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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ec0a8d5 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #54093 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/54093) diff --git a/old/54093-0.txt b/old/54093-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 30478ce..0000000 --- a/old/54093-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,5712 +0,0 @@ -Project Gutenberg's A Valiant Ignorance; vol. 1 of 3, by Mary Angela Dickens - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license - - -Title: A Valiant Ignorance; vol. 1 of 3 - A Novel in Three Volumes - -Author: Mary Angela Dickens - -Release Date: February 2, 2017 [EBook #54093] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VALIANT IGNORANCE; VOL. 1 OF 3 *** - - - - -Produced by Chuck Greif, MFR and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - - - - - - - A VALIANT IGNORANCE - - - - - A - - VALIANT IGNORANCE - - A Novel - - BY - - MARY ANGELA DICKENS - - AUTHOR OF “CROSS CURRENTS,” “A MERE CYPHER,” ETC. - - “Thy gold is brass!” - PRINCE HOHENSTIEL SCHWANGAU - - _IN THREE VOLUMES_ - - VOL. I. - - London MACMILLAN & CO. AND NEW YORK 1894 - - - - - A VALIANT IGNORANCE - - - - -CHAPTER I - - -“MY DEAR MAMMA, - - “I hope you are quite well. I am quite well, and Smut is quite - well. Her tail is very fat. I hope papa is quite well. I have a box - of soldiers. The captain has a horse. Uncle Richard gave them to - me. There is a hole in the horse, and he sticks in tight. Auntie is - quite well, and so is nurse, and so is cook. - -“I am, your loving Son, - -“JULIAN.” - - - -It was the table d’hôte room of one of the best hotels in Nice; a large -room, gay and attractive, according to its kind, as fresh paint, bright -decoration, and expanse of looking-glass could make it. From end to end -were ranged small tables, varying in size but uniform in the radiant -spotlessness of their white cloths, and the brightness of their silver, -china, or glass; and to and fro between the tables, and from the tables -to the door, moved active waiters, whose one aim in life seemed to be -the anticipation of the wishes of the visitors for whose pleasure alone -they apparently existed. - -It was early, and _déjeuner_ proper was hardly in full swing as yet. But -a good many of the tables were occupied, and a subdued hum of -conversation pervaded the air; a hum compounded of the high-pitched -chatter of American women and the quick, eager volubility of French -tongues, backed by a less pronounced but perfectly perceptible -undercurrent of German and English; the whole diversified now and then -by a light laugh. - -The sounds were subdued because the room was large and sparsely filled, -but they were gay. The smiling alacrity of the waiters was apparently at -once a symptom of, and a subtle tribute to, the humour of the hour. -There were sundry strongly-marked faces here and there among the little -groups; middle-aged men to whom neither ambition nor care could have -been empty words; middle-aged women with lines about their faces not -lightly come by; young girls with the vague desire and unrest of youth; -young men with its secrets and its aspirations. But all individuality of -care, anxiety, or desire seemed to be in abeyance for the time being; -enjoyment--somewhat conventional, well-dressed enjoyment, of the kind -that rather covers up trouble as not “the thing” than disperses it--was -evidently the order of the day. It was within three days of the -carnival, and the visitors who were crowding into Nice came one and all -with fixedly and obviously light-hearted intention. - -The link between the little letter--not little by any means in a -material sense, since its capitals sprawled and staggered over a large -sheet of foreign letter paper--and the smart, pleasure-seeking -atmosphere of the Nice table d’hôte room, was a woman who sat at a -little table by one of the open windows. And she was much more easily to -be identified, arguing from her appearance and manner, with her present -surroundings than with the images conjured up by the blotted letter in -her hand. She was a small woman, with a very erect little figure, the -trimness of which was accentuated by the conventional perfection of the -dress she wore; it was not such a dress as would commend itself to the -fashionable woman of to-day--at that date, eighteen hundred and -seventy-two, tailor-made garments for ladies were not--but it had won a -glance of respect, nevertheless, from every woman in the room in the -course of the few minutes which had elapsed since its wearer had -entered. Her hair was fair; very plentiful and very fashionably dressed. -Her eyes were blue; her colouring pale. If she had had no other claims -on a critic’s attention, no more marked characteristics, she might have -been called rather pretty. She was rather pretty, as a matter of fact, -but her prettiness was dwarfed, and put out of sight by the stronger -influence of her manner and expression. - -As she sat there reading her letter, neither moving nor speaking, she -was stamped from head to foot--as far as externals went--as one of a -type of woman which commands more superficial homage than perhaps any -other--the woman of the world. The self-possession, the quiet, -unquestioning assurance, even the superficiality of her expression in -its total absence of intellectuality or emotionalism, spoke to -character; the narrow character, truly, which is cognisant only of -shallow waters, knows them, and reigns in them. But it was a noticeable -feature about her that even this character had gone to the accentuation -of the type in her. As to her age, it would have been extremely -difficult to guess it from her appearance. Her face was quite -unworn--evidently such emotions as she had known had gone by no means -deep--and yet it was not young; there was too much knowledge of the -world about it for youthfulness. As a matter of fact, she was twenty-six -years old. She was sitting alone at the little table by the window, and -her perfect freedom from nervousness, or even consciousness of the -admiring glances cast at her, emphasized her perfect self-possession. - -A waiter, smiling and assiduous even beyond the smiling assiduity with -which he had waited at other tables, appeared with her breakfast, and as -he arranged it on the table, she replaced the blotted letter in its -envelope with a certain lingering touch that was apparently quite -unconscious, and contrasted rather oddly with her self-possessed face. - -The envelope was addressed in a woman’s writing to “Mrs. William -Romayne, Hôtel Florian, Nice.” It was one of a pile, and she took up the -others and looked them through. They all bore the same name. - -“There are no letters for Mr. Romayne?” she said to the waiter -carelessly. - -The voice was rather thin, and, as would have been expected from her -face, slightly unsympathetic, but it was refined and well modulated. Her -French was excellent. - -The waiter thus questioned showed a letter--a business-like looking -letter in a blue envelope--which he had brought in on his tray; and -presented it with a torrent of explanation and apology. It had arrived -last night, before the arrival of monsieur and madame, and with -unheard-of carelessness, but with quite amazing carelessness indeed, it -had been placed in a private sitting-room ordered by another English -monsieur, who had arrived only this morning. By the valet of this -English monsieur it had been given to the waiter this moment only; by -the waiter it was now given to madame with ten million desolations that -such an accident should have occurred. Monsieur had seemed so anxious -for letters on his arrival! If madame would have the goodness to -explain! - -Madame stopped the flood of protestations with a little gesture. However -it might affect monsieur, the accident did not appear to disturb her -greatly. Indeed, it was inconceivable that she should be easily ruffled. - -“Let Mr. Romayne have the letter at once,” she said, “and send him also -a cup of coffee and an English newspaper!” - -The waiter signified his readiness to do her bidding with the greatest -alacrity, took the letter from her with an apologetic bow, laid by her -side a newspaper for madame’s own reading, as he said, and retired. Left -once more alone, madame proceeded to breakfast in a dainty, leisurely -fashion, ignoring the newspaper for the present, and drawing from the -envelope in which she had replaced the childish little epistle, a second -letter. It was a long one, and she read it placidly as she went on with -her breakfast. - - “MY DEAR HERMIA,” it ran, “Julian has just accomplished the - enclosed with a great deal of pride and excitement. The wild - scrawls that occur here and there were the result of imperative - demands on his part to be allowed to write ‘all by himself’! The - dear pet is very well, and grows sweeter every day, I believe. You - were to meet Mr. Romayne at Mentone, on the second, I think he - said, and to go on to Nice the next day, so I hope you will get - this soon after you arrive there. I hope the change will do Mr. - Romayne good. He came here to see Julian yesterday, and I did not - think him looking well, nor did father. He only laughed when father - told him so. We were so glad to get your last letter. You are not a - very good correspondent, are you? But, of course, you were going - out a great deal in Paris and had not much time for writing. You - seem to have had a delightful time there. - - “Dennis Falconer came back last week. He has been away nearly a - year, you know. He is very brown, and has a long beard, which is - rather becoming. The Royal Geographical are beginning to think - rather highly of him, father is told, and he will probably get - something important to do before long. Father wanted him to come - and stay here, but he has gone back to his old chambers. Not very - cousinly of him, I think! - - “You don’t say whether you are coming to London for the season? I - asked Mr. Romayne, but he said he did not know what your plans - were. I do so hope you will come, though I am afraid I should not - be pleased if the spirit should move you to settle down in England - and demand Julian! However, I suppose that is not very likely? - - “With much love, dear Hermia, - - “Your very affectionate Cousin, - - “FRANCES FALCONER.” - - - -Mrs. Romayne finished the letter, which she had read with leisurely -calm, as though her interest in it was by no means of a thrilling -nature, and then opened and glanced through, the others which were -waiting their turn. They were of various natures; one or two came from -villas about Nice, and consisted of more or less pressing invitations; -one was from a well-known leader of society in Rome--a long, chatty -letter, which the recipient read with evident amusement and interest. -There were also one or two bills, at which Mrs. Romayne glanced with the -composure of a woman with whom money is plentiful. - -Breakfast and correspondence were alike disposed of at last, and by this -time the room was nearly full. The laughter and talk was louder now, the -atmosphere of gaiety was more accentuated. Outside in the sunshine in -the public gardens a band was playing. Mrs. Romayne was alone, it is -true, and her voice consequently added nothing to the pervading note, -but her presence, solitary as it was, was no jarring element. She was -not lonely; her solitude was evidently an affair of the moment merely; -she was absolutely in touch with the spirit of the hour, and no -laughing, excited girl there witnessed more eloquently or more -unconsciously to the all-pervading dominion of the pleasures of life -than did the self-possessed looking little woman, to whom its pleasures -were also its businesses--the only businesses she knew. - -She had gathered her letters together, and was rising from her seat with -a certain amount of indecision in her face, when a waiter entered the -room and came up to her. “Some ladies wishing to see madame were in the -salon,” he said, and he handed her as he spoke a visiting-card bearing -the name, “Lady Cloughton.” Underneath the name was written in pencil, -“An unconscionable hour to invade you, but we are going this afternoon -to La Turbie, and we hope we may perhaps persuade you to join us.” - -“The ladies are in the salon, you say?” said Mrs. Romayne, glancing up -with the careless satisfaction of a woman to whom the turn of events -usually does bring satisfaction; perhaps because her demands and her -experience are alike of the most superficial description. - -“In the salon, madame,” returned the waiter. “Three ladies and two -gentlemen.” - -He was conducting her obsequiously across the room as he spoke, and a -moment later he opened the door of the salon and stood aside to let her -pass in. - -A little well-bred clamour ensued upon her entrance; greetings, -questions and answers as between acquaintances who had not met for some -time, and met now with a pleasure which seemed rather part and parcel of -the gaiety to which the atmosphere of the dining-room had witnessed than -an affair of the feelings. All Mrs. Romayne’s five visitors were -apparently under five-and-thirty, the eldest being a man of perhaps -three or four-and-thirty, addressed by Mrs. Romayne as Lord Cloughton; -the youngest a pretty girl who was introduced by the leader of the -party, presumably Lady Cloughton, herself quite a young woman, as “my -little sister.” They were all well-dressed; they were all apparently in -the best possible spirits, and bent upon enjoyment; and gay little -laughs interspersed the chatter, incessantly breaking from one or the -other on little or no apparent provocation. Eventually Lady Cloughton’s -voice detached itself and went on alone. - -“We heard you were here,” she said, “from a man who is staying here. We -are at the Français, you know. And we said at once, ‘Supposing Mrs. -Romayne is not engaged for to-morrow’--so many people don’t come, you -see, until the day before the carnival, and consequently, of course, one -has fewer friends and fewer engagements, and this week is not so full, -don’t you know--‘supposing she has no engagement for to-morrow,’ we -said, ‘how pleasant it would be if she would come with us to La Turbie.’ -We have to make Mr. Romayne’s acquaintance, you know. So charmed to have -the opportunity! I hope he is well?” - -“Fairly well, thanks,” replied his wife. “He has been in London all the -winter--his business always seems to take him to the wrong place at the -wrong time--and either the climate or his work seems to have knocked him -up a little. He seems to have got into a shocking habit of sitting up -all night and staying in bed all day. At least he has acted on that -principle during the week we have been together. He is actually not up -yet.” - -Mrs. Romayne smiled as she spoke; her husband’s “shocking habits” -apparently sat very lightly on her; in fact, there was something -singularly disengaged and impersonal in her manner of speaking of him, -altogether. Her visitor received her smile with a pretty little -unmeaning laugh, and went on with much superficial eagerness: - -“He may, perhaps, be up in time for our expedition, though! We thought -of starting in about two hours’ time. They say the place is perfectly -beautiful at this time of year. Perhaps you know it.” - -“No,” returned Mrs. Romayne. “Oddly enough I have never been to Nice -before. I have often talked of wintering here, but I have always -eventually gone somewhere else! Are you here for the first time?” she -added, turning to the young man, whom she had received as Mr. Allan, and -who evidently occupied the position of mutual acquaintance between -herself and her other visitors. He was answering her in the affirmative -when Lord Cloughton struck in with a cheery laugh. - -“He’s been here two days, and he has come to the conclusion that Nice is -a beastly hole, Mrs. Romayne!” he said. “This afternoon’s expedition is -really a device on our part for cheering him up. He let himself be -persuaded into putting some money into a new bank, and the new bank has -smashed. Have you seen the papers? Now, Allan hasn’t lost much, -fortunately; it isn’t that that weighs upon him. But he is oppressed by -a sense of his own imbecility, aren’t you, old fellow?” - -The young man laughed, freely enough. - -“Perhaps I am,” he said. “So would you be, Cloughton, wouldn’t he, Mrs. -Romayne? And don’t tell me you wouldn’t have done the same, because any -fellow would, in my place. However, if Mrs. Romayne is more likely to -join us this afternoon if the proceedings are presented to her in the -light of a charity, I’m quite willing to pose as an object! Take pity on -me, Mrs. Romayne, do!” - -“I shan’t pity you,” answered Mrs. Romayne lightly. “You don’t seem to -me to be much depressed, and your misfortunes appear to be of your own -making. But I shall be delighted to go with you this afternoon,” she -continued, turning to Lady Cloughton. “And I feel sure that Mr. Romayne -will also be delighted.” - -“That is quite charming of you!” exclaimed Lady Cloughton, rising as she -spoke. “Well, then, I think if we were to call for you--yes, we will -call for you in two hours from now. So glad you can come! The little boy -quite well? So glad. In two hours, then! Au revoir.” - -There was a flutter of departure, a chorus of bright, meaningless, last -words, and Mrs. Romayne stood at the head of the great staircase, waving -her hand in farewell as her visitors, with a last backward glance and -parting smiles and gestures, disappeared from view. She stood a moment -watching some people in the hall below, whose appearance had struck her -at dinner on the previous evening, and as she looked idly at them she -saw a man come in--an Englishman, evidently just off a journey, and “not -a gentleman” as she decided absently--and go up to a waiter who was -standing in the dining-room doorway. The Englishman evidently asked a -question and then another and another, and finally the waiter glanced -up the stairs to where Mrs. Romayne stood carelessly watching, and -obviously pointed her out to his interlocutor, asking a question in his -turn. The Englishman, after looking quickly in Mrs. Romayne’s direction, -shook his head in answer and walked into the dining-room. - -With a vague feeling of surprise and curiosity Mrs. Romayne turned and -moved away. She retraced her steps, evidently intending to go upstairs, -but as she passed the open door of the drawing-room she hesitated; her -eyes caught by the bright prospect visible through the open windows -which looked out over the public gardens and the blue Mediterranean; her -ears caught by the sounds from the band still playing outside. She -re-entered the room, crossed to the window and stood there, looking out -with inattentive pleasure, the dialogue she had witnessed in the hall -quite forgotten as she thought of her own affairs. She thought of the -immediate prospects of the next few weeks; wholly satisfactory prospects -they were, to judge from her expression. She thought of the letters she -had received that morning, mentally answering the invitations she had -received. She thought of the acquaintances who had just left her, and of -the engagement she had made for that afternoon; and then, as if the -necessity for seeing her husband on the subject had by this means become -freshly present to her, she turned away from the window and went out of -the room and up the staircase. On her way she chanced to glance down -into the hall and noticed the Englishman to whom the waiter had pointed -her out, leaning in a reposeful and eminently stationary attitude -against the entrance. She would ask who he was, she resolved idly. She -went on until she came to a door at the end of a long corridor, outside -which stood a dainty little pair of walking shoes and a pair of man’s -boots. She glanced at them and lifted her eyebrows slightly--a -characteristic gesture--and then opened the door. - -It led into a little dressing-room, from which another doorway on the -left led, evidently, into a larger room beyond. The glimpse of the -latter afforded by the partly open door showed it dim and dark by -contrast with the light outside; apparently the blind was but slightly -raised. There was no sunshine in the dressing-room, either, though it -was light enough; and as Mrs. Romayne went in and shut the door she -seemed to pass into a silence that was almost oppressive. The band, the -strains of which had reached her at the very threshold, was not audible -in the room; in shutting the door she seemed to shut out all external -sounds, and within the room was absolute stillness. - -The contrast, however, made no impression whatever upon Mrs. Romayne. -She was by no means sensitive, evidently, to such subtle influence. She -glanced carelessly through the doorway into the dim vista of the bedroom -beyond, and going to the other end of the dressing-room knelt down by a -portmanteau, and began to search in it with the uncertainty of a woman -whose packing is done for her by a maid. She found what she wanted; -sundry dainty adjuncts to out-of-door attire, one of which, a large lace -sunshade, required a little attention. She took up an elaborate little -case for work implements that lay on the table, and selected a needle -and thread, and a thimble; and perhaps the dead silence about her -oppressed her a little, unconsciously to herself, for she hummed as she -did so a bar or two of the waltz she had shut out as she shut the door. -Then with the needle moving deftly to and fro in her white, well-shaped -hands, she moved down the dressing-room, and standing in the light for -the sake of her work, she spoke through the doorway into the still, dark -bedroom. - -“The Cloughtons have been here, William,” she said. “The people I met in -Rome this winter; I think I told you, didn’t I? They wanted us to go to -La Turbie with them this afternoon, and I said we would. That is to say, -I only answered conditionally for you, of course. Will you go?” - -There was no answer, no sound of any kind. Not so much as a stir or a -rustle to indicate that the sleep of the man hidden in the dimness -beyond--and only sleep surely could account for his silence--was even -broken by the words addressed to him. Yet the voice which proceeded from -the serene, well-appointed little figure standing in the sombre light of -the dressing-room, with its attention more or less given to the trivial -work in its hands, was penetrating in its quality, though not loud. - -Mrs. Romayne paused a moment, listening. Then, with that expressive -movement of her eyebrows, she went back again to the dressing-table she -had left, took up a little pair of scissors which were necessary to give -the finishing touch to her work, gave that finishing touch with careless -deliberation, studied the effect with satisfaction, and then laid down -the sunshade, and returned to the doorway into the bedroom. She stood on -the threshold this time, and the darkness before her and the sombre -light behind her seemed to meet upon her figure; the silence and -stillness all about her seemed to claim even the space she occupied. - -“William!” she said crisply. “William!” - -Again there was no answer; no sound or stir of any sort or kind. And for -the first time the silence seemed to strike her. She moved quickly -forward into the dimness. - -“William! Are you asleep----” - -Her eyes had fallen on the bed, and she stopped suddenly. For it was -empty. She paused an instant, and in that instant the silence seemed to -rise and dominate the atmosphere as with a grim and mighty presence, -before which everything shallow or superficial sank into insignificance. -All that was typical and conventional about the woman standing in the -midst of the stillness, arrested by she knew not what, suddenly seemed -to stand out jarring and incongruous, as though unreality had been met -and touched into self-revelation by a great reality. Then it subsided -altogether, and only the simplest elements of womanhood were left--the -womanhood common to the peasant and the princess--as the wife took two -or three quick steps forward. She turned the corner of the bed that hid -the greater part of the room from her, and then staggered back with a -sharp cry. At her feet, partly dressed, there lay the figure of the man -to whom she had been talking; his right hand, dropped straight by his -side, clenched a revolver; his face--a handsome face probably an hour -ago--was white and fixed; his eyes were glassy. On the floor beside him -lay an open letter--a letter written on blue paper. - -William Romayne was asleep indeed. His wife might tear at the bell-rope; -the hotel servants might hurry and rush to and fro; even the -recently-arrived Englishman might render his assistance. But it was all -in vain. William Romayne was beyond their reach. - - - - -CHAPTER II - - -The long railway journey from Paris to Nice was nearly over. The -passengers, jaded and tired out, for the most part, after a night in the -train, were beginning to rouse to a languid interest in the landscape; -to become aware that dawn and the uncomfortable and unfamiliar early day -had some time since given place to a fuller and maturer light; and to -consult their watches, reminding themselves--or one another, as the case -might be--that they were due at Nice at twelve-fifteen. - -Alone in one of the first-class carriages was a passenger who had -accepted the situation with the most matter-of-fact indifference from -first to last. He had made his arrangements for the night, with the -skill and deliberation of an experienced traveller; and as the morning -advanced he had composed himself, as comfortably as circumstances -permitted, in a corner of his carriage, now and then casting a keen, -comprehensive glance at the country through which he was being carried. -These glances, however, were evidently instinctive and almost -unconscious. For the most part he gazed straight before him with a -preoccupied frown and a grave and anxious expression in marked contrast -with his physical imperturbability. He was a man of apparently three or -four-and-thirty; tall; rather lean than thin; and very muscular-looking. -His face, and the right hand from which he had pulled off the glove, -were bronzed a deep red-brown, and he wore a long brown beard; but he -was not otherwise remarkable-looking. His eyes, indeed, were very keen -and steady, but the rest of his face conveyed the impression that he -owed these characteristics rather to trained habits of material -observation than to general intellectual depths; the mouth was firm and -strong, but neither sensitive nor sympathetic, and the straight, -well-cut nose was as distinctly too thin as the rather high forehead was -too narrow. On a much-worn travelling-bag on the seat beside him, was -the name Dennis Falconer. - -The train steamed slowly into the station at Nice at last; the traveller -stepped out on to the platform, and the shade of grave preoccupation -which had touched him seemed to descend on him more heavily and -all-absorbingly as he did so. He was walking down the platform, looking -neither to the right nor the left, when he was stopped by a quick -exclamation from a little wiry man with a shrewd, clever face who had -just come into the station. - -“Falconer, as I’m alive,” he cried. “Well met, my boy!” - -The gravity of the younger man’s face relaxed for the moment into a -smile of well-pleased astonishment. - -“Dr. Aston!” he exclaimed. “Why, I was thinking of looking you up in -London! I’d no idea you were abroad!” - -The other man laughed, a very pleasant, jovial laugh. - -“I’m taking a holiday,” he said. “I don’t know that I’ve any particular -right to it! But I don’t know these places, and I took it into my head -that I should like to have a look at a carnival in Nice. And you, my -boy? Just back from Africa, you are, I know. You’ve come for the -carnival by way of a change, eh?” - -Falconer’s face altered. - -“No!” he said gravely, and with a good deal of restraint. “I’ve not come -for pleasure. Very much the reverse, I’m sorry to say.” - -He paused, apparently intending to say no more on the subject. But the -keen, kindly interest in his hearer’s face, or something magnetic about -the man, influenced him in spite of himself. - -“I don’t know whether the facts about this bank business are known here -yet,” he said, “but if they are you’ll understand, Aston, when I tell -you that I and my old uncle are the only male relations of William -Romayne’s wife.” - -A quick flash of grave intelligence passed across Dr. Aston’s face. He -hesitated, and glanced dubiously at the younger man. - -“When did you leave London?” he said abruptly. - -“Yesterday morning,” was the somewhat surprised reply. - -“You’ve come in good time, my boy,” said Dr. Aston very gravely. “Mrs. -Romayne wants a relation with her if ever she did in her life. Was her -husband ever a friend of yours, Dennis?” - -“I have never met him. I know very little even of his wife. What is it, -doctor?” - -“William Romayne shot himself yesterday morning!” - -A short, sharp exclamation broke from Falconer, and then there was a -moment’s total silence between the two men as the sudden, unspeakable -horror in Falconer’s face resolved itself into a shocked, almost -awestruck gravity. - -“I am thankful to have met you,” he said at last in a low, stern voice; -“and I am more than thankful that I came.” - -He held out his hand as he spoke, as though what he had heard impelled -him to go on his way, and Dr. Aston wrung it with warm sympathy. - -“We shall meet again,” he said. “Let me know if I can be of any use. I -am staying at the Français.” - -Grave and stern, but not apparently shaken or rendered nervous by the -news he had heard, or by the prospect of the meeting before him, as a -sympathetic or emotional man must have been, Dennis Falconer strode out -of the station. Grave and stern he reached his destination, and enquired -for Mrs. Romayne. His question was answered by the proprietor himself, -supplemented by half-audible ejaculations from attendant waiters, in a -tone in which sympathetic interest, familiarity, and even a certain -amount of resentment were inextricably blended. - -Monsieur would see Madame Romayne--_cette pauvre madame_, of a demeanour -so beautiful, yes, even in these frightful circumstances, so beautiful -and so distinguished? Monsieur had but just arrived from -England--monsieur had then perhaps not heard? Monsieur was aware? He was -a kinsman of madame? Monsieur would then doubtless appreciate the so -great inconvenience occasioned, the hardly-to-be-reckoned damage -sustained by one of the first hotels in Nice, by the event? Monsieur -would see madame at once? But yes, madame was visible. There was, in -fact, a monsieur with her even now--an English monsieur from the -English Scotland Yard. Madame had sent---- But monsieur was indeed in -haste. - -Monsieur left no possibility of doubt on that score. The waiter, told -off by a wave of the proprietor’s hand on the vigorous demonstration to -that effect evoked by the mention of the monsieur from Scotland Yard, -had to hasten his usual pace considerably to keep ahead of those quick, -firm footsteps, and it was almost breathlessly that he at last threw -open a door at the end of a long corridor. - -“Mr. Romayne’s name is public property in connection with the affair, -then, in London, since yesterday morning?” - -The words, spoken in a hard, thin, woman’s voice, came to Falconer’s ear -as the door opened; and the waiter’s announcement, “A kinsman of -madame,” passed