woman could.  She was easily the
+most noticeable-looking of her sex among all the people there.
+Tavernake heard the sound of her voice and once more the thrill
+came and passed.  She was the same Elizabeth.  Thank God, he
+thought, that he was not the same Tavernake!
+
+"Do you wish to go?" Pritchard asked.
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+"Not I!" he answered.  "This place is far too fascinating.  Can't
+we have some more wine?  This is my treat.  And, Pritchard, why
+do you look at me like that?  You are not supposing for a moment
+that I am capable of making an ass of myself again?"
+
+Pritchard smiled in a relieved fashion.
+
+"My young friend," he said, "I have lived in the world so long
+and seen so many strange things, especially between men and
+women, that I am never surprised at anything.  I thought you'd
+shed your follies as your grip upon life had tightened, but one
+is never sure."
+
+Tavernake sighed.
+
+"Oh, I have shed the worst of my follies!" he answered.  "I only
+wish--"
+
+He never finished his sentence.  Elizabeth had suddenly seen him.
+For a moment she leaned forward as though to assure herself that
+she was not mistaken.  Then she half sprang to her feet and sat
+down again.  Her lips were parted--she was once more
+bewilderingly beautiful.
+
+"Mr. Tavernake," she cried, "come and speak to me at once."
+
+Tavernake rose without hesitation, and walked firmly across the
+few yards which separated them.  She held out both her hands.
+
+"This is wonderful!" she exclaimed.  "You in New York!  And I
+have wondered so often what became of you."
+
+Tavernake smiled.
+
+"It is my first night here," he said.  "For two years I have been
+prospecting in the far west."
+
+"Then I saw your name in the papers," she declared.  "It was for
+the Manhattan Syndicate, wasn't it?"
+
+Tavernake nodded, and one of the men of the party leaned forward
+with interest.
+
+"You're going to make millions and millions," she assured him.
+"You always knew you would, didn't you?"
+
+"I am afraid that I was almost too confident," he answered.  "But
+certainly we have been quite fortunate."
+
+One of Elizabeth's companions intervened--he was the one who had
+pricked up his ears at the mention of the Manhattan Syndicate.
+
+"Say, Elizabeth," he remarked, "I'd like to meet your friend."
+
+Elizabeth, with a frown, performed the introduction.
+
+"Mr. Anthony Cruxhall - Mr. Tavernake!"
+
+Mr. Cruxhall held out a fat white hand, on the little finger of
+which glittered a big diamond ring.
+
+"Say, are you the Mr. Tavernake that was surveyor to the
+prospecting party sent out by the Manhattan Syndicate?" he
+inquired.
+
+"I was," Tavernake admitted, briefly.  "I still am, I hope."
+
+"Then you're just the man I was hoping to meet," Mr. Cruxhall
+declared.  "Won't you sit down with us right here?  I'd like to
+talk some about that trip.  I'm interested in the Syndicate."
+
+Tavernake shook his head.
+
+"I've had enough of work for a time," he said.  "Besides, I
+couldn't talk about it till after my report to the meeting
+to-morrow."
+
+"Just a few words," Mr. Cruxhall persisted.  "We'll have a bottle
+of champagne, eh?"
+
+"You will excuse me, I am sure," Tavernake replied, "when I tell
+you that it would not be correct on my part to discuss my trip
+until after I have handed in my report to the company.  I am very
+glad to have seen you again, Mrs. Gardner."
+
+"But you are not going!" she exclaimed, in dismay.
+
+"I have left Mr. Pritchard alone," Tavernake answered.
+
+Elizabeth smiled, and waved her hand to the solitary figure.
+
+"Our friend Mr. Pritchard again," she remarked.  "Well, it is
+really a curious meeting, isn't it?  I wonder,"--she lifted her
+head to his and her eyes called him closer to hers--"have you
+forgotten everything?"
+
+He pointed over the roofs of the houses.  His back was to the
+river and he pointed westward.
+
+"I have been in a country where one forgets," he answered.  "I
+think that I have thrown the knapsack of my follies away.  I
+think that it is buried.  There are some things which I do not
+forget, but they are scarcely to be spoken of."
+
+"You are a strange young man," she said.  "Was I wrong, or were
+you not once in love with me?"
+
+"I was terribly in love with you," Tavernake confessed.