unheeded as he moved hastily forward into the room. - -It was a small private sitting-room, evidently by no means the best in -the hotel. With his back to the door stood a young man in an attitude of -professional calm, rather belied by a certain nervous fingering of the -hat he held, which seemed to say that he found his position a somewhat -embarrassing one. Facing him, and indirectly facing the door, stood Mrs. -Romayne. - -She was dressed in black from head to foot, but the gown she wore was -one that she had had in her wardrobe--very fashionably made, with no -trace of mourning about it other than its hue. - -Emphasized, perhaps, by the incongruity of her conventional smartness, -but a result of the past twenty-four hours independent of any such -emphasis, all the more salient points of her demeanour of the day before -seemed to be accentuated into hardness. Her perfect self-possession, as -she faced the young man before her--it was the man she had noticed on -the previous morning questioning the waiter--was hard; her perfect -freedom from any touch of emotion or agitation was hard; her face, a -little sharpened and haggard, and reddened slightly about the eyelids, -apparently rather from want of sleep than from tears, was very hard; her -eyes, brighter than usual, and her rather thin mouth, were eloquent of -bitterness, rather than desolation, of spirit. - -She turned quickly towards the door as Falconer entered, and looked at -him for an instant with an unrecognising stare. Then, as he advanced to -her without speaking, and with outstretched hand, something that was -almost a spasm of comprehension passed across her face, settling into a -stiff little society smile. - -“It is Dennis Falconer, isn’t it?” she said, holding out her hand to -him. “I ought to have known you at once. I am very glad to see you.” - -“My uncle thought---- We decided yesterday morning----” - -Dennis Falconer hesitated and stopped. He was thrown out of his -reckoning, taken hopelessly aback, as it were, by something so entirely -unlike what he had expected as was her whole bearing; though, indeed, he -had been quite unconscious of expecting anything. But Mrs. Romayne -remained completely mistress of the situation. - -“It is very kind of you,” she said, with the same hard composure. “It -was very kind of my uncle.” She hesitated, hardly perceptibly, and then -said, the lines about her mouth growing more bitter, “You have heard?” - -Falconer bowed his head in assent, and she turned toward the young man, -who had drawn a little apart during this colloquy. - -“This gentleman comes from Scotland Yard,” she said. “Perhaps you will -be so kind as to go into matters with him. I do not understand business -or legal details. Mr. Falconer will represent me,” she added to the -young man, who bowed with an alacrity that suggested, as did his glance -at Falconer, that the prospect of conferring with a man rather than a -woman was a distinct relief to him. Then, before Falconer’s not very -rapid mind had adjusted itself to the situation, she had bowed slightly -to the young man and left the room. - - - - -CHAPTER III - - -Three days before, the name of William Romayne had been widely known and -respected throughout Europe as the name of a successful and -distinguished financier. Now, it was the centre of a nine-days’ wonder -as the name of a master swindler, detected. - -A bank, established in London within the last twelve months in -connection with a company offering an exceptionally high rate of -interest, had suddenly suspended payment. The circumstances were so -ordinary, and the explanation offered so plausible, that at first no -suspicion of underhand dealings presented itself. It was in connection -with the first whispers--which ran like wildfire through financial -London--of something beneath the surface, that it first became known -that William Romayne had some connection, as yet undefined by rumour, -with the bank in question; a fact hitherto quite unknown. The whispers -grew with rapidity which was almost incredible even to the whisperers, -into a definite and authentic shout of accusation; and with the exposure -of an outline of such daring and ingenious fraud as had not been -perpetrated for many a day, another fact had become public property. The -exposure had been brought about by an incredibly short-sighted blunder -on the part of the master mind by which the whole affair had been -conceived. William Romayne’s was the master mind, and William Romayne, -in trying to overreach alike his dupes and his confederates, had -overreached himself. His own hand had created the clue which had led -eventually to the ruin of the scheme he had originated. His death, with -the news of which the London Stock Exchange was ringing only a few hours -after it was known in Nice, was the forfeit paid by a strong nature to -which success in all its undertakings was the very salt of life. - -Mrs. Romayne, on leaving the sitting-room, passed along the passages to -her own room--not that which she had entered twenty-four hours before to -consult with her husband as to the pleasure expedition of the -afternoon--her face and manner altering not at all. Her composure was -evidently neither forced nor unreal. The emotion created in her by the -tragic circumstances through which she was living was obviously not the -heartbroken shame and despair naturally to be attributed to a wife so -situated, but a bitter and burning resentment. Had William Romayne -passed away in the ordinary course of nature, or by any violent -accident, his widow would have mourned him with conventional lamentation -and with a certain amount of genuine regret. He had committed suicide, -as the letter lying by his side revealed to his wife even while she -hardly realised that he was indeed dead, as his only way of escape from -the consequences of fraud on the brink of detection; and his widow’s -attitude to his memory under these circumstances was the natural outcome -of the character of their married life. - -Hermia Stirling at nineteen had been a pretty, practical, matter-of-fact -girl, with her rather shallow nature somewhat prematurely matured. She -had been an orphan from her babyhood, and having no near relations in -England, her nineteen years of life had been lived under varied -auspices, resulting in more desultory education, moral as well as -mental, than was good for her. The most impressionable of those years, -however--those from fourteen to nineteen--had been passed with -connections of her mother’s, young and wealthy society women, with no -ideas beyond society life, and with little perceptible principle but -that of social expediency. Hermia was just nineteen, just out, and -taking to the life before her with the ease and zest of a born woman of -the world, when one of these ladies died, and the other married and went -away to America with her husband. At this juncture the girl’s guardian, -her father’s only brother, returned from India to settle in London with -his only child, a girl two years older than Hermia; and it was obvious -that his home must be also Hermia’s. But neither old Mr. Falconer nor -his daughter had the slightest taste or capacity for fashionable life, -and before she had spent six months with them the world had become to -Hermia an insufferably dull and tiresome place. - -She had known William Romayne in society. He was rich, he was handsome, -and he was very popular; there was that indefinable something about him, -manner, magnetism, or tact, which constitutes a kind of dominating -charm. He was not the less “somebody” in that he was vaguely understood -to be a business man of some sort, with dealings in shares and stocks -all over the world--a locality which lent a picturesque haziness to his -affairs. Consequently, when he followed Hermia into her new life and -asked her to marry him, she passed over the fact that he was -five-and-twenty years her senior, and consented with the practical -promptitude of a nature for which romance and sentiment were not. For -eighteen months she and her husband had lived in a large house in Eaton -Square, entertaining and being entertained through two brilliant -seasons, which took away any girlishness which Hermia had ever -possessed, and gave her qualities which she admired infinitely more. She -found her husband very pleasant, very easy to live with, and, after the -first six months, quite unexacting. His business took him into the City -every day at this time, though, as his wife said, complacently, he was -not the least like the ordinary City man; but at the end of the season -which followed on the birth of their child he announced that he would -have to spend certainly six months, possibly more, in America. - -He showed no ardent desire to take his wife with him, and his wife had -no desire whatever to go. She wanted to spend the rest of the summer at -one of the fashionable health resorts, and to winter in Rome. Such an -arrangement was accordingly made between them in the simplest, most -matter-of-fact way, arguing no shadow of ill-will on either side; and -during the four years which had elapsed since then, husband and wife had -each gone his or her own way, meeting when occasion served for a month -or two at a time, now in London, now in Paris, now in Rome; and -presumably finding the arrangement mutually satisfactory. The little boy -had been left for the most part to the care of Mrs. Romayne’s cousin, -Frances Falconer. Mrs. Romayne regarded him with the careless, -half-dormant affection of a woman to whom her child owes nothing but -bare life; to whom its arrival in the world has been rather a tiresome -interlude, merely, in her round of pleasures and pursuits; who has had -no time since, and has seen no occasion to make time, to give it that -care which other people, as it seemed to her, could give it quite as -well as she; and who is waiting, vaguely, until it shall be “grown up,” -to find it interesting. - -That her husband’s “business” had taken him in the course of those four -years into every corner of the globe where the passing of money from -hand to hand is elevated into a science, Mrs. Romayne knew; and with -that fact her knowledge of his affairs began and ended. He made her an -ample allowance; whenever they met she found him the same handsome, -rather callous, but withal fascinating man; clever with a cleverness -which she could appreciate--the cleverness which made money, and held a -position in society--and she had asked nothing more of him. Her regard -for him, if regard that could be called which was more truly -indifference, had been founded on appreciation of his success. Before -failure, before the social disgrace which must be the lot of a detected -swindler and suicide, it disappeared totally and instantaneously, to be -replaced by a burning sense of personal outrage and insult. - -It was late in the afternoon before she left her room again. Dennis -Falconer received a message to the effect that Mrs. Romayne was sure -that he must be tired, and begged that he would not think of her until -he had lunched and rested. - -When she did reappear she was in widow’s weeds, and the contrast between -her dress, with its tragic significance of desolation, and her face, -untouched with feeling, was inexpressible. - -Dennis Falconer was in the sitting-room when she entered it. His sense -of duty was largely developed, and he was also keenly sensible of the -moral aspect of the affair with which he was brought into such close -contact. The first of these senses kept him in waiting in anticipation -of the appearance of the woman for whose assistance he was there; and -the second weighed so heavily upon him that the publicity of the hotel -smoking-room would have been intolerable to him under the circumstances. - -He rose quickly as Mrs. Romayne came in, a look of slight constraint on -his face. - -Dennis Falconer had no near relation, and perhaps this absence of close -ties to England had had something to do with his adoption of the life of -a traveller and explorer in connection with the Royal Geographical -Society. Old Mr. Falconer, Mrs. Romayne’s uncle, was his second cousin -only, though the younger man had been brought up to address him as -uncle; but in so small a clan distant relationship counts for more than -in a family where first cousins and brothers and sisters abound, and -there was nothing strange to Dennis Falconer or to Mrs. Romayne in the -fact of his coming to her support, even though they hardly knew one -another. But Falconer had been chilled and even repelled by her manner -of the morning, and he was very conscious now of having his cousin’s -acquaintance to make, and of approaching the process with a vague -prejudice against her in his mind. - -This prejudice was not dissipated by her first words, spoken with a -suavity somewhat low in pitch, truly, but with a tacit ignoring of the -significance of their meeting which seemed to the man she addressed--to -whom society life with its obligations and conventionalities was -practically an unknown quantity--simply jarring and unsuitable. - -“I hope you are rested!” she said. “I suppose, though, that to such a -traveller as you are, the journey from London to Nice is nothing. I hear -from Frances constantly about your exploits, and she tells me that we -are to expect great things of you. What a long time it is since we met!” - -She sat down as she spoke, with a hard little smile, and Falconer -murmured something almost unintelligible. Thinking that his manner arose -from mere embarrassment, instinct dictated to her to set him at his -ease; and with no faintest comprehension of his attitude of mind she -proceeded to chat to him about his own affairs, asking him questions -which elicited coherent answers indeed, but answers which grew terser -and sterner until she thought indifferently that her cousin was a -rather heavy person. At last there came a pause; a pause during which -Falconer gazed grimly and uncomfortably at the floor. And when Mrs. -Romayne broke it, it was with a different tone and manner, hard and -matter-of-fact. - -“The detective told you more than he told me, possibly,” she said. “If -there is anything more for me to hear, I should like to hear it. You had -better, I think, read this letter. Mr. Romayne received it yesterday -morning.” - -She handed him that letter written on blue paper which had lain by the -dead man’s side, and Falconer took it in silence. - -The letter was from one of William Romayne’s confederates. It was the -desperate letter of a desperate man who knew himself to be addressing -the man to whom he was to owe ruin and disgrace. The crisis had -evidently been so wholly unexpected that detection was actually imminent -before the criminals recognised it as even possible. The gist of the -letter was contained in the statement that before it met the eyes of the -man for whom it was intended, the whole scheme would be exploded. - -Falconer read it through, his face very stern. He finished it and -refolded it, still in silence, and Mrs. Romayne said in a dry, thin -voice: - -“It bears out, as you see, what the detective no doubt told you--that -there was so little ground for suspicion three days ago that he was sent -out merely to watch, and without even a warrant. He found a telegram -waiting for him here from his authorities yesterday morning.” - -“He told me so!” answered Falconer distantly and constrainedly, handing -her back the letter as he spoke without comment. - -“There is not the faintest possibility of hushing it up, I conclude?” -she asked, in the same hard voice. - -Falconer looked at her for a moment, the indefinite disapprobation of -her, which had been growing in him almost with every word she said, -taking form in his face in a distinct expression of reprobation. - -“Not the faintest!” he said emphatically. “Nor do I see that such a -possibility is in any way to be desired.” - -She glanced at him with a quick movement of her eyebrows. She did not -speak, however, and a silence ensued between them; one of those -uncomfortable silences eloquent of conscious want of sympathy. It was -broken this time by Falconer, who spoke with formal politeness and -restraint. - -“You will wish to get away from this place as soon as possible, no -doubt,” he said. “There may be some slight delay before we are put into -possession of the papers and other effects at present in the hands of -the authorities here. But I will, of course, do all I can to hasten -matters.” - -“Thanks!” she said. “The papers? Oh, you mean Mr. Romayne’s papers! Are -there any, do you think? A will, I suppose?” - -“The will, if there is one, will be so much waste paper, I fear,” said -Falconer with uncompromising sternness. “There is no chance of any -property being saved, even if it was possible to wish for such a thing. -But there may be papers, nevertheless; in fact, no doubt there must be; -and you will, of course, wish to have them.” - -“Yes,” said Mrs. Romayne thoughtfully; “yes, of course.” She paused a -moment, and then added in a dry, constrained voice: “Do you mean me to -understand that I am absolutely penniless?” - -“Was your own money in your own hands, or in Mr. Romayne’s?” - -“In Mr. Romayne’s.” - -“Then I fear there can be no doubt that such is the case.” - -Falconer spoke very stiffly and distantly, and Mrs. Romayne rose from -her chair a little abruptly, and walked to the window. When she turned -to him again it was to speak of the formalities necessary with the Nice -authorities, and a few moments later the interview was ended by the -appearance of dinner. - -During the few days that followed, the distance between them, which that -first interview established so imperceptibly but so certainly, never -lessened; it grew, indeed, with their contact with one another. - -To Falconer Mrs. Romayne’s whole attitude of mind, her whole -personality, was simply and entirely antipathetic. That a woman under -such circumstances should speak, and act, and think as Mrs. Romayne -spoke, and acted, and--as far as he could tell--thought; with so little -sense of any but the social aspect of her husband’s crime; with so -little realisation of the ruin that crime had brought to hundreds of -innocent people; with so little moral feeling of any kind; was in the -highest degree reprehensible to him. Having assumed a mental attitude of -reprehension, he stopped short; his perceptions were not sufficiently -keen to allow of his understanding that some pity might be due also. - -Suffering is not always to be estimated by the worth of the object -through which it is inflicted; not often, indeed, in this world, where -the sum of man’s suffering is out of all proportion greater than the sum -of man’s spirituality. Mrs. Romayne’s conception of life might be in the -last degree narrow and selfish, and as such it might be in the highest -degree to be deprecated; but such as it was it was all she had, and -within its limits her life was now in ruin. Her aims and ends in life -might be of the poorest, and deserving of unsparing condemnation; but -she had nothing beyond, and the pain of their overthrow was to her -dormant sensibility not so very disproportionate to the suffering -inflicted on a more sensitive organisation by the shattering of higher -hopes. - -Mrs. Romayne, for her part, found her cousin, with the reserve and -formality of demeanour which the situation developed in him, simply a -tiresome and uncongenial companion. He was very attentive to her. His -manner, as she acknowledged to herself more than once with a heavy sigh, -was excellent, and he managed her difficult and painful affairs with -admirable strength and tact; she learnt in the course of those few days -to respect him and depend on him, in spite of herself and even against -her will. But it was not surprising that the end of their enforced dual -solitude should be looked for more or less eagerly by both parties. They -were almost entirely dependent on one another for companionship. -Falconer, it is true, saw Dr. Aston once or twice; but of Mrs. Romayne’s -acquaintances not one had even left a card of condolence upon her. -Neither the Cloughtons nor any other of the pleasure-seekers who had -previously been so anxious for her society, showed any sign of being -aware of her existence under her present circumstances. - -The form taken by Falconer’s first allusion to the probable limits of -their detention in Nice had created in both of them, by one of those -vague chains of idea which are so unaccountable and so often -experienced, a tendency to think and speak of the termination of that -detention, when they did speak together on the subject, as “when the -papers are given up.” There was some question, at one time, as to -whether or no even the private papers of William Romayne would be -returned to his widow. And these same papers, thus surrounded by an -element of painful uncertainty, and at the same time elevated into a -kind of order of release, obtained in the minds of both a fictitious -importance on their own account. Mrs. Romayne found herself thinking -about them, conjecturing about them, even dreaming about them; until at -last, when they were actually placed in her hand, they possessed a -curious fascination for her. - -It was about midday when she and Falconer returned from their final -appearance before the authorities. She stood in the middle of the room -holding the large, shabby despatch-box, lately handed to her with a -grave “Private papers, madame”; the noise of the carnival floated in at -the window in striking contrast with the two sombre figures. - -“I think I will go and look them over!” she said in a low, rather -surprised voice. “You would like to go out, perhaps. Please don’t think -about me. I will spend the day quietly indoors.” - -He answered her courteously, and she left the room slowly, with her eyes -fixed curiously on the despatch-box in her hand. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - - -Mrs. Romayne carried the despatch-box to her bedroom and set it down on -a small table. She and Falconer were leaving Nice on the following -morning, and her maid was just finishing her packing. Mrs. Romayne -inspected the woman’s arrangements, gave her sundry orders, and then -dismissed her. Left alone, she made one or two trifling preparations for -the journey on her own account, and when these were completed to her -satisfaction, she drew the table on which she had placed the -despatch-box to the open window, and seated herself. - -She drew the box towards her and unlocked it, and there was nothing in -her face as she did so but the hard resentment which had grown upon it -during the last few days, just touched by an indefinite and equally -hard curiosity. The interest which those papers possessed for her had -been created by purely artificial means; intrinsically they were nothing -to her. The position which the possession of them had occupied in her -thoughts lately was the sole source of the impulse under which she was -acting now; under any other circumstances she might hardly have cared to -look at them. - -She raised the lid and paused a moment, looking down at the compact mass -of papers within with a sudden vague touch of more personal interest. -The box was nearly full. The various sets of papers were carefully and -methodically fastened together, and endorsed evidently upon a system. -Mrs. Romayne hesitated a moment, and then took out a packet at random. - -It consisted of bills all bearing dates within the last six months; all -sent in by leading London tradesmen, and all for large amounts. Mrs. -Romayne glanced at the figures, and her eyebrows moved with an -expression of slight surprise, which was almost immediately dominated by -bitter acceptance and comprehension. She opened none, however, until -she came to one bearing the name of a well-known London jeweller. She -read the name and the amount of the bill, and paused; then a new -curiosity came into her eyes, and she unfolded the paper quickly. The -account was a very long one, and as her eyes travelled quickly down it, -taking in item after item, a dull red colour crept into her face, and -her eyes sparkled with contemptuous resentment. She was evidently -surprised, and yet half-annoyed with herself for being surprised. -Two-thirds of the items in the bill in her hand were for articles of -jewellery not worn by men, and not one of these had ever been seen by -William Romayne’s wife. - -She stuffed the paper back into its fastening, tossed the bundle away -and took another packet from the box with quickened interest. It -consisted of miscellaneous documents, all, likewise, connected with her -husband’s life in London during the past winter, but of no particular -interest. The next packet she opened was of the same nature, and with -that the top layer of the box came to an end. - -The papers below were evidently older; of varying ages, indeed, to judge -from their varying tints of yellow. Disarranging a lower layer in -taking out the packet nearest to her hand, Mrs. Romayne saw that there -were older papers still, beneath, and realised that the box before her -contained the private papers of many years; probably all the private -papers which William Romayne had preserved throughout his life. She -opened the packet she had drawn out, hastily and with an angry glitter -in her eyes. It consisted of businesslike-looking documents, not likely, -as it seemed, to be of any interest to her. - -She glanced through the first unheedingly enough, and then, as she -reached the end, something seemed suddenly to touch her attention. She -paused a moment, with a startled, incredulous expression on her face, -and began to re-read it slowly and carefully. She read it to the end -again, and her face, as she finished, was a little pale and -chilled-looking. She freed another paper from the packet almost -mechanically, with an absorbed, preoccupied look in her eyes, opened it -and read it with a strained, hardly comprehending attention which grew -gradually and imperceptibly, as she went on from paper to paper, into a -kind of stupefied horror. She finished the thick packet in her hands, -and then she paused, lifting her pale face for a moment and gazing -straight before her with an indescribable expression on its shallow -hardness, as though she was realising something almost incredibly bitter -and repugnant to her, and was stunned by the realisation. Then her -instincts and habits of life and thought seemed to assert themselves, as -it were, and to dominate the situation. Her expression changed; the -stupefied look gave place to what was little deeper than bitter -excitement; a patch of angry colour succeeded the pallor of a moment -earlier; and her eyes glittered. - -Turning to the despatch-box again, she proceeded to ransack it with a -hasty eagerness of touch which differed markedly from the careless -composure of her earlier proceedings. Paper after paper was torn open, -glanced through--sometimes even re-read with a feverish attention--and -tossed aside; sometimes with a sudden deepening of that angry flush; -sometimes with a movement of the lips, as though an interjection formed -itself upon them; always with a heightening of her excitement; until one -packet only remained at the bottom of the box. Mrs. Romayne snatched it -out, and then started slightly as she saw that it did not consist, as -the majority of the others had done, of business papers, but of letters -in a woman’s handwriting. Nor was it so old as many of the papers she -had looked at, some of which had borne dates twenty-five years back. She -opened it with a sudden hardening of her excitement, which seemed to -mark the change from almost impersonal to intensely personal interest. -She saw that the date was that of the second year after her marriage; -that each letter was annotated in her husband’s writing; and then she -began deliberately to read, her lips very thin and set, her eyes cold -and hard. She read the letters all through, with every comment inscribed -on them, and by the time she laid the last upon the table her very lips -were white with vindictive feeling strangely incongruous on her little -conventional face. She sat quite still for a moment, and then rose -abruptly and stood by the window with her back to the table, looking -out upon the evening sky. - -The strength of feeling died out of her face, however, in the course of -a very few minutes, leaving it only very white and rather -strange-looking, as though she had received a series of shocks which had -made a mark even on material so difficult to impress as her artificial -personality; and she turned, by-and-by, and contemplated the table, -littered now with documents of all sorts, as though she saw, not the -actual heaps of papers, but something beyond them contemptible and -disgusting to her beyond expression. Then suddenly she moved forward, -crammed the papers indiscriminately into the despatch-box, forced down -the lid, and carried the box out of the room down the stairs towards the -sitting-room where she had left Dennis Falconer. - -It was an impulse not wholly consistent with the self-reliance of her -ordinary manner; but that manner had been acquired in a world where -shocks and difficulties were more or less disbelieved in. Face to face -with so unconventional a condition of affairs Mrs. Romayne’s -conventional instincts were necessarily at fault; and there being no -strong motive power in her to supply their place, it was only natural -that she should relieve herself by turning to the man on whom the past -few days had taught her to rely. - -Dennis Falconer was not in the sitting-room when she opened the door, -but as she stood in the doorway contemplating the empty room, he came -down the corridor behind her. - -“Were you looking for me?” he said with distant courtesy as he reached -her. He made a movement to relieve her of the box she carried, and as he -did so he was struck by her expression. “Is there anything here you wish -me to see?” he said quickly and gravely. - -“Yes,” she said; she spoke in a dry, hard voice, about which there was a -ring of excitement which made him look at her again, and realise vaguely -that something was wrong. - -He followed her into the room, and she motioned to him to put the box on -the table. - -“I have been looking them over,” she said, indicating the papers with a -gesture, “and I have brought them to you. They are very interesting.” - -She laughed a bitter, crackling little laugh, and the disapproval in -ambush in Dennis Falconer’s expression developed a little. - -“Do you wish me to go over them now, and with you?” he enquired stiffly. - -“Not with me, I think, thank you,” she answered, the novel excitement -about her manner finding expression once more in that harsh laugh. “One -reading is enough. But now, if you don’t mind. There are business points -on which I may possibly be mistaken”--she did not look as though she -spoke from conviction--“and--I should like you to read them. I will go -out into the garden; it is quite empty always at this time, and I want -some air.” - -Her tone and the glance she cast at the despatch-box as she spoke made -it evident that it was not closeness of material atmosphere alone that -had created the necessity. - -“I will read them now, certainly, if you wish it,” he returned. - -Then, as she took up a book which lay on a table with a mechanical -gesture of acknowledgement, he opened the door for her and she went out -of the room. He came back to the table, drew up a chair, and opened the -despatch-box. - -Two hours later Dennis Falconer was still sitting in that same chair, -his right