+
+"Yet you tore up my cheque and flung yourself away when you found
+out that my standard of morals was not quite what you had
+expected," she murmured.  "Haven't you got over that quixoticism
+a little, Leonard?"
+
+He drew a deep sigh.
+
+"I am thankful to say," he declared, earnestly, "that I have not
+got over it, that, if anything, my prejudices are stronger than
+ever."
+
+She sat for a moment quite still, and her face had become hard
+and expressionless.  She was looking past him, past the line of
+lights, out into the blue darkness.
+
+"Somehow," she said, softly, "I always prayed that you might
+remember.  You were the one true thing I had ever met, you were
+in earnest.  It is past, then?"
+
+"It is past," Tavernake answered, bravely.
+
+The music of a Hungarian waltz came floating down to them.  She
+half closed her eyes.  Her head moved slowly with the melody.
+Tavernake looked away.
+
+"Will you come and see me just once?" she asked, suddenly.  "I am
+staying at the Delvedere, in Forty-Second Street."
+
+"Thank you very much," Tavernake replied.  "I do not know how
+long I shall be in New York.  If I am here for a few days, I
+shall take my chance at finding you at home."
+
+He bowed, and returned to Pritchard, who welcomed him with a
+quiet smile.
+
+"You're wise, Tavernake," he said, softly.  "I could hear no
+words, but I know that you have been wise.  Between you and me,"
+he added, in a lower tone, "she is going downhill.  She is in
+with the wrong lot here.  She can't seem to keep away from them.
+They are on the very fringe of Bohemia, a great deal nearer the
+arm of the law than makes for respectable society.  The man to
+whom I saw you introduced is a millionaire one day and a thief
+the next.  They're none of them any good.  Did you notice, too,
+that she is wearing sham jewelry?  That always looks bad."
+
+"No, I didn't notice," Tavernake answered.
+
+He was silent for a moment.  Then he leaned a little forward.
+
+"I wonder," he asked, "do you know anything about her sister?"
+
+Pritchard finished his wine and knocked the ash from his cigar.
+
+"Not much," he replied.  "I believe she had a very hard time.
+She took on the father, you know, the old professor, and did her
+best to keep him straight.  He died about a year ago and Miss
+Beatrice tried to get back into the theatre, but she'd missed her
+chance.  Theatrical business has been shocking in London.  I
+heard she'd come out here.  Wherever she is, she keeps right away
+from that sort of set," he wound up, moving his head towards
+Elizabeth's friends.
+
+"I wonder if she is in New York," Tavernake said, with a strange
+thrill at his heart.
+
+Pritchard made no reply.  His eyes were fixed upon the little
+group at the next table.  Elizabeth was leaning back in her
+chair.  She seemed to have abandoned the conversation.  Her eyes
+were always seeking Tavernake's.  Pritchard rose to his feet
+abruptly.
+
+"It's time we were in bed," he declared.  "Remember the meeting
+to-morrow."
+
+Tavernake rose to his feet.  As they passed the next table,
+Elizabeth leaned over to him.  Her eyes pleaded with his almost
+passionately.
+
+"Dear Leonard," she whispered, "you must--you must come and see
+me.  I shall stay in between four and six every evening this
+week.  The Delvedere, remember."
+
+"Thank you very much," Tavernake answered.  "I shall not forget."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+FOR ALWAYS
+
+
+Once again it seemed to Beatrice that history was repeating
+itself.  The dingy, oblong dining-room, with its mosquito
+netting, stained tablecloth, and hard cane chairs, expanded until
+she fancied herself in the drawing-room of Blenheim House.
+Between the landladies there was little enough to choose.  Mrs.
+Raithby Lawrence, notwithstanding her caustic tongue and
+suspicious nature, had at least made some pretense at gentility.
+The woman who faced her now--hard-featured, with narrow,
+suspicious eyes and a mass of florid hair--was unmistakably and
+brutally vulgar.
+
+"What's the good of your keeping on saying you hope to get an
+engagement next week?" she demanded, with a sneer.  "Who's likely
+to engage you?  Why, you've lost your color and your looks and
+your weight since you came to stay here.  They don't want such as
+you in the chorus.  And for the rest, you're too high and mighty,
+that's my opinion of you.  Take what you can get, and how you can
+get it, and be thankful,--that's my motto.  Day after day you
+tramp about the streets with your head in the air, and won't take
+this and won't take that, and meanwhile my bill gets bigger and
+bigger.  Now where have you been to this morning, I should like
+to know?"
+
+Beatrice, who was faint and tired, shaking in every limb, tried
+to pass out of the room, but her questioner barred the way.
+
+"I have been up town," she answered, nervously.
+
+"Hear of anything?"
+
+Beatrice shook her head.
+
+"Not yet.  Please let me go upstairs and lie down.  I am tired
+and I need to rest."
+
+"And I need my money," Mrs. Selina P. Watkins declared, without
+quitting her position, "and it's no good your going up to your
+room because the door's locked."
+
+"What do you mean?" Beatrice faltered.
+
+"I mean that I've done with you," the lodging-house keeper
+announced.  "Your room's locked up and the key's in my pocket,
+and the sooner you get out of this, the better I shall be
+pleased."
+
+"But my box--my clothes," Beatrice cried.
+
+"I'll keep 'em a week for you," the woman answered.  "Bring me
+the money by then and you shall have them.  If I don't hear
+anything of you, they'll go to the auction mart."
+
+Something of her old spirit fired the girl for a moment.  She was
+angry, and she forgot that her knees were trembling with fatigue,
+that she was weak and aching with hunger.
+
+"How dare you talk like that!" she exclaimed.  "You shall have
+your money shortly, but I must have my clothes.  I cannot go
+anywhere without them."
+
+The woman laughed harshly.
+
+"Look here, my young lady," she said, "you'll see your box again
+when I see the color of your money, and not before.  And now out
+you go, please,--out you go!  If you're going to make any
+trouble, Solly will have to show you the way down the steps."
+
+The woman had opened the door, and a colored servant, half
+dressed, with a broom in her hand, came slouching down the
+passage.  Beatrice turned and fled out of the greasy, noisome
+atmosphere, down the wooden, uneven steps, out into the ugly
+street.  She turned toward the nearest elevated as though by
+instinct, but when she came to the bottom of the stairs she
+stopped short with a little groan.  She knew very well that she
+had not a nickel to pay the fare.  Her pockets were empty.  All
+day she had eaten nothing, and her last coin had gone for the car
+which had brought her back from Broadway.  And here she was on
+the other side of New York, in the region of low-class lodging
+houses, with the Bowery between her and Broadway.  She had
+neither the strength nor the courage to walk.  With a
+half-stifled sob she took off her one remaining ornament, a cheap
+enameled brooch, and entered a pawnbroker's shop close to where
+she had been standing.
+
+"Will you give me something on this, please?" she asked,
+desperately.
+
+A man who seemed to be sorting a pile of ready-made coats, paused
+in his task for a moment, took the ornament into his hand, and
+threw it contemptuously upon the counter.
+
+"Not worth anything," he answered.
+
+"But it must be worth something," Beatrice protested.  "I only
+want a very little."
+
+Something in her voice compelled the man's attention.  He looked
+at her white face.
+
+"What's the trouble?" he inquired.
+
+"I must get up to Fifth Avenue somehow," she declared.  "I can't
+walk and I haven't a nickel."
+
+He pushed the brooch back to her and threw a dime upon the
+counter.
+
+"Well," he said, "you don't look fit to walk, and that's a fact,
+but the brooch isn't worth entering up.  There's a dime for you.
+Now git, please, I'm busy."
+
+Beatrice clutched the coin and, almost forgetting to thank him,
+found her way up the iron stairs on to the platform of the
+elevated.  Soon she was seated in the train, rattling and shaking
+on its way through the slums into the heart of the wonderful
+city.  There was only one thing left for her to try, a thing
+which she had had in her mind for days.  Yet she found herself,
+even now she was committed to it, thinking of what lay before her
+with something like black horror.  It was her last resource,
+indeed.  Strong though she was, she knew by many small signs that
+her strength was almost at an end.  The days and weeks of
+"disappointments, the long fruitless trudges from office to
+office, the heart-sickness of constant refusals, poor food, the
+long fasts, had all told their tale.  She was attractive enough
+still.  Her pallor seemed to have given her a wonderful delicacy.