hand, which rested on the table, clenched until the knuckles -were white, his face pale to the very lips beneath its tan. In his eyes, -fixed in a kind of dreadful fascination on the innocent-looking piles of -papers before him, there was a look of shocked, almost incredulous -horror, which seemed to touch all that was narrow and dogmatic about his -ordinary expression into something deep and almost solemn. The door -opened, and he started painfully. It was only the waiter with -preliminary preparations for dinner, and recovering himself with an -effort Falconer rose, and slowly, almost as though their very touch was -repugnant to him, began to replace the papers in the box. He locked it, -and then left the room, carrying it with him. - -Dinner was served, and Mrs. Romayne had been waiting some two or three -minutes before he reappeared. He was still pale, and the horror had -rather settled down on to his face than left it; but it had changed its -character somewhat; the breadth was gone from it. It was as though he -had passed through a moment of expansion and insight to contract again -to his ordinary limits. Mrs. Romayne was standing near the window; the -excitement had almost entirely subsided from her manner, leaving her -only harder and more bitter in expression than she had been three hours -before. She glanced sharply at Falconer as he came towards her with a -constrained, conventional word or two of apology; answered him with the -words his speech demanded; and they sat down to dinner. - -It was a silent meal. Mrs. Romayne made two or three remarks on general -topics, and asked one or two questions as to their journey of the -following day; and Falconer responded as briefly as courtesy allowed. On -his own account he originated no observation whatever until dinner was -over, and the final disappearance of the waiter had been succeeded by a -total silence. - -Mrs. Romayne was still sitting opposite him, one elbow resting on the -table, her head leaning on her hand as she absently played with some -grapes on which her eyes were fixed. Falconer glanced across at her once -or twice, evidently with a growing conviction that it was incumbent on -him to speak, and with a growing uncertainty as to what he should say. -This latter condition of things helped to make his tone even unusually -formal and dogmatic as he said at last: - -“Sympathy, I fear, must seem almost a farce!” - -She glanced up quickly, her eyes very bright and hard. - -“Sympathy?” she said drily. “I don’t know that there is any new call for -sympathy, is there? After all, things are very much where they were!” - -A kind of shock passed across Falconer’s face; a materialisation of a -mental process. - -“What we know now----” he began stiffly. - -“What we knew before was quite enough!” interrupted Mrs. Romayne. “When -one has arrived violently at the foot of the precipice, it is of no -particular moment how long one has been living on the precipice’s edge. -While nothing was known, Mr. Romayne was only on the precipice’s edge, -and as no one knew of the precipice it was practically as though none -existed. Directly one thing came out it was all over! He was over the -edge. Nothing could make it either better or worse.” - -She spoke almost carelessly, though very bitterly, as though she felt -her words to be almost truisms, and Falconer stared at her for a moment -in silence. Then he said with stern formality, as though he were making -a deliberate effort to realise her point of view: - -“You imply that Mr. Romayne’s fall--his going over the edge of the -precipice, if I may adopt your figure--consisted in the discovery of his -misdeeds. Do you mean that you think it would have been better if -nothing had ever been known?” - -Mrs. Romayne raised her eyebrows. - -“Of course!” she said amazedly. Then catching sight of her cousin’s face -she shrugged her shoulders with a little gesture of deprecating -concession. “Oh, of course, I don’t mean that Mr. Romayne himself would -have been any better if nothing had ever come out,” she said -impatiently. “The right and wrong and all that kind of thing would have -been the same, I suppose. But I don’t see how ruin and suicide improve -the position.” - -She rose as she spoke, and Falconer made no answer. - -Mrs. Romayne had touched on the great realities of life, the everlasting -mystery of the spirit of man with its unfathomable obligations and -disabilities; had touched on them carelessly, patronisingly, as “all -that kind of thing.” She was as absolutely blind to the depth of their -significance as is a man without eyesight to the illimitable spaces of -the sky above him. To Falconer her tone was simply scandalising. He did -not understand her ignorance. He could not touch the pathos of its -limitations and the possibilities by which it was surrounded. The grim -irony of such a tone as used by the ephemeral of the immutable was -beyond his ken. - -“I have several things to see to upstairs,” Mrs. Romayne went on after a -moment’s pause. “I shall go up now, and I think, if you will excuse me, -I will not come down again. We start so early. Good night!” - -“Good night!” he returned stiffly; and with a little superior, -contemptuous smile on her face she went away. - - - - -CHAPTER V - - -Dennis Falconer had been alone for nearly an hour, when his solitude was -broken up by the appearance of a waiter, who presented him with a card, -and the information that the gentleman whose name it bore was in the -smoking-room. The name was Dr. Aston’s, and after a moment’s reflection -Falconer told the waiter to ask the gentleman to come upstairs. Falconer -had spent that last hour in meditation, which had grown steadily deeper -and graver. It seemed to have carried him beyond the formal and dogmatic -attitude of mind with which he had met Mrs. Romayne, back to the borders -of those larger regions he had touched when he sat looking at William -Romayne’s papers; and there was a warmth and gratitude in his reception -of Dr. Aston when that gentleman appeared, that suggested that he was -not so completely sufficient for himself as usual. - -“The smoking-room is very full, I imagine?” he said, as he welcomed the -little doctor. “My cousin has gone to bed, and I thought if you didn’t -mind coming up, doctor, we should be better off here.” - -Dr. Aston’s answer was characteristically hearty and alert. Knowing it -to be Falconer’s last night at Nice, he had come round, he said, just -for a farewell word, and to arrange, if possible, for a meeting later on -under happier circumstances. A quiet chat over a cigar was what he had -not hoped for, but the thing of all others he would like. He settled -himself with a genial instinct for comfort in the arm-chair Falconer -pulled round to the window for him; accepted a cigar and prepared to -light it; glancing now and again at the younger man’s face with shrewd, -kindly eyes, which had already noticed something unusual in its -expression. - -Dr. Aston and Dennis Falconer had met, some six years before, in Africa, -under circumstances which had brought out all that was best in the young -man’s character; and Dr. Aston had been warmly attracted by him. Being -a particularly shrewd student of human nature, he had taken his measure -accurately enough, subsequently, and knew as certainly as one man may of -another where his weak points lay, and how time was dealing with them. -But his kindness for, and interest in, Dennis Falconer had never abated; -perhaps because his insight did not, as so much human insight does, stop -at the weak points. - -Dennis Falconer, for his part, regarded Dr. Aston with an affectionate -respect which he gave to hardly any other man on earth. - -There was a short silence as the two men lit their cigars, and then Dr. -Aston, with another glance at Falconer’s face, broke it with a kindly, -delicate enquiry after Mrs. Romayne. Falconer answered it almost -absently, but with an instinctive stiffening, so to speak, of his face -and voice, and there was another pause. The doctor was trying the -experiment of waiting for a lead. He was just deciding that he must make -another attempt on his own account when Falconer took his cigar from -between his lips and said, with his eyes fixed on the evening sky: - -“I’m always glad to see you, doctor; but I never was more glad than -to-night.” - -A sound proceeded from the doctor which might have been described as a -grunt if it had been less delicately sympathetic, and Falconer -continued: - -“I’ve been trying to think out a problem, and it was one too many for -me: the origin of evil.” - -He was thoroughly in earnest, and nothing was further from him than any -thought of lightness or flippancy. But there was a calm familiarity and -matter-of-course acquaintanceship with his subject about his tone that -produced a slight quiver about the corners of the little doctor’s mouth. -He did not speak, however, and the movement with which he took his cigar -from between his lips and turned to Falconer was merely sympathetic and -interested. - -“Of course, I know it’s an unprofitable subject enough,” continued -Falconer almost apologetically. “We shall never be much the wiser on the -subject, struggle as we may. But still, now and then it seems to be -forced on one. It has been forced on me to-day.” - -“Apropos of William Romayne?” suggested Dr. Aston, so delicately that -the words seemed rather a sympathetic comment than a question. - -“Yes,” returned Falconer. “We have been looking through his private -papers.” He paused a moment, and then continued as if drawn on almost in -spite of himself. “You knew him by repute, I dare say, doctor. He had -one of those strong personalities which get conveyed even by hearsay. A -clever man, striking and dominating, universally liked and deferred to. -Yet he must have been as absolutely without principle as this table is -without feeling.” - -He struck the little table between them with his open hand as he spoke; -and then, as though the expression of his feelings had begotten, as is -often the case, an irresistible desire to relieve himself further, he -answered Dr. Aston’s interested ejaculation as if it had been the -question the doctor was at once too well-bred and too full of tact to -put. - -“There were no papers connected with this last disgraceful affair, of -course; those, as you know, I dare say, were all seized in London. It’s -the man’s past life that these private papers throw light on. Light, did -I say? It was a life of systematic, cold-blooded villainy, for which no -colours could be dark enough.” - -He had uttered his last sentence involuntarily, as it seemed, and now he -laid down his cigar, and turning to Dr. Aston, began to speak low and -quickly. - -“They are papers of all kinds,” he said. “Letters, business documents, -memoranda of every description, and two-thirds of them at least have -reference to fraud and wrong of one kind or another. Not one penny that -man possessed can have been honestly come by. His business was -swindling; every one of his business transactions was founded on fraud. -He can have had no faith or honesty of any sort or kind. He was living -with another woman before he had been married a year. All that woman’s -letters--he deceived her abominably, and it’s fortunate that she -died--are annotated and endorsed like his ‘business’ memoranda; -evidently kept deliberately as so much stored experience for future -use!” - -Dr. Aston had listened with a keen, alert expression of intent -interest. His cigar was forgotten, and he laid it down now as if -impatient of any distraction, and leant forward over the table with his -shrewd, kindly little eyes fixed eagerly on Falconer. Human nature was a -hobby of his. - -Falconer’s confidence, or more truly perhaps the manner of it, had swept -away all conventional barriers, and the elder man asked two or three -quick, penetrating questions. - -“How far back do these records go?” he asked finally. - -“They cover five-and-twenty years, I should say,” returned Falconer. -“The first note on a successful fraud must have been made when he was -about four-and-twenty. Why, even then--when he was a mere boy--he must -have been entirely without moral sense!” - -“Yes!” said the doctor, with a certain dry briskness of manner which was -apt to come to him in moments of excitement. “That is exactly what he -was, my boy! It was that, in conjunction with his powerful brain, that -made him what you called, just now, dominating. It gave him -vantage-ground over his fellow-men. He was as literally without moral -sense as a colour-blind man is without a sense of colour, or a homicidal -maniac without a sense of the sanctity of human life.” - -An expression of rather horrified and entirely uncomprehending protest -spread itself over Falconer’s face. - -“Romayne was not mad,” he objected, with that incapacity for penetrating -beneath the surface which was characteristic of him. “I never even heard -that there was madness in the family.” - -“You would find it if you looked far enough, without a doubt!” answered -the doctor decidedly. “This is a most interesting subject, Dennis, and -it’s one that it’s very difficult to look into without upsetting the -whole theory of moral responsibility, and doing more harm than enough. I -don’t say Romayne was mad, as the word is usually understood, but all -you tell me confirms a notion I have had about him ever since this -affair came out. He was what we call morally insane. I’ll tell you what -first put the idea into my head. It was the extraordinary obtuseness, -the extraordinary want of perception, of that blunder of his that burst -up the whole thing. Look at it for yourself. It was a flaw in his -comprehension of moral sense only possible in a man who knew of the -quality by hearsay alone. He must have been a very remarkable man. I -wish I had known him!” - -“I have heard the term ‘moral insanity,’ of course,” said Falconer -slowly and distastefully, ignoring the doctor’s last, purely æsthetic -sentence, “but it has always seemed to me, doctor, if you’ll pardon my -saying so, a very dangerous tampering with things that should be sacred -even from science. I cannot believe that any man is actually incapable -of knowing right from wrong.” - -“The difficulty is,” said the doctor drily, “that the words right and -wrong sometimes convey nothing to him, as the words red and blue convey -nothing to a colour-blind man, and the endearments of his wife convey -nothing to the lunatic who is convinced that she is trying to poison -him.” He paused a moment, and then said abruptly: “Are there any -children?” - -Falconer glanced at him and changed colour slightly. - -“Yes,” he said slowly. “One boy!” - -The keen, shrewd face of the elder man softened suddenly and -indescribably under one of those quick sympathetic impulses which were -Dr. Aston’s great charm. - -“Heaven help his mother!” he said gently. - -Falconer moved quickly and protestingly, and there was a touch of -something like rebuke in his voice as he said: - -“Doctor, you don’t mean to say that you think----” - -“You believe in heredity, I suppose?” interrupted the doctor quickly. -“Well, at least, you believe in the heredity you can’t deny--that a -child may--or rather must--inherit, not only physical traits and -infirmities, but mental tendencies; likes, dislikes, aptitudes, -incapacities, or what not. Be consistent, man, and acknowledge the -sequel, though it’s pleasanter to shut one’s eyes to it, I admit. Put -the theory of moral insanity out of the question for the moment if you -like; say that Romayne was a pronounced specimen of the common -criminal. Why should not his child inherit his father’s tendency to -crime, his father’s aptitude for lying and thieving, as he might inherit -his father’s eyes, or his father’s liking for music--if he had had a -turn that way? You’re a religious man, Falconer, I know. You believe, I -take it, that the sins of the fathers shall be visited on the children. -How can they be visited more heavily than in their reproduction? You -mark my words, my boy, that little child of Romayne’s--unless he -inherits strong counter influences from his mother, or some far-away -ancestor--will go the way his father has gone, and may end as his father -has ended!” - -There was a slight sound by the door behind the two men as Dr. Aston -finished--finished with a force and solemnity that carried a painful -thrill of conviction even through the not very penetrable outer crust of -dogma which enwrapped Dennis Falconer--and the latter turned his head -involuntarily. The next instant both men had sprung to their feet, and -were standing dumb and aghast face to face with Mrs. Romayne. She was -standing with her hand still on the lock of the door as if her attention -had been arrested just as she was entering the room; she had apparently -recoiled, for she was pressed now tightly against the door; her face was -white to the very lips, and a vague thought passed through Falconer that -he had never seen it before. It was as though the look in her eyes, as -she gazed at Dr. Aston, had changed it beyond recognition. - -There was a moment’s dead silence; a moment during which Dr. Aston -turned from red to white and from white to red again, and struggled -vainly to find words; a moment during which Falconer could only stare -blankly at that unfamiliar woman’s face. Then, while the two men were -still utterly at a loss, Mrs. Romayne seemed gradually to command -herself, as if with a tremendous effort. Gradually, as he looked at her, -Falconer saw the face with which he was familiar shape itself, so to -speak, upon that other face he did not know. He saw her eyes change and -harden as if with the effort necessitated by her conventional instinct -against a scene. He saw the quivering horror of her mouth alter and -subside in the hard society smile he knew well, only rather stiffer -than usual as her face was whiter; and then he heard her speak. - -With a little movement of her head in civil recognition of Dr. Aston’s -presence, she said to Falconer: - -“My book is on that table. Will you give it to me, please?” - -Her voice was quite steady, though thin. Almost mechanically Falconer -handed her the book she asked for, and with another slight inclination -of her head, before Dr. Aston had recovered his balance sufficiently to -speak, she was gone. - -The door closed behind her, and a low ejaculation broke from the doctor. -Then he drew a long breath, and said slowly: - -“That’s a remarkable woman.” - -Falconer drew his hand across his forehead as though he were a little -dazed. - -“I think not!” he said stupidly. “Not when you know her!” - -“Ah!” returned the doctor, with a shrewd glance at him. “And you do know -her?” - -If Falconer could have seen Mrs. Romayne an hour later, he would have -been more than ever convinced of the correctness of his judgement. The -preparations for departure were nearly concluded; she had dismissed her -maid and was finishing them herself with her usual quiet deliberation, -though her face was very pale and set. - -But it might have perplexed him somewhat if he had seen her, when -everything was done, stop short in the middle of the room and lift her -hands to her head as though something oppressed her almost more heavily -than she could bear. - -“End as his father ended!” she said below her breath. “Ruin and -disgrace!” - -She turned and crossed the room to where her travelling-bag stood, and -drew from it a letter, thrust into a pocket with several others. - -It was the blotted little letter which began “My dear Mamma,” and when -she returned it to the bag at last, her face was once again the face -that Dennis Falconer did not know. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - - -There are two diametrically opposed points of view from which London -life is regarded by those who know of it only by hearsay; that from -which life in the metropolis is contemplated with somewhat awestruck and -dubious eyes as necessarily involving a continuous vortex of society and -dissipation; and that which recognises no so-called “society life” -except during the eight or ten weeks of high pressure known as the -season. Both these points of view are essentially false. In no place is -it possible to lead a more completely hermit-like life than in London; -in no place is it possible to lead a simpler and more hard-working life. -On the other hand, that feverish access of stir and movement which makes -the months of May and June stand out and focus, so to speak, the -attention of onlookers, is only an acceleration and accentuation of the -life which is lived in certain strata of the London world for eight or -nine months in the year. A large proportion of the intellectual work of -the world is done in London; to be in society is a great assistance to -the intellectual worker of to-day on his road to material prosperity; -consequently a large section of “society” is of necessity in London from -October to July; and, since people must have some occupation, even out -of the season, social life, in a somewhat lower key, indeed, than the -pitch of the season, but on the same artificial foundations, goes on -undisturbed, gathering about it, as any institution will do, a crowd of -that unattached host of idlers, male and female, whose movements are -dictated solely by their own pleasure--or their own weariness. - -It was the March of one of the last of the eighties. A wild March wind -was taking the most radical liberties with the aristocratic -neighbourhood of Grosvenor Place, racing and tearing and shrieking down -the chimneys with a total absence of the respect due to wealth. If it -could have got in at one in particular of the many drawing-room windows -at which it rushed so vigorously, it might have swept round the room and -out again with a whoop of amusement. For the room contained some twelve -ladies of varying ages and demeanours, and, with perhaps one or two -exceptions, each lady was talking at the top of her speed--which, in -some cases, was very considerable--and of her voice--which as a rule was -penetrating. Every speaker was apparently addressing the same elderly -and placid lady, who sat comfortably back in an arm-chair, and made no -attempt to listen to any one. Perhaps she recognised the futility of -such a course. - -The elderly and placid lady was the mistress of the very handsomely and -fashionably furnished drawing-room and of the house to which it -belonged. Her dress bore traces--so near to vanishing point that their -actual presence had something a little ludicrous about it--of the last -lingering stage of widow’s mourning. Her name was Pomeroy, Mrs. Robert -Pomeroy, and she was presiding over the ladies’ committee for a charity -bazaar. - -Fashionable charities and their frequent concomitant, the fashionable -bazaars which have superseded the fashionable private theatricals of -some years ago, are generally and perhaps uncharitably supposed by a -certain class of cynical unfashionables to have their motive power in a -feminine love of excitement and desire for conspicuousness. Perhaps -there is another aspect under which they may present themselves; namely, -as a proof that not even a long course of society life can destroy the -heaven-sent instinct for work, even though the circumstances under which -it struggles may render it so mere a travesty of the real thing. From -this point of view, and when the promoter of a charitable folly is a -middle-aged woman, who puts into the business an almost painfully -earnest enthusiasm which might have been so useful if she had only known -more of any life outside her own narrow round, the situation is not -without its pathos. But when, as in the present instance, a -long-established, self-reliant, and venerable philanthropic institution -is suddenly “discovered,” taken up, and patronised by such a woman as -the secretary and treasurer of the present committee; a woman who would -have been empty-headed and vociferous in any sphere, and who had been -moulded by circumstances into a pronounced specimen of a certain type of -fashionable woman, dashing, loud, essentially unsympathetic; the -position, in the incongruities and discrepancies involved, becomes -wholly humorous. - -Mrs. Ralph Halse, in virtue of her office as secretary and treasurer, -was sitting at Mrs. Pomeroy’s right hand; her conception as to the -duties of her office seemed to be limited to a sense that it behoved her -never for a single instant to leave off addressing the chair, and this -duty she fulfilled with a conscientious energy worthy of the highest -praise. She had “discovered” the well-known and well-to-do institution -before alluded to about a month earlier. - -“Such a capital time of year, you know, when one has nothing to do and -can attend to things thoroughly!” she had explained to her friends. She -had determined that “something must be done,” as she had rather vaguely -phrased it, and she had applied herself exuberantly and forthwith to -the organisation of a bazaar. The season was Lent; philanthropy was the -fashion; Mrs. Halse’s scheme became the pet hobby of the moment, and the -ladies’ committee was selected exclusively from among women well known -in society. - -The committee was tremendously in earnest; nobody could listen to it and -doubt that fact for a moment. At the same time a listener would have -found some difficulty in determining what was the particular point which -had evoked such enthusiasm, because, as has been said, the members were -all talking at once. Their eloquence was checked at last, not, as might -have been the case with a cold-blooded male committee, by a few short -and pithy words from the gently smiling president, but by the appearance -of five o’clock tea. The torrent of declamatory enthusiasm thereupon -subsided, quenched in the individual consciousness that took possession -of each lady that she was “dying for her tea,” and had “really been -working like a slave.” The committee broke up with charming informality -into low-toned duets and trios. Even Mrs. Ralph Halse ceased to address -the chair, though she could not cease to express her views on the vital -point which had roused the committee to a state bordering on frenzy; she -turned to her nearest neighbour. Mrs. Halse was a tall woman, -good-looking in a well-developed, highly coloured style, and appearing -younger than her thirty-eight years. She was dressed from head to foot -in grey, and the delicate sobriety of her attire was oddly out of -keeping with her florid personality. As a matter of fact, the hobby -which had preceded the present all-absorbing idea of the bazaar in her -mind--Mrs. Halse was a woman of hobbies--had been ritualism of an -advanced type; perhaps some of the fervour with which her latest -interest had been embraced was due to a certain sense of flatness in its -predecessor; but be that as it may, her present very fashionable attire -represented her idea of Lenten mourning. - -“I don’t see myself how there can be two opinions on the subject,” she -said. Mrs. Ralph Halse very seldom did see how there could be two -opinions on a subject on which her own views were decided. “Fancy dress -is a distinct feature, and of course there must be more effect and more -variety when each woman is dressed as suits her best, than when there is -any attempt at uniform. You agree with me, Lady Bracondale, I’m sure?” - -The woman she addressed was of the pronounced elderly aristocratic type, -tall and thin, aquiline-nosed and sallow of complexion. She seemed to be -altogether superior to enthusiasm of any kind, and her manner was of -that unreal kind of dignity and chilling suavity, in which nothing is -genuine but its slight touch of condescension. - -“Fancy dress is a pretty sight,” she said. “But it is perhaps a drawback -that of course all the stall-holders cannot be expected to wear it.” The -words were spoken with an emphasis which plainly conveyed the speaker’s -sense that no such abrogation of dignity could by any possibility be -expected of herself. “What is your opinion, Mrs. Pomeroy?” Lady -Bracondale added, turning to the chairwoman of the committee. - -Mrs. Pomeroy’s attention was not claimed for the moment otherwise than -by her serene enjoyment of her cup of tea, which she was sipping with -the air of a woman who has done, and is conscious of having done, a hard -afternoon’s work. Perhaps it is somewhat fatiguing to be talked to by -twelve ladies all at once. Lady Bracondale’s question was one which Mrs. -Pomeroy rarely answered, however, even in her secret heart, so she only -smiled now and shook her head thoughtfully. - -“Miscellaneous fancy dress gives so much scope for individual taste, -don’t you think?” said Mrs. Halse. - -“Of course it does, my dear Mrs. Halse. Every one can wear what they -like, and that is very nice,” answered Mrs. Pomeroy comfortably. - -“But, on the other hand, a quiet uniform can be worn by any one,” said -Lady Bracondale with explanatory condescension. - -“By any one, of course. So important,” assented the chairwoman with -bland cheerfulness. Then, as Mrs. Halse’s lips parted to give vent to a -flood of eloquence, she continued placidly, in her gentle, contented -voice: “Mrs. Romayne is not here yet. I wonder what she will say!” - -“I met her at the French Embassy last night,” said Mrs. Halse, with a -slightly aggressive inflection in her voice, “and she told me she meant -to come if she could make time. Apparently she has not been able to!” - -“Mrs. Romayne?” repeated Lady Bracondale interrogatively. “I don’t think -I’ve met her? Really, one feels quite out of the world.” - -There was a fine affectation of sincerity about the words which would, -however, hardly have deceived the most unsophisticated hearer as to the -speaker’s position in society, or her own appreciation of it. Lady -Bracondale was distinctly a person to be known by anybody wishing to -make good a claim to be considered in society, and she was loftily -conscious of the fact. She had only just returned to town from -Bracondale, where she had been spending the last two months. - -“Romayne?” she repeated. “Mrs. Romayne! Ah, yes! To be sure! The name -is familiar to me. I thought it was. There was a little woman, years -ago, whom we met on the Continent. Her husband--dear me, now, what was -it? Ah, yes! Her husband failed or--no, of course! I recollect! He was a -swindler of some sort. Of course, one never met her again!” - -“This Mrs. Romayne is the same, Ralph says,” said Mrs. Halse, sipping -her tea. “At least, her husband was William Romayne, who was the moving -spirit in a big bank swindle--and a lot of other things, I -believe--years ago. She turned up about two months ago, and took a house -in Chelsea. Lots of money, apparently. She has a grown-up son--he would -be grown-up, of course--who is going to the bar.” - -“But, dear me!” said Lady Bracondale with freezing stateliness, “does -she propose to go into society? It was a most scandalous affair, my dear -Mrs. Pomeroy, as far as I remember. A connection of Lord Bracondale’s -lost some money, I recollect; and I think the man--Romayne, I mean, of -course--poisoned himself or something. We were at Nice when it happened. -He committed suicide there, and it was most unpleasant! She can’t -expect one to know her!” - -Eighteen years had passed since the same woman had expressed herself as -eager to make the acquaintance of “the man,” and the haze which had -wrapped itself in her mind about the tragedy which had frustrated her -desire in that direction, was not the only outcome for her of the -passing of those years. Lady Bracondale had been Lady Cloughton eighteen -years ago, the wife of the eldest son of the Earl of Bracondale; poor, -and with a somewhat perfunctorily yielded position. She and her husband -had been, moreover, a cheery, easy-tempered pair, living chiefly on the -Continent, and getting a good deal of pleasure out of life. His father’s -death had given to Lord Cloughton the family title and the family lands; -and with his accession to wealth, importance, and responsibilities, his -wife’s whole personality had gradually seemed to become transformed. Her -satisfaction in her new dignities took the form of living rigidly up to -what she considered their obligations. Laxity, frivolity of any kind, -seemed to her to abrogate from the importance of her position. She -ranged herself on the side of strict decorum and respectability, and -became more precise than the precisians. Her husband at the same time -developed talents latent in his obscurity, and became a prominent -politician; and the ultra-correct and exclusive Lady Bracondale was now -in truth a power in society. - -Consequently, the tone in which she disposed of the intruder, who had -ventured unauthorised to obtain recognition during her absence, was -crushing and conclusive. But Mrs. Pomeroy’s individuality was of too -soft a consistency to allow of her being crushed; and she replied -placidly, and with unconscious practicality. - -“People do know her, dear Lady Bracondale,” she said. “She had some -friends among really nice people to begin with, and every one has called -on her. I really don’t know how it has happened, but it is years and -years ago, you know, and she really is a delightful little woman. Quite -wrapped up in her boy!” - -Almost before the words were well uttered, before Lady Bracondale could -translate into speech the aristocratic disapproval written stiffly on -her face, the door was flung open, and the footman announced “Mrs. -Romayne!” - - - - -CHAPTER VII - - -Eighteen years lay between the events which Lady Bracondale recalled so -hazily and the Mrs. Romayne who crossed the threshold of Mrs. Pomeroy’s -drawing-room as the footman spoke her name. Those eighteen years had -changed her at once curiously more and curiously less than the years -between six-and-twenty and four-and-forty usually change a woman. She -looked at the first glance very little older than she had done eighteen -years ago; younger, indeed, than she had looked during those early days -of her widowhood. Such changes as time had made in her appearance seemed -mainly due to the immense difference in the styles of dress now -obtaining. The dainty colouring, the cut of her frock, the pose of her -bonnet, the arrangement of her hair, with its fluffy curls, all seemed -to accentuate her prettiness and to bring out the youthfulness which a -little woman without strongly marked features may keep for so long. The -fluffy hair was a red-brown now, instead of a pale yellow, and the -change was becoming, although it helped greatly, though very subtly, to -alter the character of her face. The outline of her features was perhaps -a trifle sharper than it had been, and there were sundry lines about the -mouth and eyes when it was in repose. But these were obliterated, as a -rule, by a characteristic to which all the minor changes in her seemed -to have more or less direct reference; a characteristic which seemed to -make the very similarity between the woman of to-day and the woman of -eighteen years before, seem unreal; the singular brightness and vivacity -of her expression. Her features were animated, eager, almost restless; -her gestures and movements were alert and quick; her voice, as she spoke -to an acquaintance here and there, as she moved up Mrs. Pomeroy’s -drawing-room, was brisk and laughing. Her dress and demeanour were the -dress and demeanour of the day to the subtlest shade; she had been a -typical woman of the world eighteen years before; she was a typical -woman of the world now. But in the old days the personality of the woman -had been dominated by and merged in the type. Now the type seemed to be -penetrated by something from within, which was not to be wholly -suppressed. - -She came quickly down the long drawing-room, smiling and nodding as she -came, and greeted Mrs. Pomeroy with a little exaggerated gesture of -despair and apology. - -“Have you really finished?” she cried. “Is everything settled? How -shocking of me!” Then, as she shook hands with Mrs. Halse, she added, -with a sweetness of tone which seemed to cover an underlying tendency -which was not sweet: “However, we have such a host in our secretary that -really one voice more or less makes very little difference.” - -“Well, really, I don’t know that we have settled anything!” said Mrs. -Pomeroy. “We have talked things over, you know. It is such a mistake to -be in a hurry! Don’t you think so?” - -“I’ve not a doubt of it,” was the answer, given with a laugh. “My dear -Mrs. Pomeroy, I have been in a hurry for the last six weeks, and it’s a -frightful state of things. You’ve had a capital meeting, though. Why, I -believe I am actually the only defaulter!” - -The hard blue eyes were moving rapidly over the room as Mrs. Romayne -spoke; there was an eager comprehensive glance in them as though the -survey taken was in some sense a survey of material or--at one -instant--of a battle-ground; and it gave a certain unreality to their -carelessness. - -“The only defaulter. Yes,” agreed Mrs. Pomeroy comfortably. “And now, -Mrs. Romayne, you must let me introduce you to a new member of our -committee; quite an acquisition! Why, where--oh!” and serenely oblivious -of the stony stare with which Lady Bracondale, a few paces off, was -regarding the opposite wall of the room just over the newcomer’s bonnet, -Mrs. Pomeroy, with her kind fat hand on Mrs. Romayne’s arm, approached -the exclusive acquisition. “Let me introduce Mrs. Romayne, dear Lady -Bracondale!” she said with unimpaired placidity. - -The stony stare was lowered an inch or two until it was about on a level -with Mrs. Romayne’s eyebrows, and Lady Bracondale bowed icily; but at -the same moment Mrs. Romayne held out her hand with a graceful little -exclamation of surprise. It was not genuine, though it sounded so; those -keen, quick, blue eyes had seen Lady Bracondale and recognised her in -the course of their owner’s progress up the room, and had observed her -withdrawal of herself those two or three paces from Mrs. Pomeroy’s -vicinity; and it was as they rested for an instant only on her in their -subsequent survey of the room that that subtle change suggestive of a -sense of coming battle had come to them. They looked full into Lady -Bracondale’s face now with a smiling ease, which was just touched with a -suggestion of pleasure in the meeting. - -“I hardly know whether we require an introduction,” said Mrs. Romayne; -she spoke with cordiality which was just sufficiently careless to be -thoroughly “good form.” “It is so many years since we met, though, that -perhaps our former acquaintanceship must be considered to have died a -natural death. I am very pleased that it should have a resurrection!” - -She finished with a little light laugh, and Lady Bracondale found, -almost to her own surprise, that they were shaking hands. If she had -been able to analyse cause and effect--which she was not--she would have -known that it was that carelessness in Mrs. Romayne’s manner that -influenced her. A powerful prompter to a freezing demeanour is withdrawn -when the other party is obviously insensible to cold. - -“It is really too bad of me to be so late!” continued Mrs. Romayne, -proceeding to pass over their past acquaintance as a half forgotten -recollection to which they were both indifferent, and taking up matters -as they stood with the easy unconcern and casual conversationalism of a -society woman. “At least it would be if my time were my own just now. -But as a matter of fact my sole _raison d’être_ for the moment is the -getting ready of our little place for my boy. I ought to have shut -myself up with carpenters and upholsterers until it was done! I assure -you I can’t even dine out without a guilty feeling that I ought to be -seeing after something or other connected with chairs and tables!” - -She finished with a laugh about which there was a touch of -artificiality, as there had been about her tone as she alluded to her -“boy.” Perhaps the only thoroughly genuine point about her, at that -moment, was a certain intent watchfulness, strongly repressed, in the -eyes with which she met Lady Bracondale’s gorgon-like stare; and -something about the spirited pose of her head and the lines of her face, -always recalling, vaguely and indefinitely, that idea of single combat. -Lady Bracondale, however, was not a judge of artificiality, and Mrs. -Romayne’s manner, with its perfect assurance and careless assumption of -a position and a footing in society, affected her in spite of herself. -The stony stare relaxed perceptibly as she said, stiffly enough, but -with condescending interest: - -“You are expecting your son in town?” - -“I am expecting him every day, I am delighted to say!” answered Mrs. -Romayne, with a little conventional gush of superficial enthusiasm. -“Really, you have no idea how forlorn I am without him! We are quite -absurdly devoted to one another, as I often tell him, stupid fellow. But -I always think--don’t you?--that a man is much better out of the way -during the agonies of furnishing, so I insisted on his making a little -tour while I plunged into the fray. He was very anxious to help, of -course, dear fellow. But I told him frankly that he would be more -hindrance than help, and packed him off--and made a great baby of myself -when he was gone. Of course I have had to console myself by making our -little place as perfect as possible, as a surprise for him! You know how -these things grow! One little surprise after another comes into one’s -head, and one excuses oneself for one’s extravagance when it’s for one’s -boy.” - -“Are you thinking of settling in London?” enquired Lady Bracondale. - -She was unbending moment by moment in direct contradiction of her -preconceived determination. Mrs. Romayne was so bright and so -unconscious. She ran off her pretty maternal platitudes with such -careless confidence, that iciness on Lady Bracondale’s part would have -assumed a futile and even ridiculous appearance. - -“Yes!” was the answer. “We are going to settle down a regular cosy -couple. It has been our castle in the air all the time his education has -been going on. He is to read for the bar, and I tell him that he will -value a holiday more in another year or two, poor fellow. But I’m afraid -I bore about him frightfully!” she added, with another laugh. “And it is -rather hard on him, poor boy, for he really is not a bore! I think you -will like him, Lady Bracondale. I remember young men always adored you!” - -Lady Bracondale smiled, absolutely smiled, and said -graciously--graciously for her, that is to say: - -“You must bring him to see me! I should like to call upon you if you -will give me your card.” - -Mrs. Romayne was in the act of complying--complying with smiling -indifference, which was the very perfection of society manner--when Mrs. -Pomeroy, evidently moved solely by the impetus of the excited group of -ladies of which she was the serenely smiling centre, bore cheerfully -down upon them. - -“Perhaps we ought to vote about the fancy dress before we separate this -afternoon,” she suggested, “or shall we talk it over a little more at -the next meeting? Perhaps that would be wiser. Mrs. Romayne----” - -She looked invitingly at Mrs. Romayne as if for her opinion on the -subject, and the invitation was responded to with that ever-ready little -laugh. - -“Oh, let us put it off until the next meeting,” she said. “I am ashamed -to say that I really must run away now. But at the next meeting I -promise faithfully to be here at the beginning and stay until the very -end.” - -Whereupon it became evident that the greater part of the committee was -anxious to postpone the decision on the knotty point in question, and -was conscious of more or less pressing engagements. A general exodus -ensued, Mrs. Halse alone remaining to expound her views to Mrs. Pomeroy -all by herself and in a higher and more conclusive tone than before. - -A neat little coupé was waiting for Mrs. Romayne. She gave the coachman -the order “home” at first, and then paused and told him to go to a -famous cigar merchant’s. She got into the carriage with a smiling -gesture of farewell to Lady Bracondale, whose brougham passed her at the -moment; but as she leant back against the cushions the smile died from -her lips with singular suddenness. It left her face very intent; the -eyes very bright and hard, the lips set and a little compressed. The -lines about them and about her eyes showed out faintly under this new -aspect of her face in spite of the eager satisfaction which was its -dominant expression. The battle had evidently been fought and won and -the victor was ready and braced for the next. - -She got out at the cigar merchant’s, and when she returned to her -carriage there was that expression of elation about her which often -attends the perpetration of a piece of extravagance. But as she was -driven through the fading sunlight of the March afternoon towards -Chelsea, her face settled once more into that intent reflection and -satisfaction. - -It was a narrow slip of a house at which her coupé eventually stopped, -wedged in among much more imposing-looking mansions in the most -fashionable part of Chelsea. But what it lacked in size it made up in -brightness and general smartness. It had evidently been recently done up -with all the latest improvements in paint, window-boxes, and fittings -generally, and it presented a very attractive appearance indeed. - -Mrs. Romayne let herself in with a latch-key, and went quickly across -the prettily decorated hall into a room at the back of what was -evidently the dining-room. She opened the door, and then stood still -upon the threshold. - -The light of the setting sun was stealing in at the window, the lower -half of which was filled in with Indian blinds; and as it fell in long -slanting rays across the silent room, it seemed to emphasize and, at the -same time, to soften and beautify an impression of waiting and of -expectancy that seemed to emanate from everything that room contained. -It was furnished--it was not large--as a compromise between a -smoking-room and a study, and its every item, from the bookcases and -the writing-table to the bronzes on the mantelpiece, was in the most -approved and latest style, and of the very best kind. Every conceivable -detail had evidently been thought out and attended to; the room was -obviously absolutely complete and perfect--only on the writing-table -something seemed lacking, and some brown paper parcels lay there waiting -to be unfastened--and it had as obviously never been lived in. It was -like a body without a soul. - -The lingering light stole along the wall, touching here and there those -unused objects waiting, characterless, for that strange character which -the personality of a man impresses always on the room in which he lives, -and its last touch fell upon the face of the woman standing in the -doorway. The artificiality of its expression was standing out in strong -relief as if in half conscious, half instinctive struggle with something -that lay behind, something which the aspect of that empty room had -developed out of its previous intentness and excitement. With a little -affected laugh, as though some one else had been present--or as though -affectation were indeed second nature to her--Mrs. Romayne went up to -the writing-table and began to undo the parcels lying there. They -contained a very handsome set of fittings for a man’s writing-table, and -she arranged them in their places, clearing away the paper with -scrupulous care, and with another little laugh. - -“What a ridiculous woman!” she said half aloud, with just the intonation -she had used in speaking to Lady Bracondale of her “little surprises” -for “her boy.” “And what a spoilt fellow!” - -She turned away, went out of the room, with one backward glance as she -closed the door, and upstairs to the drawing-room. She had just entered -the room when a thought seemed to strike her. - -“How utterly ridiculous!” she said to herself. “I quite forgot to notice -whether there were any letters!” - -She was just crossing the room to ring for a servant when the front-door -bell rang vigorously and she stopped short. With an exclamation of -surprise she went to the door and stood there listening, that she might -prepare herself beforehand for the possible visitor, for whom she -evidently had no desire. “How tiresome!” she said to herself. “Who is -it, I wonder?” She heard the parlourmaid go down the hall and open the -door. - -“Mrs. Romayne at home?” - -With a shock and convulsion, which only the wildest leap of the heart -can produce, the listening face in the drawing-room doorway, with the -conventional smile which might momently be called for just quivering on -it, half in abeyance, half in evidence, was suddenly transformed. Every -trace of artificiality fell away, blotted out utterly before the swift, -involuntary flash of mother love and longing with which those hard blue -eyes, those pretty, superficial little features were, in that instant, -transfigured. The elaborately dressed figure caught at the door-post, as -any homely drudge might have done; the woman of the world, startled out -of--or into--herself, forgot the world. - -“It’s Julian!” the white, trembling lips murmured. “Julian!” - -As she spoke the word, up the stairs two steps at a time, there dashed a -tall, fair-haired young man who caught her in his arms with a delighted -laugh--her own laugh, but with a boyish ring of sincerity in it. - -“I’ve taken you by surprise, mother!” he cried. “You’ve never opened my -telegram!” - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - - -Mrs. Romayne had been left, eighteen years before, absolutely penniless. -When Dennis Falconer took her back from Nice to her uncle’s home in -London, she had returned to that house wholly dependent, for herself and -for her little five-year-old boy, on the generosity she would meet with -there. Fortunately old Mr. Falconer was a rich man. There had been a -good deal of money in the Falconer family, and as its representatives -decreased in number, that money had collected itself in the hands of a -few survivors. - -A long nervous illness, slight enough in itself, but begetting -considerable restlessness and irritability, had followed on her return -to London. So natural, her tender-hearted cousin and uncle had said, -though, as a matter of fact, such an illness was anything but natural -in such a woman as Mrs. Romayne, and anything but consistent with her -demeanour during the early days of her widowhood. Partly by the advice -of the doctor, partly by reason of the sense, unexpressed but shared by -all concerned, that London was by no means a desirable residence for the -widow of William Romayne, old Mr. Falconer and his daughter left their -quiet London home and went abroad with her. No definite period was -talked of for their return to England, and they settled down in a -charming little house near the Lake of Geneva. - -In the same house, when Julian was seven years old, Frances Falconer -died. Her death was comparatively sudden, and the blow broke her -father’s heart. From that time forward his only close interests in life -were Mrs. Romayne and her boy. The vague expectation of a return to -London at some future time faded out altogether. Mr. Falconer’s only -desire was to please his niece, and she, with the same tendency towards -seclusion which had dictated their first choice of a Continental home, -suggested a place near Heidelberg. Here they lived for five years more, -and then Mr. Falconer, also, died, leaving the bulk of his property to -Mrs. Romayne. The remainder was to go to Dennis Falconer; to his only -other near relation, William Romayne’s little son, he left no money. - -So seven years after her husband’s death Mrs. Romayne was a rich woman -again; rich and independent as she had never been before, and -practically alone in the world with her son. In her relations with her -son, those seven years had brought about a curious alteration or -developement. - -The dawnings of this change had been observed by Frances Falconer during -the early months of Mrs. Romayne’s widowhood. She had spoken to her -father with tears in her eyes of her belief that her cousin was turning -for consolation to her child. Blindly attached to her cousin, she had -never acknowledged her previous easy indifference as a mother. She stood -by while the first place in little Julian’s easy affections was -gradually won away from herself not only without a thought of -resentment, but without any capacity for the criticism of Mrs. -Romayne’s demeanour in her new capacity as a devoted mother. To her that -devotion was the natural and beautiful outcome of the overthrow of her -cousin’s married life. To sundry other people the new departure -presented other aspects. Dennis Falconer, spending a few days at the -house near the Lake of Geneva, regarded with eyes of stern distaste what -seemed to him the most affected, superficial travesty of the maternal -sentiment ever exhibited. Meditating upon the subject by himself, he -referred Mrs. Romayne’s assumption of the character of devoted mother to -the innate artificiality of a fashionable woman denied the legitimate -outlet of society life. He went away marvelling at the blindness of his -uncle and cousin, and asking himself with heavy disapprobation how long -the pose would last. - -Time, as a matter of fact, seemed only to confirm it. The half-laughing, -wholly artificial manner with which Mrs. Romayne had alluded to her -“boy” in Mrs. Pomeroy’s drawing-room was the same manner with which, in -his early school-days, she had alluded to her “little boy,” only -developed by years. Mr. Falconer’s death and her own consequent -independence had made no difference in her way of life. Julian’s -education had been proceeded with on the Continent as had been already -arranged, his mother living always near at hand that they might be -together whenever it was possible. In his holidays they took little -luxurious tours together. But into society Mrs. Romayne went not at all -until Julian was over twenty; when the haze of fifteen years had wound -itself about the memory of William Romayne and his misdeeds. - -Of those misdeeds William Romayne’s son knew nothing. The one point of -discord between old Mr. Falconer and his niece had been her alleged -intention of keeping the truth from him, if possible, for ever. Mr. -Falconer’s death removed the only creature who had a right to protest -against her decision. When Julian, as he grew older, asked his first -questions about his father, she told him that he had “failed,” and had -died suddenly, and begged him not to question her. And the boy, careless -and easy-going, had taken her at her word. - -With the termination of Julian’s university career, it became necessary -that some arrangement should be made for his future. As Julian grew up, -the topic had come up between the mother and son with increasing -frequency, introduced as a rule not, as might have been expected, by the -young man, whom it most concerned, but by Mrs. Romayne. From the very -first it had been presented to him as a foregone conclusion that the -start in life to which he was to look forward was to be made in London. -London was to be their home, and he was to read for the English bar; on -these premises all Mrs. Romayne’s plans and suggestions were grounded, -and Julian’s was not the nature to carve out the idea of a future for -himself in opposition to that presented to him. Consequently the -arrangements, of which the bright little house in Chelsea was the -preliminary outcome, were matured with much gaiety and enthusiasm, in -what Mrs. Romayne called merrily “a family council of two”; and a -certain touch of feverish excitement which had pervaded his mother’s -consideration of the subject, moved Julian to a carelessly affectionate -compunction in that it was presumably for his sake that she had -remained so long away from the life she apparently preferred. - -The arrangement by which Mrs. Romayne eventually came to London alone -was not part of the original scheme. As the time fixed for their -departure thither drew nearer, that feverish excitement increased upon -her strangely. It seemed as an expression of the nervous restlessness -that possessed her that she finally insisted on his joining some friends -who were going for two months to Egypt, and leaving her to “struggle -with the agonies of furnishing,” as she said, alone. - -The arrangement had separated the mother and son for the first time -within Julian’s memory. The fact had, perhaps, had little practical -influence on his enjoyment in the interval, but it gave an added fervour -to his boyish demonstration of delight in that first moment of meeting -as he held her in his vigorous young arms, and kissed her again and -again. - -“To think of my having surprised you, after all!” he cried gleefully, at -last. “You ought to have had my telegram this morning. Why, you’ve got -nervous while you’ve been alone, mother! You’re quite trembling!” - -Mrs. Romayne laughed a rather uncertain little laugh. She was indeed -trembling from head to foot. Her face was very pale still, but as she -raised it to her son the strange, transfigured look had passed from it -utterly, and her normal expression had returned to it in all its -superficial liveliness, brought back by an effort of will, conscious or -instinctive, which was perceptible in the slight stiffness of all the -lines. At the same moment she seemed to become aware of the close, -clinging pressure with which her hand had closed upon the arm which held -her, and she relaxed it in a gesture of playful rebuke and deprecation. - -“What would you have, bad boy?” she said lightly. “Don’t you know I hate -surprises? Oh, I suppose you want to flatter yourself that your poor -little mother can’t get on without you to take care of her! Well, -perhaps she can’t, very well. There’s a demoralising confession for you, -sir!” - -But it was not such a confession as her face had been only a few minutes -before; in fact, the spoken words seemed rather to belie that mute -witness. They were spoken in her ordinary tone, and the gesture with -which she laid her hand on his arm to draw him into the drawing-room was -one of her usual pretty, affected gestures--as sharp a contrast as -possible to the first clinging, unconscious touch. - -“Let me look at you,” she said gaily, “and make sure that I have got my -own bad penny back from Africa, and not somebody else’s!” - -She drew him laughingly into the fullest light the fading day afforded, -and proceeded to “inspect” him, as she said, her face full of a -superficial vivacity, which seemed to be doing battle all the time with -something behind--something which looked out of her hard, bright eyes, -eager and insistent. - -Julian Romayne was a tall, well-made young man--taller by a head than -the mother smiling up at him; he was well developed for his twenty-three -years, slight and athletic-looking, and carrying himself more gracefully -than most young Englishmen. But except in this particular, and in a -slight tendency towards the use of more gesture than is common in -England, his foreign training was in no wise perceptible in his -appearance. The first impression he made on people who knew them both -was that he was exactly like his mother, and that his mother’s features -touched into manliness were a very desirable inheritance for her son; -for he was distinctly good-looking. But as a matter of fact, only the -upper part of his face, and his colouring, were Mrs. Romayne’s. He had -the fair hair which had been hers eighteen years ago; he had her blue -eyes and her pale complexion, and his nose and the shape of his brow -were hers. But his mouth was larger and rather fuller-lipped than his -mother’s, and the line of the chin and jaw was totally different. No -strongly-marked characteristics, either intellectual or moral, were to -be read in his face; his expression was simply bright and good-tempered -with the good temper which has never been tried, and is the result -rather of circumstances than of principle. - -That strange something in Mrs. Romayne’s face seemed to retreat into the -depths from which it had come as she looked at him. She finished her -inspection with a gay tirade against the coat which he was wearing, and -Julian replied with a boyish laugh. - -“I knew you’d be down upon it!” he said. “I say, does it look so very -bad? I’ll get a new fit out to-morrow--two or three, in fact! Mother, -what an awfully pretty little drawing-room! What an awfully clever -little mother you are!” - -He flung his arm round her again with the careless, affectionate -demonstrativeness which her manner seemed to produce in him, and looked -round the room with admiring eyes. They were the eyes of a young man who -knew better than some men twice his age how a room should look, and -whose appreciation was better worth having than it seemed. - -“You’re quite ready for me, you see!” he declared delightedly. “What did -you mean, I should like to know, by wanting to keep me away for another -fortnight?” - -There was a moment’s pause before Mrs. Romayne spoke. She looked up into -his face with a rather strange expression in her eyes, and then looked -away across the room to where a little pile of accepted invitations lay -on her writing-table. That curious light at once of battle and of -triumph was strong upon her face as it had not been yet. - -“Yes,” she said at last, and there was an unusual ring about her voice. -“I am quite ready for you!” - -Something more than the furnishing of a house had gone to the -preparation of a place in society for the widow and son of William -Romayne, and only the woman who had effected that preparation knew how, -and how completely it had been achieved. - -A moment later Mrs. Romayne’s face had changed again, and she was -laughing lightly at Julian’s comments as she disengaged herself from his -hold, and went towards the bell. - -“Foolish boy!” she said as she rang. “I’m glad you think it’s nice. -We’ll have some tea.” - -She had just poured him out a cup of tea, and quick, easy question and -answer as to his crossing were passing between them, when the front-door -bell rang, and she broke off suddenly in her speech. - -“Who can that be?” she said. “Hardly a caller; it must be six o’clock! -Now, I wonder whether, if it should be a caller, Dawson will have the -sense to say not at home? Perhaps I had better----” she rose as she -spoke, and moved quickly across the room to the door. But she was too -late! As she opened the drawing-room door she heard the street door open -below, and heard the words, “At home, ma’am.” With the softest possible -ejaculation of annoyance she closed the door stealthily. - -“Such a nuisance!” she said rapidly. “What a time to call! I trust they -won’t----” And thereupon her face changed suddenly and completely into -her usual society smile as the door opened again, and she rose to -receive her visitors. “My dear Mrs. Halse!” she exclaimed, “why, what a -delightful surprise! Now, don’t say that you have come to tell me that -anything has gone wrong about the bazaar?” she continued agitatedly. -“Don’t tell me that, Miss Pomeroy!” - -She was