+The curve of her lips and the soft light in her gray eyes, were
+still as potent as ever.  When she thought, though, what a poor
+asset her appearance had been, the color flamed in her cheeks.
+
+In Broadway she made her way to a very magnificent block of
+buildings, and passing inside took the lift to the seventh floor.
+Here she got out and knocked timidly at a glass-paneled door, on
+which was inscribed the name of Mr. Anthony Cruxhall.  A very
+superior young man bade her enter and inquired her business.
+
+"I wish to see Mr. Cruxhall for a moment, privately," she said.
+"I shall not detain him for more than a minute.  My name is
+Franklin--Miss Beatrice Franklin."
+
+The young man's lips seemed about to shape themselves into a
+whistle, but something in the girl's face made him change his
+mind.
+
+"I guess the boss is in," he admitted.  "He's just got back from
+a big meeting, but I am not sure about his seeing any one to-day.
+However, I'll tell him that you're here."
+
+He disappeared into an inner room.  Presently he came out again
+and held the door open.
+
+"Will you walk right in, Miss Franklin?" he invited.
+
+Beatrice went in bravely enough, but her knees began to tremble
+when she found herself in the presence of the man she had come to
+visit.  Mr. Anthony Cruxhall was not a pleasant-looking person.
+His cheeks were fat and puffy, he wore a diamond ring upon the
+finger of his toowhite hand, and a diamond pin in his somewhat
+flashily arranged necktie.  He was smoking a black cigar, which
+he omitted to remove from between his teeth as he welcomed his
+visitor.
+
+"So you've come to see me at last, little Miss Beatrice!" he
+said, with a particularly unpleasant smile.  "Come and sit down
+here by the side of me.  That's right, eh?  Now what can I do for
+you?"
+
+Beatrice was trembling all over.  The man's eyes were hateful,
+his smile was hideous.
+
+"I have not a cent in the world, Mr. Cruxhall," she faltered, "I
+cannot get an engagement, I have been turned out of my rooms, and
+I am hungry.  My father always told me that you would be a friend
+if at any time it happened that I needed help.  I am very sorry
+to have to come and beg, yet that is what I am doing.  Will you
+lend or give me ten or twenty dollars, so that I can go on for a
+little longer?  Or will you help me to get a place among some of
+your theatrical people?  "
+
+Mr. Cruxhall puffed steadily at his cigar for a moment, and
+leaning back in his chair thrust his hand into his trousers'
+pocket.
+
+"So bad as that, is it?" he remarked.  "So bad as that, eh?"
+
+"It is very bad indeed," she answered, looking at him quietly,
+"or you know that I should not have come to you."
+
+Mr. Cruxhall smiled.
+
+"I remember the last time we talked together," he said, "we
+didn't get on very well.  Too high and mighty in those days,
+weren't you, Miss Beatrice?  Wouldn't have anything to say to a
+bad lot like Anthony Cruxhall.  You're having to come to it, eh?"
+
+She began to tremble again, but she held herself in.
+
+"I must live," she murmured.  "Give me a little money and let me
+go away."
+
+He laughed.
+
+"Oh, I'll do better than that for you," he answered, thrusting
+his hand into his waistcoat pocket and drawing out a pile of
+dollar bills.  "Let's look at you.  Gee whiz!  Yes, you're
+shabby, aren't you?  Take this," he went on, slamming some notes
+down before her.  "Go and get yourself a new frock and a hat fit
+to wear, and meet me at the Madison Square roof garden at eight
+o'clock.  We'll have some dinner and I guess we can fix matters
+up."
+
+Then he smiled at her again, and Beatrice, whose hand was already
+upon the bills, suddenly felt her knees shake.  A great black
+horror was upon her.  She turned and fled out of the room, past
+the astonished clerk, into the lift, and was downstairs on the
+main floor before she remembered where she was, what she had
+done.  The clerk, after gazing at her retreating form, hurried
+into the inner office.
+
+"Young woman hasn't bolted with anything, eh?" he asked.
+
+Mr. Cruxhall smiled wickedly.
+
+"Why, no," he replied, "I guess she'll come back!"
+
+Tavernake left the meeting on that same afternoon with his future
+practically assured for life.  He had been appointed surveyor to
+the company at a salary of ten thousand dollars a year, and the
+mine in which his savings were invested was likely to return him
+his small capital a hundredfold.  Very kind things had been said
+of him and to him.