shaking hands with her younger visitor as she spoke, a girl of -apparently about twenty, very correctly dressed, as pretty as a girl -can be with neither colour, expression, nor startlingly correct -features, whose eyes are for the most part fastened on the ground. She -was Mrs. Pomeroy’s only child. She did not deal Mrs. Romayne the blow -which the latter appeared to anticipate, but reassured her in a neatly -constructed sentence uttered in a rather demure but perfectly -self-possessed voice. - -Mrs. Halse had been prevented for the moment from monopolising the -conversation by reason of her keen interest in the good-looking young -man standing by the fireplace; but Miss Pomeroy’s words were hardly -uttered before she turned excitedly to Mrs. Romayne. If she was going to -make a mistake the disagreeables of the position would be with her -hostess, she had decided. - -“It’s your son, Mrs. Romayne?” she cried. “It must be, surely! Such a -wonderful likeness! Only, really, I can hardly believe that your son--I -was ridiculous enough to expect quite a boy! Oh, don’t say that he has -just arrived and we are interrupting your first _tête-à-tête_! How -truly frightful! Let me tell you this moment what I came for and fly!” - -Mrs. Romayne answered her with a suave smile. - -“I am going to introduce my boy first, if you don’t mind,” she said, and -then as Julian, in obedience to her look, came forward, with the easy -alacrity of a young man whose social instincts are of the highly -civilised kind, she laid her hand on his arm with an artificial air of -affectionate pride, and continued lightly: “Your first London -introduction, Julian. Mrs. Ralph Halse, Miss Pomeroy! He has only just -arrived, as you guessed,” she added in an aside to Mrs. Halse, “and no -doubt he is furiously angry with me for allowing him to be caught with -the dust of his journey on him.” - -But Julian’s anger was not perceptible in his face, or in his manner, -which was very pleasant and ready. Even after he had handed tea and cake -and subsided into conversation with Miss Pomeroy, Mrs. Halse found it -difficult to concentrate herself on the business which had brought her -to Chelsea. Her speech to Mrs. Romayne, as to the brilliant idea which -had struck her just after the committee broke up, was as voluble as -usual, certainly, but less connected than it might have been. - -“That’s all right, then. Such a weight off my mind!” she said, as she -copied an address into her note-book with a circumstance and importance -which would have befitted the settlement of the fate of nations. “It is -so important to get things settled at once, don’t you think so? The -moment it occurred to me I saw how important it was that there should -not be a moment’s delay, and I said to Maud Pomeroy: ‘Let us go at once -to Mrs. Romayne, and she will give us the address, and then dear Mrs. -Pomeroy can write the letter to-night.’” Here Mrs. Halse’s breath gave -out for the moment, and she let her eyes, which had strayed constantly -in the direction of Julian and Miss Pomeroy, rest on the young man’s -good-looking, well-bred face. “We must have your son among the stewards, -Mrs. Romayne,” she said. “So important! Now, I wonder whether it has -occurred to you, as it has occurred to me, that a man or two--just a man -or two”--with an impressive emphasis on the last word, as though three -men would be altogether beside the mark--“would be rather an advantage -on the ladies’ committee? Now, what is your opinion, Mr. Romayne? Don’t -you think you could be very useful to us?” - -She turned towards Julian as she spoke, quite regardless of the fact -that Miss Pomeroy’s correctly modulated little voice was stopped by her -tones; and Mrs. Romayne turned towards him also. He and Miss Pomeroy -were sitting together on the other side of the room, and as her eye fell -upon the pair, a curious little flash, as of an idea or a revelation, -leaped for an instant into Mrs. Romayne’s eye. - -Julian moved and transferred his attention to Mrs. Halse, with an easy -courtesy which was a curiously natural reproduction of his mother’s more -artificial manner, and which was at the same time very young and -unassuming. He laughed lightly. - -“I shall be delighted to be a steward,” he said, “or to be useful in any -way. But the idea of a ladies’ committee is awe-inspiring.” - -“You would make great fun of us at your horrid clubs, no doubt,” -retorted Mrs. Halse. “Oh, I know what you young men are! But you can be -rather useful in these cases sometimes, though, of course, it doesn’t do -to tell you so.” - -She laughed loudly, and then rose with a sudden access of haste. - -“We must really go!” she said. “Maud”--Mrs. Halse had innumerable girl -friends, all of whom she was wont to address by their Christian -names--“Maud, we are behaving abominably. We mustn’t stay another -moment, not another second.” - -But they did stay a great many other seconds, while Mrs. Halse pressed -Julian into the service of the bazaar in all sorts and kinds of -capacities, and managed to find out a great deal about his past life in -the process. When at last she swooped down upon Maud Pomeroy, -metaphorically speaking, as though that eminently decorous young lady -had been responsible for the delay, and carried her off in a very -tornado of protestation, attended to the front door, as in courtesy -bound, by Julian, Mrs. Romayne, left alone in the drawing-room, let her -face relax suddenly from its responsive brightness into an unmistakeable -expression of feminine irritation and dislike. - -“Horrid woman!” she said to herself. “Patronises me! Well, she will talk -about nothing but Julian all this evening, wherever she may be--and she -goes everywhere--so perhaps it has been worth while to endure her.” -Then, as Julian appeared again, she said gaily: “My dear boy, they’ve -been here an hour, and we shall both be late for dinner! Be off with you -and dress!” - -It was a very cosy little dinner that followed. Mrs. Romayne, as -carefully dressed for her son as she could have been for the most -critical stranger, was also at her brightest and most responsive. They -talked for the most part of people and their doings; society gossip. -Mrs. Romayne told Julian all about Mrs. Halse’s bazaar; deriding the -whole affair as an excuse for deriding its promoter, but with no -realisation of its innate absurdity; and giving Julian to understand, at -the same time, that it was “the thing” to be in it; an idea which he was -evidently quite capable of appreciating. Dinner over, she drew his arm -playfully through hers and took him all over the house. - -“Let me see that you approve!” she said with a laughing assumption of -burlesque suspense. - -The last room into which she took him was the little room at the back of -the dining-room; and as his previous tone of appreciation and pleasure -developed into genuine boyish exclamations of delight at the sight of -it, the instant’s intense satisfaction in her face struck oddly on her -manner. - -“You like it, my lord?” she said. “My disgraceful extravagance is -rewarded by your gracious approval? Then your ridiculous mother is silly -enough to be pleased.” She gave him a little careless touch, half shake -and half caress, and Julian threw his arm round her rapturously. - -“I should think I did like it!” he said boyishly. “I say, shan’t I have -to work hard here! Mother, what an awfully jolly smoking table!” - -“Suppose you smoke here now,” suggested Mrs. Romayne, “by way of taking -possession? Oh, yes! I’ll stay with you.” - -She sat down, as she spoke, in one of the low basket-chairs by the fire, -taking a little hand-screen from the mantelpiece as she did so. And -Julian, with an exclamation of supreme satisfaction, threw himself into -a long lounging-chair with an air of general proprietorship which sat -oddly on his youthful figure; and proceeded to select and light a cigar. - -A silence followed--rather a long silence. Julian lay back in his chair, -and smoked in luxurious contentment. Mrs. Romayne sat with her dainty -head, with its elaborate arrangement of red-brown hair, resting against -a cushion, her face half hidden by the shade thrown by the fire-screen -as she held it up in one slender, ringed hand. She seemed to be looking -straight into the fire; as a matter of fact her eyes were fixed on the -boyish face beside her. She was the first to break silence. - -“It is two, nearly three, months since we were together,” she said. - -The words might have been the merest comment in themselves; but there -was something in the bright tone in which they were spoken, -something--half suggestion, half invitation--which implied a desire to -make them the opening of a conversation. Julian Romayne’s perceptions, -however, were by no means of the acutest, and he detected no undertone. - -“So it is!” he assented, with dreamy cheerfulness. - -“How long did you spend in Cairo?” - -The question, which came after a pause, was evidently another attempt on -a new line. Again it failed. - -“Didn’t I tell you? Ten days!” said Julian lazily. - -Mrs. Romayne changed her position. She leant forward, her elbow on her -knee, her cheek resting on her hand, the screen still shading her face. - -“The catechism is going to begin,” she said gaily. - -Julian’s cigar was finished. He roused himself, and dropped the end into -the ash-tray by his side as he said with a smile: - -“What catechism?” - -“Your catechism, sir,” returned his mother. “Do you suppose I am going -to let you off without insisting on a full and particular account of -all your doings during the last ten weeks?” - -“A full and particular account of all my doings!” he said. “I say, that -sounds formidable, doesn’t it? The only thing is, you’ve had it in my -letters.” - -“The fullest and most particular?” she laughed. - -“The fullest and most particular!” - -“Never mind,” she exclaimed, leaning back in her chair again with a -restless movement, “I shall catechise all the same. My curiosity knows -no limits, you see. Now, you are on your honour as a--as a spoilt boy, -understand.” - -“On my honour as a spoilt boy! All right. Fire away, mum!” - -He pulled himself up, folding his hands with an assumption of “good -little boy” demeanour, and laughing into her face. She also drew herself -up, and laughed back at him. - -“Question one: Have you lost your heart to any pretty girl in the past -ten weeks?” - -“No, mum.” - -“Question two: Have you flirted--much--with any girl, pretty or plain?” - -“No, mum.” - -“Have you overdrawn your allowance?” - -“No, mum. I’ve got such a jolly generous mother, mum!” - -“Have you---- Oh! Have you any secrets from your mother?” - -The question broke from her in a kind of cry, but she turned it before -it was finished into burlesque, and Julian burst into a shout of -laughter. - -“Not a solitary secret! There, will that do?” - -She was looking straight into his face--her own still in shadow--and -there was a moment’s pause; almost a breathless pause on her part it -seemed; then she broke into a laugh. - -“That will do capitally,” she said. “The catechism is over.” - -She rose as she spoke, and added a word or two about a note she had to -write. - -“We may as well go up into the drawing-room if you have finished -smoking,” she said. “It is an invitation from some friends of the -Pomeroys--a dinner. By-the-bye, don’t you think Miss Pomeroy a very -pretty girl?” - -Julian’s response was rather languid, but his mother did not press the -point. She turned away to replace the screen on the mantelpiece, and as -she did so a thought seemed to strike her. - -“Oh, Julian!” she said. “Did you go to Alexandria? What about those -curtains you were to get me?” - -Her back was towards Julian, and she did not notice the instant’s -hesitation which preceded his reply. He was putting his cigar-case into -his pocket, and the process seemed to demand all his attention. - -“I didn’t go to Alexandria, unfortunately,” he said lightly. “The -Fosters had been there, and didn’t care to go again.” - -The clock struck twelve that night when Mrs. Romayne rose at last from -the chair in front of her bedroom fireplace in which she had been -sitting for more than an hour. The fire had gone out before her eyes -unnoticed, and she shivered a little as she rose. Her face was strangely -pale and haggard-looking, and the red-brown hair harmonised ill with -the anxiety of its look. - -“It begins from to-night!” she said to herself. “It is his man’s life -that begins from to-night!” - - - - -CHAPTER IX - - -“Quite a presentable fellow!” - -There was an unusual ring of excitement in Mrs. Romayne’s voice; it was -about ten o’clock in the evening, and she was standing in the middle of -her own drawing-room, looking up into Julian’s face, as he stood before -her, having just come into the room, smiling back at her with a certain -touch of excitement about his appearance also. He was in evening dress; -he had evidently bestowed particular pains upon his attire, and the -flower in his buttonhole was an exceptionally dainty one. - -Mrs. Romayne was also in evening dress, and in evening dress of the most -elaborate description. From the point of view of the fashion of the day, -her appearance was absolutely perfect; no detail, from the arrangement -of her hair to the point of the silk shoe just visible beneath her -skirt, had been neglected; everything was in good taste and in the -height of fashion, and the effect of the whole, heightened by the -background afforded by the quiet little drawing-room with its softly -shaded lamps, was almost startling in its suggestion of luxury and -refinement. The fashion of the moment was peculiarly becoming to Mrs. -Romayne, and evening dress, with its artificialities and its -conventionalities, always enhanced her good points, strictly -conventional as they were. With that light of excitement on her face, -and a certain suggestion about her of verve and vivacity, she looked -almost charming enough to justify the boyish exclamations of exaggerated -admiration into which Julian had broken on entering the room. - -There was an eager, restless happiness in her eyes, which leapt up into -almost triumphant life as she gave a little touch to Julian’s -buttonhole; and then pushed him a step or two further back, that she -might look at him again, and repeated her commendatory words with a -laugh. Then, on a little gesture from her, he picked up her cloak, which -lay on a chair near, put it carefully about her, and, opening the door -for her, followed her downstairs. - -Nearly three weeks had elapsed since Julian’s arrival in London, and in -that time, short as it was, his expression had changed somewhat. There -was a quickened interest and alertness about it which detracted from his -boyishness, inasmuch as it made him look as though life had actually -begun for him. It would have been wholly untrue to say that any touch of -responsibility or ambition had dawned upon his good-looking young face; -but a subtle something had come to it which was, perhaps, a -materialisation of a mental movement which did duty for those emotions. -In the course of those three weeks he had had several interviews with -the man with whom he was to read; all the preliminaries of his legal -career had been settled; and in more than one half-laughing talk with -his mother on the conclusion of some arrangement, the preliminaries had -been far outstripped, and he had been conducted in triumph to the bench -itself. - -But in all these buildings of castles in the air, there was a factor in -the foundations of his fortunes never allowed by his mother to drop out -of sight; the main factor it became when she was the architect, -relegating to a subordinate position even the hard work on which Julian -was wont to expatiate with enthusiasm and energy. Sometimes as a means, -sometimes as an end, sometimes as the sum total of all human ambition, -social success, social position were woven into all his schemes for the -future as they talked together; woven in with no direct statements or -precepts; but with an insidious insistence, and a tacit assumption of -their value in the scale of things as a truism in no need of -formulation. - -Society life had begun for him with the very day after his arrival in -town, and had moved briskly with him through the following weeks; -briskly, but in a small way. Easter had intervened, and no large -entertainments had been given. To-night was to be, as Mrs. Romayne said -gaily as she settled her train and her cloak in the brougham into which -he had followed her, his first public appearance. They were on their way -to the first “smart affair” of the coming season; a dance to be given at -a house in Park Lane; not very large, but very desirable, at -which--again on Mrs. Romayne’s authority--all the right people would be. - -“You must dance, of course, but not all the evening, Julian!” his mother -said, as their drive drew to an end. “I shall want to introduce you a -good deal. And don’t engage yourself for supper if you can help it. I’m -sorry to be so hard upon you!” - -She finished with a laugh, light as her tone had been throughout. Then -their carriage drew up suddenly, and her face, in shadow for the moment, -changed strangely. For an instant all the happiness, all the excitement -and superficiality died out of it, quenched in a kind of revelation of -heartsick anxiety so utterly out of all proportion with the occasion, as -to be absolutely ghastly; ghastly as only a momentary revelation of the -cruel cross-purposes and incongruities of life can be. The next moment, -as Julian sprang out of the carriage and turned to help her out, her -expression changed again. - -It took them some time to get up to the drawing-room, for though the -party was by no means a crush, they had arrived at the most fashionable -moment, and the staircase was crowded. Salutations, conveyed by graceful -movements of the head, passed across an intervening barrier of gay -dresses and black coats between Mrs. Romayne and numbers of -acquaintances above her or below her on the stairs; and as she smiled -and bowed she murmured comments to Julian--names or data, criticisms of -dress or appearance--until at last patience, and the continual movement -of the stream of which they made part, brought them face to face with -their hostess. The conventional handshake, the conventional words of -greeting passed between that lady and Mrs. Romayne, and then the latter -indicated Julian with a smiling gesture. - -“Let me introduce my boy, Lady Arden,” she said. “So glad to have the -opportunity!” - -She spoke with an accentuation of that self-conscious, self-deriding -maternal pride which was her usual pose, setting, as it were, her tone -for the night. And certainly Julian, as he bowed, and then shook the -hand Lady Arden held out to him, was a legitimate subject for pride. His -sense of the importance of the occasion had given to his manner and -expression not only that touch of excitement which made him positively -handsome, but a certain added readiness and assurance, by no means -presuming and very attractive. Lady Arden’s eyes rested on him with -obvious approval, as she said the few words the situation demanded with -unusual graciousness, and a sign from her brought one of her daughters -to her side. She introduced Julian to the girl. - -“Take care of Mr. Romayne, Ida,” she said. “He has only lately come to -London. Find him some nice partners.” - -“And let me have him back by-and-by, please, Lady Ida!” laughed Mrs. -Romayne, as they passed on with the girl into the room. “There are some -friends of his mother’s to whom he must spare a little time to-night.” - -The gay replies with which Julian and his guide--who after a -comprehensive glance at him had shown considerable readiness to do her -mother’s bidding--disappeared in the crowd were lost to Mrs. Romayne; -her attention was claimed by a man at her elbow. - -“May I have a dance, Mrs. Romayne?” he said. - -Mrs. Romayne shook hands and laughed. - -“Well, really I don’t know,” she said; “I think I must give up dancing -from to-night. I’ve got a great grown-up son here, do you know. Look, -there he is with Lady Ida Arden! Nice-looking boy, isn’t he? It doesn’t -seem the right thing for his mother to be dancing about, now does it?” - -She laughed again, a gay little laugh, well in the key she had set in -her first introduction of Julian, and the man to whom she spoke -protested vigorously. - -“It seems to me exactly the right thing,” he said. “The idea of your -having a grown-up son is the preposterous point, don’t you know. Come, -I say, Mrs. Romayne, don’t be so horribly hard-hearted!” - -“But I must introduce him, don’t you see. I must do my duty as a -mother.” - -“Lady Ida is introducing him! She has introduced him to half-a-dozen of -the best girls in the room already.” - -The colloquy, carried on on either side in the lightest of tones, -finally ended in Mrs. Romayne’s promising a “turn by-and-by,” and the -couple drifted apart; Mrs. Romayne to find acquaintances close at hand. -Among the first she met was Lady Bracondale, condescendingly amiable, to -whom she pointed out Julian, with laughing self-excuse. He was dancing -now, and dancing extremely well. - -“I am so absurdly proud of him!” she said. “I want to introduce him to -you by-and-by, if I can catch him. But dancing men are so inconveniently -useful.” - -Some time had worn away, and she had repeated the substance of this -speech in sundry forms to sundry persons, before Julian rejoined her. -She had cast several rather preoccupied glances in his direction, when -she became aware of him on the opposite side of the room, threading his -way through the intervening groups in her direction, just as she was -accosted by a rather distinguished-looking, elderly man. - -“How do you do, Mrs. Romayne? They tell me that you have a grown-up son -here, and I decline to believe it.” - -He spoke in a pleasant, refined voice, marred, however, by all the -affectation of the day, and with a tone about it as of a man absolutely -secure of position and used to some amount of homage. He was a certain -Lord Garstin, a distinguished figure in London society, rich, well-bred, -and idle. He was troubled with no ideals. Fashionable women, with all -the weaknesses which he knew quite well, were quite as high a type of -woman as he thought possible; or, at least, desirable; and he had a -considerable admiration for Mrs. Romayne as a very highly-finished and -attractive specimen of the type he preferred. - -She shook hands with him with a laugh, and a gathering together of her -social resources, so to speak, which suggested that in her scheme of -things he was a power whose suffrage was eminently desirable. - -“It is true, notwithstanding,” she said brightly. “I am the proud -possessor of a grown-up son, Lord Garstin; a very dear boy, I assure -you. We are settling down in London together.” - -“Is it possible?” was the answer, uttered with exaggerated incredulity. -“And what are you going to do with him, may I ask?” - -“He is reading for the bar----” began Mrs. Romayne; and then becoming -aware that the subject of her words had by this time reached her side, -she turned slightly, and laid her hand on Julian’s arm with a pretty -gesture. “Here he is,” she said. “Let me introduce him. Julian, this is -Lord Garstin. He has been kindly asking me about you.” - -Julian knew all about Lord Garstin, and his tone and manner as he -responded to his mother’s words were touched with a deference which made -them, as his mother said to herself, “just what they ought to be.” The -elder man looked him over with eyes which, as far as their vision -extended, were as keen as eyes need be. - -“A great many of your mother’s admirers will find it difficult to -realise your existence,” he said pleasantly. “Though of course we have -all heard of you. You are going to the bar, eh?” - -Lord Garstin had a great following among smart young men, and the fact -was rather a weakness of his. He liked to have young men about him; to -be admired and imitated by them. His manner to Julian was characteristic -of these tastes; free from condescension as superiority can only be when -it is absolute and unassailable, and full of easy familiarity. - -Mrs. Romayne, standing fanning herself between them, listened for -Julian’s reply with a certain intent suspense beneath her smile; Lord -Garstin’s approval was so important to him. The simple, unaffected -frankness of the answer satisfied her ear, and Lord Garstin’s -expression, as he listened to it, satisfied her eye; and with a laughing -comment on Julian’s words, she allowed her attention to be drawn away -for the moment by an acquaintance who claimed it in passing. - -There was a slight flush of elation on her face when, a few moments -later, the chat between Lord Garstin and Julian being broken off, the -former moved away with a friendly nod to the young man, and a little -gesture and smile to herself, significant of congratulation. - -“Come and walk round the room,” she said gaily, slipping her hand -through Julian’s arm. “There are hundreds of people you must be -introduced to.” - -During the half-hour that followed, Julian was introduced to a large -proportion of those people in the room who were best worth knowing. Mrs. -Romayne seemed to have wasted no time on the acquaintance of -mediocrities. - -His presentation to Lady Bracondale had just been accomplished, when -Mrs. Halse appeared upon the scene and greeted Mrs. Romayne with -stereotyped enthusiasm. - -“Such a success!” she said in a loud whisper, as Julian talked to Lady -Bracondale. “Everybody is quite taken by surprise. I don’t know why, -I’m sure, but I don’t think any one was prepared for such a charming -young man. I’ve been quite in love with him ever since I saw him first, -you know, and we really must have him on the bazaar committee.” Mrs. -Halse had been out of town for Easter, and the affairs of the bazaar had -been somewhat in abeyance in consequence. “Mr. Romayne,” she continued, -seizing upon Julian, “I want to talk to you. You really must help -me----” - -At this juncture the man who had pressed Mrs. Romayne to dance earlier -in the evening came up to her and claimed the promise she had made him -then. She cast a glance of laughing pity at Julian, intended for his -eyes alone, and moved away. - -“It was too bad, mother,” he declared, laughing, as he met her a little -later coming out of the dancing-room. “Now, to make up you must have one -turn with me--just one. We haven’t danced together for ages.” - -He was full of eagerness, a little flushed with the excitement of the -evening, and her laughing protestations, her ridicule of him for -wanting to dance with his mother, went for nothing. They only let loose -on her a torrent of boyish persuasion, and finally she hesitated, -laughed undecidedly, and yielded. She, too, was a little flushed and -elated, as though with triumph. - -“One turn, then, you absurd boy!” she said; and she let him draw her -hand through his arm and lead her back into the dancing-room. They went -only half-a-dozen times round the room in spite of his protestations -against stopping, but Mrs. Romayne was too excellent a dancer and too -striking a figure for those turns to pass unnoticed. When she stopped -and made him take her, flushed and laughing, out of the room, she was -instantly surrounded by a group of men vehemently reproaching her for -dancing with her son to the exclusion of so many would-be partners, and -laughingly denouncing Julian. - -“I couldn’t help it!” she protested gaily. “Yes, I know it’s a -ridiculous sight, but we are rather ridiculous, we two, you know! Come, -Julian, take me home this moment! Let me disappear covered with -confusion.” - -She went swiftly downstairs as she spoke, laughing prettily, and a few -minutes later Julian, with a good deal of extraneous and wholly -unnecessary assistance, was putting her into her carriage. - -The whole evening had gone off admirably, Mrs. Romayne said the next -morning; repeating the dictum with which she had parted from Julian at -night, with less excitement, but with undiminished satisfaction. - -During the course of the next three or four weeks that satisfaction--a -certain genuine and deliberate satisfaction which seemed to underlie the -superficial gaiety and brightness of her manner--seemed to grow upon -her. The season had begun early, and very gaily, and she and Julian were -in great request. It was perhaps as well that little work was expected -of the embryo barrister before the winter, for he and his mother were -out night after night; welcomed and made much of wherever they went, as -so attractive a pair--one of whom was steeped to the finger-tips in -knowledge of her world--were sure to be. Mrs. Romayne arranged a series -of weekly dinner-parties in the little house at Chelsea, which promised -to be, in a small way, one of the features of the season. They were very -small, very select, and very cheery; no better hostess was to be found -in London, and there was a touch of sentiment about the relation between -the hostess and the pleasant young host, which was by no means without -charm for the guests. - -Mrs. Halse’s bazaar, too, which was affording far more entertainment to -its promoters than it seemed at all likely to afford to its supporters, -served to bring Julian into special prominence. He was not clever, but -there is a great deal to be done in connection with a bazaar on which -intellect would be thrown away, and Julian proved himself what Mrs. -Halse described effusively as “a most useful dear!” an expression by -which she probably meant to convey the fact that he was always ready to -toil for the ladies’ committee, without too close an investigation into -the end to be attained by the said toiling. He was quite an important -person at all the meetings connected with the bazaar, and the fact gave -him a standing with the innumerable “smart” people concerned which he -would otherwise hardly have attained so soon. - -His introduction to Lord Garstin resulted, about a fortnight after it -took place, in an invitation to a bachelor dinner. An invitation to one -of Lord Garstin’s dinners was, in its way, about as desirable a thing as -a young man “in Society” could receive; and the pleased, repressed -importance on Julian’s face as he came into the drawing-room to his -mother before he started to keep the engagement, was like a faint -reflection of the satisfaction with which Mrs. Romayne’s expression was -transfused. - -“You’re going?” she said brightly. “Well, I shall be at the Ponsonbys’ -by half-past eleven, and I shall expect you there some time before -twelve. Enjoy yourself, sir!” - -He kissed her with careless affection, and she patted him on the -shoulder for a conceited boy as he hoped, lightly, that she would not -find her solitary evening dull; she had refused to dine out without -him, saying laughingly that she should enjoy a holiday; and then he went -off, whistling gaily and arranging his buttonhole. - -It wanted a few minutes only to the dinner-hour when he arrived at the -club where the dinner was to be given. Three of his fellow guests were -already assembled, and to two of these--well-known young men about -town--he had already been introduced. - -“You know these two fellows, I think,” said Lord Garstin lightly, -“but”--turning to the third man--“Loring tells me that you and he have -not yet been introduced. I’m delighted to perform the ceremony! Mr. -Julian Romayne--Mr. Marston Loring!” - -Julian held out his hand with a frank exclamation of pleasure. He had -recognised in Mr. Marston Loring a young man whom he had seen about -incessantly during the past month, and who had excited a good deal of -secret and boyish admiration in him by reason of a certain assumption of -_blasé_ cynicism with which an excellent society manner was just -sufficiently seasoned to give it character. It was conventional -character enough, but it was not to be expected that Julian should -understand that. - -“I’m awfully glad to meet you,” he said pleasantly. “I’ve known you by -sight for ages!” - -“And I you!” was the answer, spoken with a slight smile and a touch of -cordiality which delighted Julian. “The pleasure is distinctly mutual.” - -Marston Loring was not a good-looking young man; his features, indeed, -would have been insignificant but for the presence of that spurious air -of refinement which life in society usually produces; and for something -more genuine, namely, a strength and resolution about the mould of his -chin and the set of his thin lips which had won him a reputation for -being “clever-looking” among the superficial observers of the social -world. He was nine-and-twenty, but his face might have been the face of -a man twenty years older--so entirely destitute was it of any of the -gracious possibilities which should characterise early manhood. It was -pale and lined, and worn with very ugly suggestiveness; and there were -stories told about him, whispered and laughed at in many of the houses -where he was received, which accounted amply for those lines. The pose, -too, which it pleased him to adopt was that of elderly superiority to -all the illusions and credulities of youth. Marston Loring was a man of -whom it was vaguely but universally said that he had “got on so well!” -Reduced to facts, this statement meant, primarily, that with no -particular rights in that direction he had gradually worked his way into -a position in society--a position the insecurity and unreality of which -was known only to himself; and, secondarily, that by dint of influence, -hard work--hard work was also part of his pose--and a certain amount of -unscrupulousness, he was making money at the bar when most men dependent -on their profession would have starved at it. - -He had brown eyes, dull and curiously shallow-looking, but very keen and -calculating, and they were even keener than usual as they gave Julian -one quick look. - -“I think we belong to the same profession?” he said with easy -friendliness. “You are reading with Allardyce, are you not? A good man, -Allardyce.” - -“So they tell me,” answered Julian, not a little impressed by the -critical and experienced tone of the approbation. “I can’t say I’ve done -much with him yet. One doesn’t do much at this time of year, you know.” - -Loring smiled rather sardonically. - -“That’s what it is to be a gentleman of independent fortune,” he said. -“Some people have to burn the candle at both ends.” - -The five minutes’ chat which ensued before the arrival of the fifth -guest--a certain Lord Hesseltine, known only by sight to Julian--and the -announcement of dinner, was just enough to create a regret in Julian’s -mind when he found that he and his new acquaintance were seated on -opposite sides of the table. Loring’s contribution to the general -conversation throughout dinner, witty, cynical, and assured, completed -his conquest, and when, on the subsequent adjournment of the party to -the smoking-room, Loring strolled up to him, cigar in hand, the prospect -of a _tête-à-tête_ was greatly to Julian’s satisfaction. - -“What an odd thing it is that we should never have been introduced -before!” he began, lighting his own cigar and scanning the other man -with youthful, admiring eyes. - -“It is odd,” returned Loring placidly, throwing himself into an -arm-chair as he spoke, and signing an invitation to Julian to establish -himself in another. “Especially as, like every one else, I’ve been an -immense admirer of your mother all this year. I wonder whether you -recognise what a lucky fellow you are, Romayne?” - -Julian’s eyes sparkled with pleasure at the easy familiarity of the -address, and he crossed his legs with careless self-importance, as he -answered, with the lightness of youth: - -“I ought to, oughtn’t I? I say, I know my mother would be awfully -pleased to know you. You must let me introduce you to her. Are you -coming on to the Ponsonbys’ to-night?” - -“I shall be only too delighted,” answered Loring, watching the smoke -from his cigar with his dull, brown eyes, and answering the first part -of Julian’s speech. “No, unfortunately I’ve got an affair in Chelsea -to-night, and another in Kensington. But we shall meet to-morrow night -at the Bracondales’, I suppose?” - -“Of course,” assented Julian eagerly. “That will be capital!” - -There was a moment’s pause, broken by Loring with a reference to a -political opinion formulated by one of the other men at dinner; and a -talk about politics ensued, eager on Julian’s part, cynical and -effectively reserved on Loring’s. A political discussion, when the -discussers hold the same political faith, has much the same effect in -promoting rapid intimacy between men, granted a predisposition towards -intimacy on either side, as a discussion of the reigning fashion in -dress has with a certain class of women. When Lord Garstin’s -dinner-party began to break up, and Loring and Julian rose to take their -departure, they parted with a hand-clasp which would have befitted an -acquaintanceship three months, rather than three hours old. - -“Good night,” said Julian. “Awfully pleased to have met you, Loring. -See you to-morrow night. My mother will be delighted.” - -“I shall be delighted,” said Loring. “All right, then. To-morrow night -we’ll arrange that look in at the House. Good night.” - -A few minutes’ talk with Lord Garstin, who had taken a decided fancy to -“that charming little woman’s boy,” and Julian was standing on the -pavement of St. James’s Street, with that pleasant sense of exhilaration -and warmth of heart, which is an attendant, in youth, on the -inauguration of a new friendship. - -It was a night in early May, and a fine, hot day had ended, as evening -drew on, in sultry closeness. The clouds had been rolling up steadily, -though not a breath of air seemed to be stirring now, and it was evident -that a storm was inevitable before long. Julian was hot and excited; he -had only a short distance to go; he looked up at the sky and -decided--the wish being father to the thought--that it would “hold up -for the present,” and that he would walk. - -He set out up St. James’s Street and along Piccadilly, taking the right -road by instinct, his busy thoughts divided between satisfaction at the -idea of belonging to the “best” club in London, introduced thereinto by -Lord Garstin; and Loring and his gifts and graces. He had just turned -into Berkeley Street when a rattling peal of thunder roused him with a -start, and the next instant the thunder was followed by a perfect deluge -of rain. - -It was so sudden and he was so entirely unprepared, that his only -instinct for the moment was to step back hastily into the shelter of a -portico in front of which he was just passing; and as he did so, he -noticed a young woman who must have been following him up the street, a -young woman in the shabby hat and jacket of a work-girl, take refuge, -perforce, beneath the same shelter with a shrinking movement which was -not undignified, though it seemed to imply that she was almost more -afraid of him than of the drenching, bitter rain. Then, his reasoning -powers reasserting themselves in the comparative security of the -portico, he began to consider what he should do. He was within seven -minutes’ walk of his destination, but seven minutes’ walk in such rain -as was beating down on the pavement before him would render him wholly -unfit to present himself at a party; and “of course,” as he said to -himself, there was not a cab to be seen. A blinding flash of lightning -cut across his reflections, and drove him back a step or two farther -into shelter involuntarily. And as a terrific peal of thunder followed -it instantaneously, he glanced almost unconsciously at the sharer of his -shelter. - -“By Jove!” he said to himself. - -The girl had retreated, as he himself had done, and was standing close -up against the door of the house to which the portico belonged, in the -extreme corner from that which he himself occupied. But except for that -tacit acknowledgement of his presence, she seemed no longer conscious of -it. She was looking straight out at the storm, her head a little lifted -as though to catch a glimpse of the sky; and her face, outlined by her -dark clothes and the dark paint of the door behind her, stood out in -great distinctness. It was rather thin and pale, and very -tired-looking; the large brown eyes were heavy and haggard. It was not -worthy of a second glance at that moment, according to any canon of the -world in which Julian lived, and yet it drew from him that exclamation -of startled admiration. He had never seen anything like it, he told -himself vaguely. - -Apparently the intent gaze, of which he himself was hardly conscious, -affected its object. She moved uneasily, and turning as if -involuntarily, met his eyes. - -The next instant she was moving hastily from under the portico, when the -driver of a hansom cab became aware of Julian’s existence, and pulled up -suddenly. - -“Hansom, sir?” he shouted. - -“Yes!” answered Julian quickly, dashing across the drenched pavement. “A -hundred and three, Berkeley Square!” - - - - -CHAPTER X - - -All the rooms in the house in Chelsea were bright and pretty, and by no -means the least attractive was the dining-room. The late breakfast-hour -fixed by Mrs. Romayne, “just for the season,” as she said, gave plenty -of time for the sun to find its way in at the windows; and on the -morning following Julian’s dinner with Lord Garstin the sunshine was -dancing on the walls, and the soft, warm air floating in at the open -windows, as though the thunderstorm of the previous evening had cleared -the air to some purpose. - -The two occupants of the room, as they faced one another across the -dainty little breakfast-table, had been laughing and talking after their -usual fashion ever since they sat down; talking of the party of the -night before and of engagements in the future; and finally reverting to -Lord Garstin’s dinner and Marston Loring, of whom Julian had already had -a great deal to say. - -“I have a kind of feeling that he and I are going to be chums, mother!” -he said as he carried his coffee-cup round the table to her to be -refilled. “I think he took to me rather, do you know!” - -“That’s a very surprising thing, isn’t it?” returned his mother, -laughing. “And you took to him? Well, if you must pick up a chum, you -couldn’t do it under better auspices than Lord Garstin’s.” - -“I took to him no end!” answered Julian eagerly. “I do hope you’ll like -him.” - -“I think I am pretty sure to like him,” said Mrs. Romayne graciously. “I -remember hearing about him some time ago--that he was quite one of the -rising young men of the day. He was to have been introduced to me then. -I forget why it didn’t come off. There’s your coffee!” - -Julian took his cup with a word of thanks and turned back to his chair; -and his mother began again. - -“Mr. Loring is a member of the Prince’s, I suppose?” she said. The -“Prince’s” was the name of the club at which Lord Garstin’s dinner had -been given. “I suppose you will want to be setting up a club in no time, -sir?” - -Julian laughed, and then replied somewhat eagerly and confidentially, as -though in unconscious response to a certain invitation in his mother’s -tone. - -“Well, of course a fellow does want a club, mother,” he said. “One feels -it more and more, don’t you know! Of course I should awfully like to -belong to the Prince’s.” - -“And why not?” responded his mother brightly, watching him rather -narrowly as she spoke. “Lord Garstin would put you up, I’ve no doubt, if -I asked him.” - -Julian’s eyes sparkled. - -“It would be first-rate!” he exclaimed. “Mother, it’s awfully jolly of -you!” He paused a moment and then continued tentatively: “It would be -rather expensive, you know. That’s the only thing!” - -“So I suppose!” answered his mother, laughing. “Oh, you’re a very -expensive luxury altogether! However, I imagine another hundred a year -would do?” Then as he broke into vehement demonstrations of delight and -gratitude, she added with another laugh which did not seem to ring quite -true: “I don’t think you need ever run short of money!” - -There was a moment’s pause as Julian, the picture of glowing -satisfaction, finished his breakfast, and then Mrs. Romayne rose. - -“What are you going to do this morning?” she said. “Read?” - -Julian glanced out of the window. - -“Well,” he said, “it’s an awfully jolly morning, isn’t it? I promised to -see after some live-stock for Miss Pomeroy’s stall--puppies, and -kittens, and canary birds. Rum idea, isn’t it? What are you doing this -morning, dear?” - -It turned out that Mrs. Romayne had nothing particular on her hands -beyond a visit to a jeweller in Bond Street, and accepting very easily -his substitution of Miss Pomeroy’s commission for the legal studies to -which he was supposed to devote himself in the mornings, she took up -his reference to the weather, and suggested that they should drive -together to execute first his business and then her own. - -“It will be rather nice driving this morning,” she said. “And we can -take a turn in the Park.” - -Certainly there was a certain amount of excuse for those people who had -already begun to say that Mrs. Romayne was never happy without her son -by her side. - -She spared no pains, however, to make him happy with her; and as they -drove along there was probably no brighter or brisker talk than theirs -in progress in all London. They drove through the West End streets and -penetrated, in search of Miss Pomeroy’s requirements, into regions into -which Mrs. Romayne had hardly ever penetrated before; regions which -rather amused her to-day in their squalor. When Julian had done his -commission in plenty of time to undo it and do it again before the -bazaar came off, as he remarked with a laugh, they turned back again and -went to Bond Street. - -“I have a little private matter to attend to here,” said Julian, as he -followed his mother into the jeweller’s shop. “You just have the -kindness to stop at your end of the shop, will you, please, and leave me -to mine?” - -Mrs. Romayne laughed and shook her head at him. It was within a few days -of her birthday, which was always demonstratively honoured by her son. - -“Now, you are not to be extravagant,” she said, holding up a slender, -threatening finger with mock severity. “Mind, I will not have it. I -shall descend upon you unawares, and keep you in order.” - -She let him leave her with another laugh, and he disappeared to the -other end of the shop, while she followed a shopman to a counter near -the door. Just turning away from it, she met Mrs. Pomeroy and her -daughter. - -“Now, this is really most delightful!” exclaimed Mrs. Pomeroy, if any -speech so comfortable and so entirely unexcited may be described as an -exclamation. “It is always charming to see you, dear Mrs. Romayne, of -course; but it really is particularly charming this morning, isn’t it, -Maud?” - -“That’s very nice,” said Mrs. Romayne brightly, turning to Maud Pomeroy -with a smile, and pressing the girl’s hand with an affectionate -familiarity developed in her with regard to Miss Pomeroy by the last few -weeks. A hardly perceptible touch of additional satisfaction had come to -her face as she saw the mother and daughter. “Please tell me why?” - -“Yes, of course,” said Mrs. Pomeroy placidly; she sat down as she spoke -with that instinct for personal ease under all circumstances, which was -her ruling characteristic. “That is just what I want to do. My dear Mrs. -Romayne, it is the bazaar, of course. It really is a most awkward thing, -isn’t it, Maud? It seems that we have asked twenty-one ladies--all most -important--to become stall-holders, and we can’t possibly make room for -more than eighteen stalls! Now, what would you---- Ah, Mr. Romayne, how -do you do?” - -Mrs. Pomeroy had broken off her tale of woe as placidly as she had -begun it, and had greeted Julian with comfortable cordiality. He had -come up hastily, not becoming aware of his mother’s companions until he -was close to them. - -“This is awfully lucky for me!” he exclaimed. “I want a lady desperately -for half a minute, and my mother won’t do. Miss Pomeroy,” turning -eagerly to the demure, correct-looking figure standing by Mrs. Pomeroy’s -side, “will you come to the other end of the shop with me for half a -minute? It would be awfully good of you.” - -The words were spoken in a tone of fashionable good-fellowship--the -pseudo good-fellowship which passes for the real thing in -society--which, as addressed by Julian Romayne to Miss Pomeroy and her -mother, was one of the results of his work in connection with the -bazaar; and before Miss Pomeroy could answer, Mrs. Romayne interposed. -Somebody very frequently did interpose when Miss Pomeroy was addressed. -No one ever seemed to expect opinions or decisions from her; perhaps -because she was her mother’s daughter; perhaps because of her curiously -characterless exterior; while the fact that she had never been known to -controvert a statement--in words--doubtless accentuated the tendency of -her acquaintance to make statements for her. - -“It will be awfully good of you,” Mrs. Romayne said to her now, -laughing, “if you are kind enough to help this silly fellow, to insist -on his remembering that his mother will be very angry indeed if he is -extravagant. I shall have to give up having a birthday, I think.” - -Then as Julian, with a gay gesture of repression to his mother, waited -for Miss Pomeroy’s answer with another pleading, “It would be ever so -good of you,” the girl, with a glance at her mother, said, with a -conventional smile, “With pleasure,” and walked away by his side. - -Mrs. Pomeroy looked after Julian with an approving smile. He was a -favourite of hers. - -“Such a nice fellow,” she murmured amiably; and Mrs. Romayne laughed her -pretty, self-conscious laugh. - -“So glad you find him so,” she said. “Oh, by-the-bye, dear Mrs. Pomeroy, -can you tell me anything about a Mr. Marston Loring? He goes everywhere, -doesn’t he? I think I have seen him at your house.” - -“Oh, yes,” returned Mrs. Pomeroy, as placidly as ever, but with a -decision which indicated that she was giving expression to a popular -verdict, not merely to an opinion of her own. “He is quite a young man -to know. Very clever, and rising. I don’t know what his people were; he -has been so successful that it really doesn’t signify, you know. He -lives in chambers--I don’t remember where, but it is a very good -address.” - -“Has he money?” asked Mrs. Romayne. - -“I really don’t know,” said Mrs. Pomeroy. “He is doing extremely well at -the bar. By the way, they say,” and herewith Mrs. Pomeroy lowered her -voice and confided to her interlocutor two or three details in -connection with Marston Loring’s private life--the life which in the -world no one is supposed to recognise--which might have been considered -by no means to his credit. They were not details which affected his -society character in any way, however, and Mrs. Romayne only laughed -with such slight affectation of reprobation as a woman of the world -should show. - -“Men are all alike, I suppose,” she said, with that fashionable -indulgence which has probably done as much as anything else towards -making men “all alike.” “By-the-bye, he was Lord Dunstan’s best man, -wasn’t he?” - -Mrs. Pomeroy was just confirming to Mr. Marston Loring what was -evidently a certificate of social merit, when Julian and Miss Pomeroy -reappeared, and Mrs. Romayne, with an exclamation at herself as a -“frightful gossip,” turned to the shopman, who had been waiting her -pleasure at a discreet distance, and transacted her business. - -“We haven’t settled anything about this trying business of the -twenty-one stall-holders,” said Mrs. Pomeroy plaintively, as she -finished. “Now, I wonder--we were thinking of taking a turn in the Park, -weren’t we, Maud?” Mrs. Pomeroy had a curious little habit of constantly -referring to her daughter. “It would be so kind of you, dear Mrs. -Romayne, if you would send your carriage home and take a turn with us, -you and Mr. Romayne, and I would take you home, of course. I really am -anxious to know what you advise, for there seems to be an idea that I am -in some way responsible for the awkwardness. So absurd, you know. I am -quite sure I have only done as I was told.” - -Apparently it had not occurred to Mrs. Pomeroy that to do as you are -told by four or five different people with totally different ends in -view is apt to lead to confusion. - -Mrs. Romayne fell in with the plan proposed, after an instant’s demur, -with smiling alacrity, and the “turn in the Park” that followed was a -very gay one. Miss Pomeroy and Julian laughed and talked together--that -is to say, Julian laughed and talked in the best of good spirits, and -Miss Pomeroy put in just the correct words and pretty smiles which were -wanted to keep his conversation in full swing. Mrs. Romayne and Mrs. -Pomeroy, facing them, disposed of the difficulty in connection with the -bazaar, after a good deal of irrelevant discussion, by saying very -often, and in a great many words, that three more stalls must be got in -somewhere; a decision which seemed to Mrs. Pomeroy to make everything -perfectly right, although she had had it elaborately demonstrated to her -that such a course was absolutely impossible. - -It was half-past one when Mrs. Romayne and Julian were put down at their -own door, and the barouche drove off amid a chorus of light laughter and -last words. The sunshine, the fresh air, the movement, or something less -simple and less physical, seemed to have had a most exhilarating effect -on Mrs. Romayne. Her face was almost as radiant in its curiously -different fashion as Julian’s was radiant with the unreasoning good -spirits of youth. - -“Such nice people!” she said lightly. “I wonder whether lunch is ready? -I’m quite starving! Oh, letters!” taking up three or four which lay on -the hall-table. “Let us trust they are interesting!” She turned into the -dining-room as she spoke, sorting the envelopes in her hand. “One for -you--your friend Von Mühler, isn’t it?” she said, tossing it to Julian -carelessly. “One for me--an invitation obviously. One from Mrs. -Ponsonby, about her stall, I suppose. And one from----” - -She stopped suddenly. The last letter of the pile was contained in a -small square envelope, and addressed in what was obviously a man’s -handwriting--a good handwriting, clear and strong, but somewhat cramped -and precise. “Mrs. William Romayne, 22, Queen Anne Street, Chelsea.” A -curious stillness seemed to come over the little alert figure as the -pale blue eyes caught sight of the writing, and then Mrs. Romayne moved -and walked slowly away to the window, still with her eyes fixed on the -envelope. She paused a moment, and then she opened it and drew out a -sheet of note-paper bearing a few lines only in the same small, clear -hand. - -“Well, mother, and what have your correspondents got to say? I have had -no end of a screed from Von Mühler.” - -Nearly ten minutes had passed, and Mrs. Romayne started violently. She -thrust the letter--still open in her hand, though she was looking -fixedly out of the window--back into its envelope and turned. Her face -had altered curiously and completely. All its colour, all the genuine -animation which had pervaded it as she came into the room, had -disappeared; it was pale and hard-looking, and the lines about the mouth -and eyes were very visible. - -“A dinner invitation from Lady Ashton,” she said, “and a long rigmarole -from Mrs. Ponsonby to tell me that she is resigning her stall, and why -she is doing it. Poor Mrs. Pomeroy should be grateful to her!” - -Her tone was an exaggeration of her bright carelessness of ten minutes -before, forced and unnatural; her back was towards the window, or even -Julian’s boyish eyes might have noticed the stiff unreality of the smile -with which she spoke. - -They sat down to lunch together, but the strange change which had come -to her did not pass away. Julian did most of the talking, though the -readiness of her comments and her smiles--which left her lips always -hard and set, and never seemed to touch her eyes--prevented his being in -the least aware of the fact. Their afternoon was spent apart; but when -they met again there was that about her face which made Julian say with -some surprise: - -“Are you tired, mother?” - -They were going to a large dinner-party before the very smart “at home” -to which Julian and Mr. Loring had referred on the previous evening as -an opportunity for meeting, and Mrs. Romayne was magnificently dressed. -There were diamonds round her throat and in her hair, and as they -flashed and sparkled, seeming to lend glow and animation to her face as -she laughed at him for a ridiculous boy, Julian thought carelessly that -he must have imagined the drawn look which had struck him--though he had -only recognised it as “tired-looking”--on his mother’s face. As though -his words had startled or even annoyed her, she gave neither Julian nor -any one else any further excuse for taxing her with fatigue. Throughout -the long and rather dull dinner she was vivacity itself; her face always -smiling, her laugh always ready. As the evening went on a flush made -its appearance on her cheeks, as though the mental stimulus under which -that gaiety was produced involved a veritable quickening of the pulses; -and her son, when he met her in the hall after she had uncloaked for -their second party, thought that he had never seen his mother look -“jollier,” as he expressed it. - -“We must look out for Loring,” he said eagerly. “Oh, there he is, -mother, just inside the doorway! That clever-looking fellow, do you see, -with a yellow buttonhole?” - -It was easier to recognise an acquaintance than to approach within -speaking distance of him; and some time elapsed, during which Mrs. -Romayne and Julian exchanged greetings on all sides, and were received -by Lady Bracondale, before they found themselves also just inside the -doorway. Mrs. Romayne had given one quick, keen glance in the direction -indicated by Julian, and then had become apparently oblivious of Mr. -Marston Loring’s existence until Julian finally exclaimed: - -“Well met, Loring! Awfully pleased to see you! Mother, may I introduce -Mr. Marston Loring?” - -She turned her head then, and bent it very graciously, holding out her -hand with her most charming smile. - -“I have known you by sight for a long time, Mr. Loring!” she said. “I am -delighted to make your acquaintance!” - -“The delight is mine!” was the response, spoken with just that touch of -well-bred deference which is never so attractive to a woman as when it -is exhibited in conjunction with such a personality as Loring’s. “It is -one for which I have wished for a long time!” - -“Seen the papers to-night?” interposed Julian eagerly. “We’ve lost -Nottingham, you see!” - -He was alluding to a bye-election which had led to the political -discussion of the evening before, and Loring nodded. - -“I see,” said Loring. “Romayne has told you, no doubt,” he went on, -turning to Mrs. Romayne, “that we foregathered to a considerable extent -last night over politics--and other things.” The last words were spoken -with a glance at the younger man which seemed to ascribe to their -acquaintance an altogether more personal and friendly footing than -political discussion alone could have afforded it, and Mrs. Romayne -laughed very graciously. - -“Yes; he has told me!” she said. “I am rather thinking of getting a -little jealous of you, Mr. Loring.” - -A few minutes’ more talk followed--talk in which Loring bore himself -with his usual cynical manner, just tempered into even unusual -effectiveness--and then Mrs. Romayne prepared to move on. - -“You must come and see us,” she said to Loring. “Julian will give you -the address. I am at home on Fridays; and I hope you will dine with us -before long!” - -She gave him a pretty nod and an “_au revoir_,” and turned away. - -“He’s awfully jolly, isn’t he, mother?” exclaimed Julian, as soon as -they were out of earshot. - -“Very good style,” returned Mrs. Romayne approvingly. “He is just the -kind of man to get on. You have a good deal of discrimination, sir,” -she added. - -The mother and son were separated after that, and about half an hour -later Mrs. Romayne caught sight of Julian disappearing with a very -pretty girl, whose face she did not know, in the direction of the -supper-room, just as she herself was greeted by Lord Garstin and pressed -to repair thither. - -“Thanks, no,” she said lightly. “There is such a crowd, and I really -don’t want anything.” - -She paused. That accentuated vivacity was still about her, as she looked -up at Lord Garstin with a little smile and a gesture which he thought -unusually charming. - -“I want a little chat with you, though, very much,” she said with pretty -confidence. “I’m going to ask you to give me some advice, do you know. -Will it bore you frightfully?” - -“On the contrary, it will delight me,” was the ready and by no means -insincere response. - -Mrs. Romayne made a gracious and grateful movement of her head. - -“I would rather take your opinion than that of any other man I know,” -she said confidentially. She stopped and laughed slightly. “It’s about -my boy, of course!” she said. “I want to know what you think of a club -for a young man in his position? Do you think, now, that it is a good -thing?” - -“Emphatically, yes,” returned Lord Garstin. “I consider a good club of -the first importance to a young man. Your young man ought to be a member -of the Prince’s.” He paused a moment, looking at her as she nodded her -head softly, waiting as though for further words of wisdom from him, and -thought what a delightful little woman she was. “Suppose I talk to him -about it?” he said pleasantly. “I will see to it with pleasure if you -would like it.” - -Nothing, certainly, could have been more delightful than Mrs. Romayne’s -manner, as she spoke just the right words of graceful acknowledgement -and acceptance. Then she made a gaily disparaging comment on club life, -and Lord Garstin’s advocacy of it, and a few minutes’ bantering, -laughing repartee followed--that society repartee of which Mrs. Romayne -was a mistress. From thence she drifted into talk about the party, and a -complaint of the heat of the room. - -“It is time we were going, I think!” she remarked, with a gay little -laugh. “But a mother is a miserable slave, you see! I am ‘left until -called for,’ I suppose!” - -“If I were not absolutely obliged to go myself,” returned Lord Garstin, -“I shouldn’t encourage such a suggestion on your part. But as that is -the case, unfortunately, shall I find your boy first and send him to -you?” - -Mrs. Romayne shook her head with another laugh. - -“I saw him retire to the supper-room a little while ago with a very -pretty girl,” she said. “I make it a point never to hurry him under such -circumstances! But if you should meet him you might tell him that I am -quite ready when he is. Good night!” - -The room was not by any means crowded now; it was getting late and a -great many people were in the supper-room. The corner of the room in -which Mrs. Romayne was standing