+
+Pritchard and he had left the place together.  When they had
+reached the street, they paused for a moment.
+
+"I am going to make a call near here," Pritchard said.  "Don't
+forget that we are dining together, unless you find something
+better to do, and in the meantime"--he took a card from his
+pocket and handed it to Tavernake--"I don't know whether I am a
+fool or not to give you this," he added.  "However, there it is.
+Do as you choose about it."
+
+He walked away a little abruptly.  Tavernake glanced at the
+address upon the card: 1134, East Third Street.  For a moment he
+was puzzled.  Then the light broke in upon him suddenly.  His
+heart gave a leap.  He turned back into the place to ask for some
+directions and once more stopped short.  Down the stone corridor,
+like one who flies from some hideous fate, came a slim black
+figure, with white face and set, horrified stare.  Tavernake held
+out his hands and she came to him with a great wondering sob.
+
+"Leonard!" she cried.  "Leonard!"
+
+"There's no doubt about me," he answered, quickly.  "Am I such a
+very terrifying object?"
+
+She stood quite still and struggled hard.  By and by the
+giddiness passed.
+
+"Leonard," she murmured, "I am ill."
+
+Then she began to smile.
+
+"It is too absurd," she faltered, "but you've got to do it all
+over again."'
+
+"What do you mean?" he asked.
+
+"Get me something to eat at once," she begged.  "I am starving.
+Somewhere where it's cool.  Leonard, how wonderful!  I never even
+knew that you were in New York."
+
+He called a carriage and took her off to a roof garden.  There,
+as it was early, they got a seat near the parapet.  Tavernake
+talked clumsily about himself most of the time.  There was a lump
+in his throat.  He felt all the while that tragedy was very near.
+By degrees, though, as she ate and drank, the color came back to
+her cheeks, the fear of a breakdown seemed to pass away.  She
+became even cheerful.
+
+"We are really the most amazing people, Leonard," she declared.
+"You stumbled into my life once before when I was on the point of
+being turned out of my rooms.  You've come into it again and you
+find me once more homeless.  Don't spend too much money upon our
+dinner, for I warn you that I am going to borrow from you."
+
+He laughed.
+
+"That's good news," he remarked, "but I'm not sure that I'm going
+to lend anything."
+
+He leaned across the table.  Their dinner had taken long in
+preparing and the dusk was falling now.  Over them were the
+stars, the band was playing soft music, the hubbub of the streets
+lay far below.  Almost they were in a little world by themselves.
+
+"Dear Beatrice," he said, "three times I asked you to marry me
+and you would not, and I asked you because I was a selfish brute,
+and because I knew that it was good for me and that it would save
+me from things of which I was afraid.  And now I am asking you
+the same thing again, but I have a bigger reason, Beatrice.  I
+have been alone most of the last two years, I have lived the sort
+of life which brings a man face to face with the truth, helps him
+to know himself and others, and I have found out something."
+
+"Yes?" she faltered.  "Tell me, Leonard."
+
+"I found out that it was you I cared for always," he continued,
+"and that is why I am asking you to marry me now, Beatrice, only
+this time I ask you because I love you, and because no one else
+in the world could ever take your place or be anything at all to
+me."
+
+"Leonard!" she murmured.
+
+"You are not sorry that I have said this?" he begged.
+
+She opened her eyes again.
+
+"I always prayed that I might hear you say it," she answered,
+"but it seems--oh, it seems so one-sided!  Here am I starving and
+penniless, and you--you, I suppose, are well on the way towards
+the success you worshiped."
+
+"I am well on the way," he said, earnestly, "towards something
+greater, Beatrice.  I am well on the way towards understanding
+what success really is, what things count and what don't.  I have
+even found out," he whispered, "the thing which counts for more
+than anything else in the world, and now that I have found it
+out, I shall never let it go again."
+
+He pressed her hand and she looked across the table at him with
+swimming eyes.  The waiter, who had been approaching, turned
+discreetly away.  The band started to play a fresh tune.  From
+down in the streets came the clanging of the cars.  A curious,
+cosmopolitan murmur of sounds, but between those two there was
+the wonderful silence.
+
+
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE TEMPTING OF TAVERNAKE ***
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