happened to be nearly deserted; there -was no one near her, and after Lord Garstin left her, she stood still, -fanning herself and looking straight before her with her bright smile -and animated expression rather stereotyped on her face. Suddenly, as if -involuntarily, she turned her head; she looked across to the other side -of the room and met the eyes of a man standing against the wall, who had -been looking fixedly at her ever since Lord Garstin joined her. For an -instant not the slightest perceptible change of expression touched her -face; only the very absoluteness of its immobility suggested that that -immobility was the result of a sudden and tremendous effort of -self-control; then the colour faded slowly from her cheeks and from her -lips; the smile did not disappear but it gradually assumed a ghastly -appearance of being carved in marble; her eyes widened slightly and -became strangely fixed. The man was Dennis Falconer, and he and she were -looking at one another across the gulf of eighteen years. - -It was only for a moment. Then Mrs. Romayne, still quite colourless, -lifted her eyebrows prettily and made a gesture of amazed recognition, -and Falconer moved and came slowly towards her. - -“What a surprising thing!” she exclaimed, holding out her hand. “I had -no idea you were here to-night! How do you do? Welcome home!” - -Her tone was perfectly easy and gracious; so ultra-easy, indeed, that it -deprived her words of any personal or emotional significance whatever, -and relegated their meeting-place with subtle skill to the most -conventional of society grounds. The rather distinguished-looking man -with the good reserved manner who stood before her accepted the position -with grave readiness. - -“Thank you,” he said. He spoke with distant courtesy, about which there -was not even the suggestion of that matter-of-course friendliness, as of -distant kinship, which had made her reception of him nearly perfect as a -work of art. “It is a great pleasure to me to be in England again.” - -“You have been away--let me see--two years?” said Mrs. Romayne, with -the vivacious assumption of intelligent interest which the social -situation demanded. “Five, is it? Really? And you have done wonderful -things, I hear. Funnily enough, I have been hearing about you only -to-night. I must congratulate you.” - -He bent his head with a courteous gesture of thanks. - -“You have had my note, I hope?” he said. “You are settled in London now, -Thomson tells me.” - -Thomson was the family lawyer, and he and Dennis Falconer himself were -Mrs. Romayne’s trustees under old Mr. Falconer’s will. - -“Oh, yes!” she answered suavely. “I had it to-day, just before lunch. So -nice of you to write to me. Yes, we are settled----” - -She had been fanning herself carelessly throughout the short colloquy, -glancing at Falconer or about the room with every appearance of perfect -ease; but now, as her eyes wandered to the other end of the room -something seemed to catch her attention. She hesitated, appeared to -forget what she had intended to say, tried to recover herself, and -failed. - -Julian had come into the room, and was just parting gaily from some one -in the doorway. Dennis Falconer did not take up her unfinished sentence; -he followed the direction of her eyes across the room until his own -rested upon Julian, and then he started slightly and glanced down at the -woman by his side. - -Mrs. Romayne laughed a rather high, unnatural laugh. She faced him with -her eyes very hard and bright, and her lips smiling; and through all the -artificiality of her face and manner there was something lurking in -those hard, bright eyes as she did it, something not to be caught or -defined, which made the movement almost heroic. - -“You recognise him?” she said lightly. “Ridiculously like me, isn’t he?” - -At that moment Julian started across the room, evidently to come to his -mother. He came on, stopping incessantly to exchange good-nights, -laughing, bowing, and smiling; and, as though there were a fascination -for them about his gay young figure, the man and woman standing -together at the other end of the room watched him draw nearer and -nearer. Words continued to come from Mrs. Romayne, a pretty, -inconsequent flow of society chatter, but it no more tempered the -strange gaze with which her eyes followed her son than did the unheeding -silence with which Falconer received them as his grave eyes rested also -on the young man. The whole thing was so incongruous; the expression of -those two pair of eyes was so utterly out of harmony with their -surroundings, and with the laughing, unconscious boy on whom they were -fixed; that they seemed to draw him out from the brightly dressed, -smiling groups through which he passed, and isolate him strangely in a -weird atmosphere of his own. - -“Here you are, sir!” cried his mother gaily, looking no longer at Julian -as he stood close to her at last, but beyond him. - -“Lord Garstin told me you were ready to go, dear,” said Julian -pleasantly. “I hope I haven’t kept you?” - -“There was no hurry,” she answered, smiling; her voice was a little -thin and strained. “We will go now, I think, but I want to introduce you -first to some one whose name you know. This is your cousin, Dennis -Falconer.” - - - - -CHAPTER XI - - -It was a rather close afternoon in the third week of May. Fine weather -had lasted without a break for more than a fortnight; for the last two -or three days there had been little or no breeze; and the inevitable -effect had been produced upon London. The streets were a combination of -dust, which defied the water-carts; and glare, which seemed to radiate -alike from the heavy, smoky-blue sky, the houses, and the pavements. It -was only half-past three, and Piccadilly was as yet far from being -crowded. The pavement was mainly occupied by the working population, -which hurries to and fro along the London streets from morning to night -regardless of fashionable hours; and the few representatives of the -non-working class--smartly-dressed women and carefully got-up and -sauntering men--stood out with peculiar distinctness. But the figure of -Dennis Falconer, as he walked westward along the north side of -Piccadilly, was conspicuous not only on these rather unenviable terms. - -At the first glance it would have seemed that the past eighteen years -had altered him considerably, and altered him always for the better; -analysed carefully, the alteration resolved itself into a very -noticeable increase of maturity and of a certain kind of strength; and -the improvement into the fact that his weak points were of a kind to be -far less perceptible as such on a mature than on an immature face. His -face was thin and very brown; there were worn lines about it which told -of physical endurance; and in the sharper chiselling of the whole the -thinness of the nose and the narrowness of the forehead were no longer -striking. The somewhat self-conscious superiority of his younger days -had disappeared under the hand of time, and a certain sternness which -had replaced it seemed to give dignity to his expression. The keen -steadiness of his eyes had strengthened, and, indeed, it was their -expression which helped in a very great degree to make his face so -noticeable. He no longer wore a beard, and the firm, square outline of -his chin and jaw were visible, while his mouth was hidden by a -moustache; iron-grey like his hair. He was very well dressed, but there -was that about the simple conventionality of his attire which suggested -that its correctness was rather a concession to exterior demands than -the expression of personal weakness. - -More than one of the people who turned their heads to look at him as he -walked down Piccadilly were familiar with that grave, stern face; it had -been reproduced lately in the pages of all the illustrated papers, and -people glanced at it with the interest created by the appearance in the -flesh of something of a celebrity. Falconer had done a great deal of -good work for the Geographical Society in the course of the past -eighteen years; work characterised by no brilliancy or originality of -intellectual resource, but eminently persevering, conscientious, and -patient. During the last year, however, a chapter of accidents had -conspired to invest the expedition of which he was the leader with a -touch of romance and excitement with which his personality would never -have endued it. The achievement in which the expedition had resulted had -been hailed in England as a national triumph, and Dennis Falconer found -himself one of the lions of the moment. - -But the position, especially for a man who believed himself to attach no -value whatever to it, had been somewhat dearly bought. Falconer, as he -walked the London streets on that May afternoon, was trying to realise -himself as at home in them, settled among them, perhaps, for an -indefinite period; and the effort brought an added shade of gravity to -his face. The terrible physical strain of the last six months; a strain -the severity of which he had hardly realised at the time, as he endured -from day to day with the simple, unimaginative perseverance of a man for -whom nerves have no existence; had told even upon his iron constitution; -and a couple of great London doctors had condemned him to a year’s -inactivity at least, under penalties too grave to be provoked. - -He turned down Sloane Street, and another quarter of an hour brought -him to number twenty-two, Queen Anne Street. He rang, was admitted, and -ushered upstairs into the drawing-room. - -The room was empty, and Falconer walked across it, glancing about him -with those keen, habitually observant eyes of his, and on his face there -was something of the stiffness and reserve which had characterised his -voice a minute earlier as he asked for Mrs. Romayne. - -Until the night, now nearly a fortnight ago, when they had met in Lady -Bracondale’s drawing-room, Dennis Falconer had seen Mrs. Romayne only -once since their journey from Nice had ended in old Mr. Falconer’s -house. That one occasion had been his visit to his uncle--so called--in -his Swiss home in the second year of Mrs. Romayne’s widowhood. - -He had been in Europe several times since then and had always made a -point of visiting old Mr. Falconer, but on every subsequent occasion it -had happened--rather strangely, as he had thought to himself once or -twice--that Mrs. Romayne was away from home. After old Mr. Falconer’s -death communication between them occurred only at the rarest intervals. -Dennis Falconer was Mrs. Romayne’s only remaining relation, and in this -capacity had been left by her uncle one of her trustees; but any -necessary business was transacted by his fellow trustee--old Mr. -Falconer’s lawyer. But the clan instinct was very strong in Falconer; it -brought in its wake a whole set of duties and obligations which for most -men are non-existent; and the sense of duty which had been -characteristic of him in early manhood had only been more deeply--and -narrowly--engraved by every succeeding year. - -Arrived in London, and knowing Mrs. Romayne to be settled there, he had -considered it incumbent on him to call on her, and had written the note -which she had received nearly a fortnight ago. He had written it with -much the same expression on his face--only a little less pronounced, -perhaps--as rested on it now that he was waiting for Mrs. Romayne in her -own drawing-room. Through all the changes brought about by the passing -of eighteen years, the mental attitude produced in him towards Mrs. -Romayne during those weeks of dual solitude at Nice had remained almost -untouched, except inasmuch as its disapproval had been accentuated by -everything he had heard of her since. It had been vivified and rendered, -as it were, tangible and definite by the short interview at Lady -Bracondale’s party, which had made her a reality instead of a -remembrance to him. - -He was standing before a large and very admirable photograph of -Julian--Julian at his very best and most attractive--contemplating it -with a heavy frown, when the door behind him opened under a light, quick -touch, and Mrs. Romayne came into the room. - -“It is too shocking to have kept you waiting!” she said. “So glad to see -you! I gave myself too much shopping to do, and I have had quite a -fearful rush!” - -Her voice and manner were very easy, very conventionally cordial; and, -as it seemed to Falconer, there was not a natural tone or movement about -her. It was her “at home” afternoon, and she was charmingly dressed in -something soft and pale-coloured; her eyes were very bright, and the -play of expression on her face was even more vivacious and effective -than usual--exaggeratedly so, even. - -She shook hands and pointed him to a seat, sinking into a chair herself -with an affectation of hard-won victory over the “fearful rush”; the -subtle assumption of the most superficial society relation as alone -existing between them was as insidious and as indefinable as it had been -on their previous meeting, and seemed to set the key-note of the -situation even before she spoke again. - -“It is a frightful season!” she said. “Really horribly busy! They say it -is to be a short one--I am sure I trust it is true, if we are any of us -to be left alive at the end--and everything seems to be crammed into a -few weeks. Don’t you think so? You are very lucky to have arrived -half-way through.” - -“London just now does not seem to be a particularly desirable place, -certainly,” answered Falconer; his manner was very formal and reserved, -a great contrast to her apparent ease. - -“No!” she said, lifting her eyebrows with a smile. “Now, that sounds -rather ungrateful in you, do you know, for London finds you a very -desirable visitor. One hears of you everywhere.” - -“I am afraid I must confess that I take very little pleasure in going -‘everywhere,’” returned Falconer stiffly. “Social life in London seems -to me to have altered for the worse in every direction, since I last -took part in it.” - -“And yet you go out a great deal!” with a laugh. “That sounds a trifle -inconsistent!” - -“I am not sufficiently egotistical to imagine that my individual refusal -to countenance it would have any effect upon society,” answered -Falconer, still more stiffly. “To tolerate is by no means to approve.” - -Falconer’s reasons for the toleration in question--the real reasons, of -which he himself was wholly unconscious--would have astonished him not a -little, if he could have brought himself to realise them, in their -narrow conventionality. Fortunately it did not occur to Mrs. Romayne to -ask for them. With the ready tact of a woman of the world she turned the -conversation with a gracefully worded question as to his recent -expedition. He answered it with the courteous generality--only rather -more gravely spoken--with which he had answered a great many similar -questions put to him during the past week by ladies to whom he had been -introduced in his capacity of momentary celebrity; and she passed on -from one point to another with the superficial interest evoked by one of -the topics of the hour. Her exaggerated comments and questions, more or -less wide of the mark, were exhausted at length, and a moment’s pause -followed; a fact that indicated, though Falconer did not know it, that -the preceding conversation had involved some kind of strain on the -bright little woman who had kept it up so vivaciously. The pause was -broken by Falconer. - -“You have heard,” he said, “of poor Thomson’s illness?” - -It would hardly be true to say that Mrs. Romayne started--even -slightly--but a curious kind of flush seemed to pass across her face. -As she answered, both her voice and her manner seemed instinctively to -increase and emphasize that distance which she had tacitly set between -them; it was as though the introduction into the conversation of a name -their mutual familiarity with which represented mutual interests and -connections had created the instinct in her. - -“Yes, poor man!” she said carelessly. “There has been a good deal of -illness about this season, somehow.” - -“I am afraid it is a bad business,” went on Falconer, with no -comprehension of the turn she had given to the conversation, and with -his mental condemnation of what seemed to him simple heartlessness on -her part not wholly absent from his voice. “There was to be a -consultation to-day; and I shall call this evening to hear the result. -But I am afraid there is very slender hope.” - -“How very sad!” said Mrs. Romayne with polite interest. - -Falconer bent his head in grave assent, and then with a view to arousing -in her shallow nature--as it seemed to him--some remembrance at least -of the usefulness to her of the man whose probable death she -contemplated so carelessly, he said with formal courtesy: - -“Thomson has done all the work connected with our joint trusteeship so -admirably hitherto that there has been no need for my services. But if, -while he is ill, you should find yourself in want of his aid in that -capacity, I need not say that I am entirely at your command.” - -Again that curious flush passed across Mrs. Romayne’s face, leaving it -rather pale this time. - -“Thanks, so much!” she said quickly. “I really could not think of -troubling you. I’ve no doubt I shall be able to hold on until Mr. -Thomson is well again. Thanks immensely! You will not be within reach -for very long, I suppose?” - -“I shall be in London for a year, certainly,” answered Falconer, -acknowledging her tacit refusal to recognise any claim on him in the -formal directness of his reply. Then, as she uttered a sharp little -exclamation of surprise, he added briefly; “I am in the doctors’ hands, -unfortunately. There is something wrong with me, they say.” - -“I am very sorry----” she began prettily, though her eyes were rather -hard and preoccupied. But at that moment the door opened to admit an -influx of visitors, and Falconer rose to go. - -“So glad to have seen you!” she said as she turned to him after -welcoming the new-comers. “You won’t have a cup of tea? It is always -rather crushing when a man refuses one’s tea, isn’t it, Mrs. Anson?” -turning as she spoke to a lady sitting close by. Then as she gave him -her hand, speaking in a tone which still included the other lady in the -conversation, she alluded for the first time to Julian. The whole call -had gone by without one of those references to “my boy” with which all -Mrs. Romayne’s acquaintances were so familiar, that such an omission -under the circumstances would have been hardly credible to any one of -them. - -“I’m so sorry you have missed my boy!” she said now with her apologetic -laugh. “I’m afraid I am absurdly proud of him--isn’t that so, dear Mrs. -Anson?--but he really is a dear fellow.” - -“He is going to the bar, I believe?” said Falconer; his face and voice -alike were uncompromisingly stern and unbending. - -“Yes!” answered Julian’s mother. “He is not clever, dear boy, but I hope -he may do fairly well. Good-bye! Shall you be at the Gordons’ to-night? -We are going first to see the American actor they rave about so. A funny -little domestic party--I and my son and my son’s new and particular -‘chum.’ Good-bye!” - -Mrs. Romayne’s face did not regain its normal colour as she turned her -attention to her other callers, nor did those faint lines about her -mouth and eyes disappear. She was particularly charming that afternoon, -but always, as she welcomed one set of visitors or parted from another, -laughing, talking or listening so gaily, there was a faint, hardly -definable air of preoccupation about her. She had a great many visitors, -and the afternoon grew hotter as it wore on. When she dressed for dinner -that night, finding herself strangely nervous, irritable with her maid, -and “on edge altogether,” as she expressed it, she was very definite -and distinct in her self-assurances that such an unusual state of things -was owing solely to the heat and “those tiresome people”; rather -unnecessarily distinct and explicit it would have seemed, since there -was apparently no chance of contradiction. - -The acquaintanceship between Julian and Marston Loring had developed -during the past fortnight with surprising rapidity. They had dined -together at the club, they had smoked together in Loring’s chambers, and -they had met incessantly at dances, “at homes,” or dinners, on all of -which occasions Mrs. Romayne had been uniformly gracious to her son’s -friend. - -At a garden-party a few miles out of London, admittedly the greatest -failure of the season, when Loring and the Romaynes had walked about -together all the afternoon with that carelessness of social obligations -which a dull party is apt to engender, the scheme for the present -evening had been arranged; Loring adding a preliminary dinner at a -restaurant, with himself in the capacity of host to Mrs. Romayne and her -son, to the original suggestion that they should go together to the -theatre. - -Julian was in high spirits as they drove off to keep their engagement, -but his mother’s responses to his chatter were neither so ready nor so -bright as usual. He glanced at her once or twice and then said boyishly: - -“You look awfully done up, mother!” - -Mrs. Romayne turned to him quickly, her eyes sparkling angrily, her -whole face looking irritable and annoyed. - -“My dear Julian,” she said sharply, “it’s a very bad habit to be -constantly commenting on people’s appearance; especially when your -remarks are uncomplimentary. You told me I looked tired the other day. -Please don’t do it again!” - -Such an ebullition of temper was an almost unheard-of thing with Mrs. -Romayne, and Julian could only stare at her in helpless -astonishment--not hurt, but simply surprised, and inclined to be -resentful. He could not realise as a woman might have done the jarred, -quivering state of nerves implied in such an outbreak; and he simply -thought his mother was rather odd, when a moment later she stretched -out her hand hastily, and laid it on his with a quick, tight squeeze. - -“That was abominably cross, dear!” she said in a voice which shook. -“Don’t mind! I am all right now.” - -But she was not all right, and though she made a valiant effort to -collect her forces and appear so, her gaiety throughout dinner was -strained and forced. Loring’s quick perception realised instantly that -something was wrong with her, and his demeanour under the circumstances -was significant at once of the work of the past fortnight, and of his -individual capacity for turning everything to his own ends. With a tacit -assumption of a certain right to consider her, he evinced just such a -delicate appreciation of her mood as gave her a sense of rest and -soothing, without letting her feel for a moment that he found anything -wanting in her. His pose was always that of a man to whom youth or even -early manhood, with its follies and inexperiences, is a thing of the dim -past, and he used that pose now to the utmost advantage; combining a -mental equality with the mother with an actual equality with the son as -his contemporary in a manner which made him seem in a very subtle way -equally the friend of each. He talked, of course, almost exclusively to -Mrs. Romayne, never, however, failing to include Julian in the -conversation; and he so managed the conversation as to take all its -trouble on his own shoulders, and give Mrs. Romayne little to do but -listen and be entertained. - -He succeeded so well that the dinner-hour, by the time it was over, had -done the work of many days in advancing his dawning intimacy with Mrs. -Romayne. - -She felt better, she told herself as they entered the theatre--told -herself with rather excessive eagerness and satisfaction, perhaps -because of something within, of which the quick, nervous movement of her -hands as she unfastened her cloak was the outward and visible sign. - -The curtain was just going up as they seated themselves, and during the -first quarter of an hour the two seats to their left remained empty. -Then Mrs. Romayne, whose attention was by no means chained to the stage, -became aware of the slow and difficult approach of a flow of -loudly-whispered and apologetic conversation, combined with the large -person of a lady; and a moment or two later she was being fallen over by -Mrs. Halse, who was followed by a girl, and who continued to explain the -situation fluently and audibly, until a distinct expression of the -opinion of the pit caused her to subside temporarily. - -She began to talk again before the applause on the fall of the curtain -had died away, and her voice reached Mrs. Romayne, to whom her remarks -were addressed, across the girl who was with her, and Julian, who was -sitting on his mother’s left hand, with gradually increasing -distinctness. - -“So curious that our seats should be together!” were the first words -Mrs. Romayne heard. “I have just been meeting a connection of yours. The -explorer, you know--Dennis Falconer. So fascinating! Oh, by-the-bye--my -cousin. I don’t think she has had the pleasure of being introduced to -you, though she has met your son. Miss Hilda Newton--Mrs. Romayne.” - -Miss Hilda Newton was a very pretty, dark girl of a somewhat pronounced -type. She had large, perceptive, black eyes, singularly unabashed; a -charming little turned-up nose; and a rather large mouth with a good -deal of shrewd character about it. She was understood to be a country -cousin of Mrs. Halse’s, with whom she had been staying for the last -three weeks; but only a very critical and rather unkind eye could have -traced the country cousin in her dress, which had a great deal of style -and dash about it. She acknowledged Mrs. Halse’s introduction of her -with rather excessive self-possession, and after a casual word or two to -Mrs. Romayne, addressed herself to Julian; it was she with whom he had -disappeared to supper at Lady Bracondale’s “at home,” and they had -evidently seen a good deal of one another in the interval. - -Mrs. Romayne had noticed them together more than once, and she had taken -a dislike to Miss Newton’s pretty, independent face and manners. In her -present mood it was an absolute relief to her to find in the girl a -legitimate excuse for irritation, and a reason for the fact that Mrs. -Halse’s speech had somehow undone all the work of the early part of the -evening, and set her nerves on edge afresh. - -“Detestably bad style!” she said to herself angrily, giving an unheeding -ear to Mrs. Halse as she watched Miss Newton reply with a little twirl -of her fan to an eager question of Julian’s. “Just what one would expect -in a cousin of that woman.” Then she became aware that “that woman” was -vociferously insisting on changing places with Julian, and that Julian -was acceding to the proposition with considerable alacrity; and before -she had well realised exactly what the change involved, Mrs. Halse, with -much paraphernalia of smelling-bottle, fan, opera-glasses, and -programme, was established at her side, and Julian and Miss Newton were -seated together at the end of the row, practically isolated by the -stream of Mrs. Halse’s conversation. - -“So horrid to talk across people, isn’t it?” said that lady airily, -though no crowd ever collected would have interfered with her flow of -language. “This is much more comfortable. My dear Mrs. Romayne, I am -simply dying to rave to somebody about your cousin--he is your cousin, -isn’t he?--Mr. Falconer, you know. What a splendid man! Of course all -the accounts of his work have been most fascinating, but the man himself -makes it all seem so much more real, don’t you know. Now, do tell me, is -he your first cousin, and do you remember him when he was quite a little -boy, and all that sort of thing?” - -Mrs. Romayne took up her fan and unfurled it. She was looking past Mrs. -Halse at Julian and Miss Newton, who were looking over the same -programme with their heads rather close together. Her eyebrows were -slightly contracted, and her eyes very bright, and the restless -movements of the slender hand that held the fan seemed to be an -expression of intense inward irritation. - -“Oh dear, no; Dennis Falconer is not my first cousin, by any means!” she -said carelessly, though her voice was a trifle sharp. “Third or fourth, -or something of that kind.” - -“He is quite a hero, isn’t he?” said Mrs. Halse, gushingly addressing -Loring. “Have you met him?” - -Loring, though his glance had every appearance of perfect carelessness, -was watching Mrs. Romayne intently. He had noticed her access of nervous -irritability, and he was curious as to the cause. Was it her son’s -flirtation with Miss Newton? Was it dislike to Mrs. Halse? Or had it any -connection with Dennis Falconer? He had his reasons for a study of Mrs. -Romayne’s idiosyncrasies. - -“Yes,” he said. “I met him the other night. A good sort of fellow he -seemed.” - -“He’s magnificent!” said Mrs. Halse enthusiastically. “We must have him -at the bazaar, my dear Mrs. Romayne; that I am quite determined. If he -would sell African trophies for us, you know--a native’s tooth, or -poppy-heads--oh, arrow-heads, is it?--well anything of that sort--it -would be a fortune to us! Have you seen a great deal of him? Cousins are -so often just like brothers and sisters, are they not?” - -A low laugh and a toss of her head from Miss Newton at this moment -closed the perusal of the programme, and Julian turned his attention to -perusing the pretty black eyes instead. Mrs. Romayne’s lips seemed to -tighten and whiten, and the fingers which held the fan were tightly -clenched as she answered in a voice which rang hard in spite of her -efforts: - -“Sometimes they are, of course. But it depends so much on circumstances. -Dennis Falconer and I had not met for years until the other day.” - -At that moment the curtain went up, leaving Mrs. Halse literally with -her mouth open, and the instant it fell Mrs. Romayne leant across to -Miss Newton with a comment on the performance, spoken in a rather thin, -tense voice, and with eyes that glittered as though the nervous strain -under which the speaker was labouring was becoming almost insupportable. -Apparently something in her face repelled the girl, for her answer was -of the briefest, and Julian throwing himself into the breach, he and -Miss Newton were instantly absorbed in an animated discussion. It was a -long wait, and Loring, noting every one of the restless movements of the -woman by his side as she talked and laughed so sharply, understood that -to Mrs. Romayne every moment meant nervous torture. The instant the -green curtain fell on the third act she rose, and Loring followed her -example, and wrapped her quickly and deftly in her cloak. - -“I can’t say I think much of your American prodigy,” she said to him -with a forced laugh. “I must confess that he has bored me to such an -extent that I really can’t stand any more boredom, and shall go straight -home. Julian!” - -She glanced round for him as she spoke, but he was escorting Mrs. Halse -and her cousin, and she was waiting for him in her brougham before he -joined her. - -“Suppose you come to the club with me?” suggested Loring carelessly, as -Julian received his mother’s announcement of her intentions rather -blankly. “What do you say to a game of billiards?” - -“All right,” responded Julian. “Thanks, old fellow. It was only that I -told Miss Newton we were coming on. Isn’t she a jolly girl, mother?” - -Mrs. Romayne smiled. - -“Very pretty indeed,” she said lightly. “It’s a sad pity you’re such an -ineligible fellow, isn’t it?” - -And Loring, as the carriage drove off, said to himself admiringly: “What -a wonderfully clever woman!” - -Reaction from a heavy strain--even, apparently, if it is only the strain -of combating exhaustion engendered by heat--is a terrible thing. When -Mrs. Romayne got out of her carriage after her long drive, her face was -haggard and drawn. She passed into the house, gathered up mechanically, -and without a glance, two letters waiting for her on the hall-table; -told the maid who was waiting for her that she might go to bed, and went -up into the drawing-room. - -There was a low chair by a little table covered with dainty, useless -paraphernalia, which she particularly affected. She sat down in it now, -almost unconsciously as it seemed, without even loosening her cloak, and -with a long, low sigh; the moments passed, and still she sat there, a -curious grey pallor about her face, her eyes gazing straight before her -as though they were looking into the future or the past. At last, as if -by a sudden fierce effort of will, she roused herself and began to tear -open the letters still in her hand as if with a desperate instinct -towards occupying her thoughts. - -Her eyes fell on the letter by this time open in her hand, and she read -it almost unconsciously, taking in the sense gradually as she read: - -“DEAR COUSIN HERMIA, - - “I have just heard to my great sorrow of the death of our old - friend Thomson, and I think it right to let you know of it. I - believe I need not remind you that on any future occasion on which - the help of your now, unfortunately, sole trustee may be necessary, - you will find me entirely at your service. - -“Faithfully yours, - -“DENNIS FALCONER.” - - - -With a sudden fierce gesture, of which her small white fingers looked -hardly capable, Mrs. Romayne crushed the letter in her hand and lifted -her head. - -“To be thrown upon him!” she said in a curious, breathless tone. “To -have to come into contact--close contact, personal contact--with him!” - - - - -CHAPTER XII - - -The season, as Mrs. Romayne had told Dennis Falconer, was to be a short -one, and its proceedings were apparently to be regulated on the old -principle of a short life and a merry one. Gaieties overtook one another -in too rapid succession, and an unusually sunny and breezy May and June, -with the inevitable action of such weather on human beings, even under -the most artificial conditions, rendered these gaieties a shade more -really gay than usual. - -The atmosphere was not, again, so close as it had been on the afternoon -when Dennis Falconer called on Mrs. Romayne, and it is presumable that -the weather must have been responsible for her general unusualness of -mood on the evening of that day; for if she was not quite herself on the -following morning, the touch of self-compulsion in her brightness was -so slight as to be hardly perceptible, and a day or two later it had -entirely disappeared. - -Certainly if constant stir and movement are conducive to good spirits, -there was nothing wonderful in Mrs. Romayne’s satisfaction with life. -For she had not, as she complained laughingly, a single moment to -herself. - -“It’s a regular treadmill!” she exclaimed gaily one day to Lord Garstin. -“I had really forgotten what a terrible thing a London season was!” - -“It seems to agree with you,” was the answer. “There is one lady of my -acquaintance, and only one, who seems to grow younger every day!” - -“You can’t mean me,” she laughed. “I assure you, I am growing grey with -incessantly running after that boy of mine! He is as difficult to catch -as any lion of the season. I never see him except at parties!” - -Julian’s intimacy with Marston Loring had grown apace, and it had led to -sundry social consequences which were, his mother said, “so good for -him.” Little dinners at the club, to which he had been duly elected; -dinners at which he was now guest, now host; jovial little bachelor -suppers made up among the very best “sets.” Loring himself was very -careful--though he knew better than to make his care perceptible, except -in its results--never to allow himself to be placed in the position of a -rival to Mrs. Romayne for her son’s time and company. He lost no -opportunity of making himself useful and agreeable to Mrs. Romayne; now -using pleasantly arrogated rights as Julian’s friend; now his superior -brain-power and knowledge of the world; until he gradually assumed the -position of friend of the house. But club life necessarily created in -Julian interests apart from his mother--interests which she was -apparently well content that he should have, so long as his ever-ready -chatter to her on the subject revealed that they were all connected with -good “sets.” - -It was furthermore a season of very pretty _débutantes_, a large -majority of whom elected to look upon Mr. Romayne as “such a nice boy,” -and to exact--or permit--any amount of slavery from him in the matters -of fetching and carrying and general attendance. “You’re known to be so -profoundly ineligible, you see!” his mother would say to him, laughing. -“Nobody is in the least afraid of you, poor boy!” And she looked on with -perfect calmness as he danced, and rode, and did church parade; looked -on with a calmness which might have been mistaken for indifference, but -for the significant fact that she always knew which of his “jolly girls” -was in the ascendant for the moment. - -Miss Newton had gone home on the day following the meeting at the -theatre. - -Falconer was to be seen about throughout the season, making his grave -concession to the weaknesses of society. Mrs. Romayne and Julian met him -constantly, and he was asked to, and attended, the most formal of the -dinners given at Queen Anne Street. But the intercourse between him and -his “connection,” as Mrs. Romayne called herself, was of the most -distant and non-progressive type. Julian did not take to him at all. “He -is such a solemn fellow, mother!” he said. “He seems to think that I’m -doing something wrong all the time.” An observation to which Mrs. -Romayne replied by laughing a rather forced laugh and changing the -conversation. - -The last event of the season, as it became evident as the weeks ran on, -would be the bazaar in aid of Mrs. Halse’s discovery among charities. It -was, perhaps, as well that the institution in question was by no means -in such urgent need of patronage as might have been argued from Mrs. -Halse’s demeanour towards it earlier in the proceedings; for that lady’s -enthusiasm on the subject had suffered severely in the contest with the -numerous other enthusiasms which had succeeded it, and the affairs of -the bazaar had been pursued by all its supporters with energy which is -most charitably to be described as intermittent. Three separate dates -had been fixed for the opening day; and, after a great deal of money had -been spent in printing and advertising, each of these in succession had -had to be abandoned owing to the singular incompleteness of every -fundamental arrangement--though, as Mrs. Halse observed impatiently, -after the third postponement, there were “heaps and heaps of Chinese -lanterns.” Finally it was announced for the fifth and sixth of July; -and owing to herculean efforts on the part of half-a-dozen unfortunate -men enlisted in the cause; who apparently braced themselves to the task -with a desperate sense that if the affair was not somehow or another -carried through now, by fair means or foul, they were doomed to struggle -in a tumultuous sea of fashionable feminine futility for the remainder -of their miserable lives; on the fifth the bazaar was actually opened. - -It was late in the evening of that eventful day, and in various -fashionable drawing-rooms exhausted ladies stretched on sofas were -recruiting their forces after their severe labours. It had been the -fashion for the last week or more among the prospective stall-holders to -allude to the fatigue before them with resigned and heroic sighs of -awful import; consequently they were now convinced to a woman that they -were in the last stages of exhaustion. As a matter of fact it is -doubtful whether out of the sensations of all the “smart” helpers -concerned--with the exception of the devoted half-dozen before -mentioned, who had retired to various clubs in a state of collapse--a -decent state of fatigue could have been constructed; and the reason for -this was threefold. In the first place, so much money had been spent in -announcing the dates when the bazaar did not take place, that there was -exceedingly little forthcoming to announce the date when it did take -place; consequently its attractive existence remained almost unknown to -the general public, and the services of the sellers were in very slight -demand. In the second place, the greater part of the work which could -not be done by proxy was left undone. And in the third place, each lady -had been throughout the day so deeply convinced of the “frightfully -tiring” nature of her occupation, that she thought it only her duty to -“save herself” whenever that course was open to her--which was almost -always. - -In the drawing-room at Chelsea, very cool and pretty with its open -windows and its plentiful supply of flowers and ferns, Mrs. Romayne was -lying on the sofa, as the exigencies of the moment, socially speaking, -demanded of her, in an attitude of graceful weariness; an attitude which -was rather belied by the alert expression of her contented face. She -had dined at home--“just a quiet little dinner, you know--cold, because -goodness knows when we shall get it!”--with Julian and Loring at -half-past seven. The bazaar did not close until nine, but all the -principal stall-holders had thought it their duty to the following day -not to wear themselves quite out, and had left the last two hours to the -care of one or other of the hangers-on, of whom “smart” women may -usually have a supply if they choose; and Mrs. Romayne’s quiet little -dinner was only one of a score of similar functions, very dainty and -luxurious in view of the tremendous exertions which had preceded them, -which were being held in various fashionable parts of London. At ten -o’clock Loring had taken his leave, declaring sympathetically that Mrs. -Romayne must long for perfect quiet after her exertions. It was then -that Mrs. Romayne had betaken herself to her sofa and her papers. - -“What an immense time it is since we have had such a domesticated hour!” - -Mrs. Romayne had laid down her literature some moments before, and had -been lying looking at Julian with that curious expression in her eyes -which would creep into them now and again when they rested on the -good-looking young figure, and which harmonised so ill with the shallow, -vivacious prettiness of the rest of her face. She spoke, however, with -her usual light laugh at herself, and Julian laughed too as he threw -down his magazine and turned towards her. - -“It is an age, isn’t it?” he said. - -During the final agony of preparation for the bazaar, Julian had been in -immense request. Not that he was one of the devoted half-dozen, or that -he did much definite work; but he was always ready to discuss any lady’s -private fad with her for any length of time, and to rush all over London -about nothing. His exertions, and the exhaustion engendered thereby, had -rendered necessary a great deal of recreation at the club. He had -repaired thither very frequently of late, instead of escorting his -mother home on the conclusion of their tale of parties for the night. - -“It is a comfort to think that it is so nearly over!” observed Mrs. -Romayne carelessly. It is never worth while, in the world in which Mrs. -Romayne moved, to express more than half your meaning in words, and -Julian quite understood that she alluded, not to the domestic hour, but -to the season. Her words were not prompted by any actual weariness of -the round of life she characterised as “it,” but the sentiment was in -the air--the fashionable air, that is to say. She and Julian, in common -with the greater part of their world, were leaving London at the end of -the week. - -“It has been awfully jolly!” said Julian, leaning back in his chair and -resting his head against his loosely locked hands. “I had no idea that -life was such a first-rate business!” - -His mother smiled, and there was a strange touch of triumph in her -smile. - -“It is a first-rate business,” she assented, “if one lives it among the -right people and in the right position. I imagine you see by this time -that it isn’t much use otherwise!” - -He laughed as though his appreciation of her words rendered them almost -a truism to him, and there was a moment’s silence. It was broken by -Julian. - -“It costs a lot of money,” he said, in a casual, indefinite way, but -with a quick glance at his mother. - -“Well, it isn’t cheap, certainly,” was the laughing answer: “but I think -we shall manage.” Then noticing something a little deprecating about his -pose and expression, Mrs. Romayne added, with mock reprehension, “You’re -not going to ask me to raise your allowance, you extravagant boy?” - -Julian moved, and leaning forward, clasped his hands round one knee as -if the uncomfortable and transitory pose assisted explanation. He -laughed back at her, but he was looking nevertheless somewhat ashamed of -himself. - -“No, it’s not that--exactly,” he began rather lamely. “It’s a splendid -allowance, mother dear, and I’m no end grateful; but the fact is, there -has been a good deal of card-playing lately at the club. I don’t care -for cards, you know, but one must play a bit, and I have been rather a -fool. Look here, dear, I suppose--I suppose you couldn’t let me have two -hundred, could you--before we go away, you know?” - -“Two hundred, Julian! My dear boy!” - -There was a strong tone of surprise and remonstrance in Mrs. Romayne’s -voice, and there was also a very distinct note of annoyance; but all -these sentiments seemed rather to apply to the demand, which was -apparently unseasonable, than to the desirability of the transaction. -She was neither startled nor distressed. - -“It is young Fordyce, mother,” continued her son deprecatingly. “It was -awfully foolish to play with him, he’s so beastly lucky. And you see I -must settle it before I go away.” - -“And have you none of your own?” demanded his mother, with some asperity -in her tone. Julian’s creditor was a young man who had the reputation of -being a “very good sort of fellow,” who would never “do” in society. - -“I’m awfully sorry to say I haven’t!” returned Julian meekly. - -There was a moment’s pause, and Mrs. Romayne tapped impatiently on the -papers lying by her. - -“It is such an inconvenient moment,” she said at last. “I have just made -all my arrangements for the quarter--I don’t mean that you can’t have -it, of course you can, dear--but it is difficult to lay my hand on it at -this moment.” - -“Falconer could arrange it for you,” suggested Julian, alluding to -Falconer in his capacity of trustee for the first time, as it happened. - -Mrs. Romayne started violently, and a sharp exclamation of dissent rose -to her lips. She stopped it half uttered, and paused a moment, -controlling herself with difficulty. - -“No,” she said at last, in rather a hard tone. “I would rather not do -that. I will think it over and see what can be done. We must raise your -allowance, sir. I can’t have mines sprung on me like this!” - -She had risen as she spoke, and as he followed her example she lifted -her face towards him for the good-night kiss which always passed between -them. - -“I will sleep upon it,” she said. “Good night, extravagant boy.” - - - - -CHAPTER XIII - - -The stall-holders presented a singularly fresh and unworn appearance, -considering how much they had undergone, as they gradually put in an -appearance at their stall on the following day, and gathered together in -little knots to compare notes as to their sufferings, and here and there -to allude incidentally to their takings--which certainly seemed -disproportionate to the exertions of which they were the result. The -fancy dress idea on which Mrs. Halse’s whole soul had been set in March -had been abandoned when Mrs. Halse found a fresh hobby in April; and -each lady wore that variety of the fashion of the day which seemed most -desirable in her eyes. All the dresses were very “smart,” and as their -wearers moved about, visiting one another’s stalls, exchanging -greetings, and inspecting one another’s wares with critical eyes, they -showed to conspicuous advantage. For, during the first hour at least, -the stall-holders and their satellites, male and female--a mere handful -of people in the great hall--had the entire place with all its -decorations to themselves. - -It was the cheap day, however, and as the afternoon wore on the hall -gradually filled with that curious class of person which is always -craving for any link, however “sham,” with the fashionable world, and -makes it a point of self-respect to attend all public functions in which -“society” chances to be engaged. These far-off votaries of fashion -walked about, looking not at the stalls, but at the ladies in attendance -on them, turning away as a rule in stolid silence when invited in -mellifluous tones to buy; or perhaps investing a shilling when long -search had resulted in the discovery of a twopenny article to be had for -that sum, for the sake of making a purchase from one of the leaders of -fashion; some of them, with a vague notion that it was fashionable to -“know every one,” kept up a great show of talk and laughter, and were -constantly seeing acquaintances on the other side of the hall--with whom -they never by any chance came in contact. But no one spent more than -five shillings, and the stall-holders began to find the position pall. - -“I call this deadly!” said Mrs. Halse, subsiding into a chair, and -looking up pathetically at Julian Romayne, who stood by. Julian should -have been in attendance at the stall next but one, where Mrs. Pomeroy -and his mother reigned, but Mrs. Halse, in view of the exertions before -her, had summoned to her aid, about a week before, Miss Hilda Newton; -and Miss Hilda Newton was looking irresistibly bewitching to-day in a -big yellow hat. Her spirits, also, bore the strain of the proceedings -better than did those of the other young ladies. - -“Suppose we pick out some things--cheap things”--with a little -grimace--“and go about among the people and try and sell them,” she said -now adventurously, looking up into Julian’s face, with her pretty black -eyes dancing. “I’ve done it heaps of times at bazaars, and it always -goes well. Let us try, Mr. Romayne.” - -Mr. Romayne was by no means loath, and a few minutes later his mother, -whose eyes had been covering Mrs. Halse’s stall all the time she tried -to persuade into a purchase a sharp-faced girl, whose sole object was a -sufficiently prolonged inspection of Mrs. Romayne’s dress to enable her -to find out how “that body was made,” saw them sally forth together -laughing and talking in low, confidential tones. Her lips tightened -slightly; the reappearance of Miss Newton had found Mrs. Romayne’s -dislike to the pretty, opinionated, self-reliant girl as active and -apparently unreasoning as it had been on her previous visit. - -“What a very good idea!” she said now suavely, turning to Mrs. Pomeroy -who sat by, a picture of placid content, and indicating the adventurous -pair as they disappeared among the people. “We must try something of the -sort, I think. Maud, dear”--Miss Pomeroy had recently become Maud to -Mrs. Romayne--“do you see? I really think something might be done in -that way.” - -Miss Pomeroy, who was standing in front of the stall, a charming and -apparently quite inanimate figure in white, assented demurely, and Mrs. -Romayne, looking round for a man, caught the eye of Loring. He came to -her instantly. - -“You’ll do capitally,” she said brightly, and Miss Pomeroy, making no -objection to the proceeding, was started forth with Loring, the latter -carrying a small stock-in-trade, to emulate Miss Newton and Julian. That -stock-in-trade was quite untouched, however, when about a quarter of an -hour later they returned to the stall a little hot and discomfited. - -“We haven’t made a success,” said Loring with a rather sardonic smile; -“Miss Pomeroy says I’m no good! Now, there’s that fellow Julian doing a -roaring trade!” - -Julian and Miss Newton, in point of fact, were at that moment visible -returning to Mrs. Halse’s stall, evidently in high feather, all their -stock sold out. Mrs. Romayne watched Julian counting his gains into Mrs. -Halse’s hand, saying laughingly to Loring as she did so: - -“You are not boy enough for this kind of thing, I’m afraid!” And then -Julian, with a final laughing nod, turned away from Mrs. Halse, and -came hastily towards his mother’s stall. - -“That’s right!” said Mrs. Romayne gaily, ignoring the fact that he had -evidently not come to stay. “I was just wanting you, sir, to go round -with Miss Pomeroy, if she will kindly go with you, and get rid of some -of our odds and ends!” - -Julian stopped short and flushed a little. - -“I’m awfully sorry!” he said. “I’ll come back and do it with pleasure! -But I have just promised to go round again with Miss Newton. I came to -see if you could give us some change.” - -His mother supplied his wants smilingly, and he was gone. She had turned -away with rather compressed lips when a voice behind her said half -hesitatingly, half gushingly, and with a strong German accent: - -“We are surely unmistaken! It is--yes, it must be, the much-honoured -Mrs. Romayne!” - -Mrs. Romayne turned quickly and gazed at the speaker obviously -unrecognisingly. Nor did the two figures with whom she was confronted -look in the least like acquaintances of hers. They were young women of -the plainest and most angular German type, shabbily dressed according to -the canons of middle-class German taste. - -“She remembers us not, Gretchen!” began the younger of the two. And then -a sudden light of recollection broke over Mrs. Romayne. They were two -girls who had been training for a musical career at Leipsic, whom it had -been the fashion to patronise; they had not developed as had been -expected, however, and she had entirely forgotten their existence. - -“Fräulein Schmitz!” she said now with distant brightness. “Ah, of -course! How stupid of me! How do you do?” - -They were very loquacious. Mrs. Romayne had heard all about their -careers; all the reasons that had led to their spending a fortnight in -London; and was beginning to think that the moment had come for getting -rid of them, when, having exhausted themselves in compliments on her -appearance, they enquired after Julian. - -“Though we have seen Mr. Romayne,” said the elder, “since, ah, but much -since we had the pleasure to see his mother. It was in Alexandria in the -winter past--we hoped that some concerts there might be possible, but -there is so much jealousy and favouritism--it was in Alexandria that we -met him. He was travelling in Egypt, he told to us.” - -“Yes!” said Mrs. Romayne, smothering a yawn. “He was in Egypt----” she -stopped suddenly, and her eyes seemed to contract strangely. “Where did -you say you saw him?” she said. - -“It was in Alexandria! He was there for the day only, and he was to us -most kind. He arrived in the morning early by the same train, and he -showed us much until at night he left.” - -“At Alexandria?” - -“Surely! At Alexandria!” - -“You must have made a mistake. It was some other place.” - -Mrs. Romayne’s tone was curiously unlike that in which she had conducted -the early part of the conversation. It was sharp and direct. Fräulein -Schmitz seemed to notice and resent the change. - -“But we have not made a mistake, I must assure you!” she said stiffly. -“It was at Alexandria. We saw him go away in the train.” - -There was a moment’s pause. Mrs. Romayne was looking straight before her -with those strangely contracted eyes; her lips a thin, pale line. The -sisters waited a moment, evidently affronted. Then, finding that Mrs. -Romayne took no notice whatever of them, they exchanged resentful -glances, and the elder spoke. - -“We will say good-bye!” she said formally. “It is time that we were -going!” - -Mrs. Romayne seemed to remember their presence--gradually only. Then she -said quickly, and in a voice that sounded as though her throat were dry: - -“You are going at once? Right out of the hall at once?” - -“At once we are going, yes!” was the reply, and with a stiff inclination -of their heads they moved away. - -Mrs. Romayne followed the two angular forms with her eyes until they -reached the entrance and disappeared. Then she swept a quick glance -round the hall. Julian was at the further end deeply absorbed in his -proceedings with Miss Newton. The Fräulein Schmitz had evidently been -unseen by him. - -His mother looked at him for a moment with a strange, fixed gaze, and -then she turned her eyes away mechanically, and moved her mouth with a -little twitch as though she felt the muscles stiffening and knew that -they must not take the lines they would; there was a deadly pallor about -her mouth. At that instant Loring came up to her with a witty satirical -comment on the scene at which she was apparently gazing, and for the -next few minutes she stood there exchanging gay little observations with -him, the pallor never altering, her eyes never moving. Then quite -suddenly she turned towards him. - -“I want some tea!” she said. “Take me to the refreshment place, Mr. -Loring!” - -Julian was threading his way to where she stood, and though she turned -instantly in the direction of the refreshment stall, followed perforce -by Loring, she passed close to him. He stopped and said something, but -she only nodded to him and went rapidly on. - -A great many other stall-holders were recruiting themselves with tea and -ices, and they were all more or less in spirits, real or affected, at -the approaching prospect of the end of their labours. Mrs. Romayne was -instantly hailed as one of a very smart group, and took her place with -eager, high-pitched gaiety. She did not go back to her stall, tea being -over, but moved about the bazaar, always with a little party in -attendance, laughing and talking. She and Julian were dining with a -large party of stall-holders at Mrs. Pomeroy’s; they were all to repair -thither direct from the bazaar, and Mrs. Romayne took a detachment in -her carriage. Only one instant of solitude came to her before the -luxurious, hilarious meal; only one instant, when the stream of -descending ladies left her behind on an upper landing. In that instant, -as if involuntarily and unconsciously to herself, the gaiety fell from -her face like a mask, leaving it haggard and ghastly. She put her -hand--it was icy cold--up to her head. - -“He told me a lie!” she said to herself. “A lie! Oh, my boy!” - -She was very bright and witty as she and Julian drove home together, and -the greyish whiteness which was stealing over her face was unnoticed by -her son’s careless eyes even when they stood in the well-lighted hall. - -“Are you going straight up, mother?” he said. “If so, I’ll say good -night. I want a cigar.” - -She paused a moment and looked at him with that indescribable tenderness -which haunted her eyes at times as they rested on him, intensified a -thousandfold. - -“I’ll come and sit with you for a little while if you will have me,” she -said. - -She tried evidently for her usual manner, and succeeded inasmuch as -Julian noticed nothing beyond. But beneath the surface there was -something not wholly to be suppressed--something which looked out of her -eyes, trembled in her voice, lingered in her touch as she laid her hand -on his arm; something which, taken in conjunction with the shreds of -affectation with which she strove to cover it, and with the boy’s -profound unconsciousness, was as pathetic as it was beautiful and -strange. - -She drew him into his own little room, and then with a forced laugh at -herself she pushed him gently into a chair, and insisted on waiting upon -him--bringing him cigar, matches, ash-tray--anything she could think of -to add to his comfort, laughing all the time at him and at herself, and -hugging those shreds of affectation close. But there was that about her, -if there had been any one to see and understand, which made her one with -all the many mothers since the world began who, with their hearts aching -and bleeding with impotent pity and love, have tried to find some outlet -for their yearning in the strange instinct for service which goes always -hand in hand with mother love as with no other love on earth. - -She lit his match at last, and then knelt down beside his chair. - -“My dearest,” she said, “my dearest, you shall have that two -hundred--to-morrow if you like! You did not think me vexed about it, did -you? You know I only want you to be happy, Julian, don’t you?” - -Julian laid down his cigar with a merry laugh. “I should be a fool if I -didn’t!” he answered, patting her hand with boyish affection. “It’s -awfully good of you, dear, and I’m frightfully grateful. I won’t make -such a fool of myself again.” - -Mrs. Romayne put up her hand quickly. “Don’t promise, Julian!” she said -in a strange breathless way, “you might--you might forget, you know, and -then perhaps you wouldn’t like to tell me! And I want to know! I always -want to know!” She stopped abruptly, an almost agonised appeal in her -eyes. - -She was still kneeling at his side, with her eyes fixed on his face; and -suddenly, abruptly, almost as though the words forced themselves from -her against her will, she said, with a slight catch in her voice: - -“Julian, I met Fräulein Schmitz to-day!” - -He met her eyes for a moment, his own questioning and uncomprehending; -then gradually there stole over his face recollection, vague at first, -which became as it grew definite rather shamefaced, rather annoyed, and -rather amused. - -“Oh!” he said; his tone was light and daring enough, though a touch of -genuine shame and embarrassment lurked in it. “Oh, I call that hard -lines!” - -He was smiling daringly into her face with an acceptance of the -situation that was perfectly frank. His mother’s hands, as they rested -on the arm of his chair, were tightly wrung together, and her eyes never -stirred from his face. - -“Why?” she said rather hoarsely, “why did you?” - -He laughed, shrugging his shoulders and throwing out his hands with a -graceful foreign movement. - -“I was rather a culprit, you see,” he said. “I only spent those few -hours in Alexandria, and I never gave a thought to your commission. And -I felt such a brute about it that I wasn’t up to confessing!” - -It was the truth and the whole truth, and it conveyed itself as such. -Mrs. Romayne knelt there for a moment more, looking into his eyes, her -own wide and strained; and then she rose heavily and slowly to her feet. -There was a pause. - -The silence was broken by Julian, evidently with a view to changing a -subject on which he could hardly be said to show to conspicuous -advantage. - -“You’re going to write to Falconer, I suppose? You wouldn’t like to do -it to-night, dear, would you? He would get the letter in better time if -it was posted the first thing. You could do it at my table there!” - -Mrs. Romayne did not speak. Julian could not see her face. - -“Yes!” she said at last, and her voice sounded rather hollow and far -away, “I will do it to-night if you like.” She bent down and kissed him. -“Good night!” she said. - -“Won’t you write here?” said Julian in some surprise. - -“No, I’ll go upstairs!” she answered, and went out of the room. - -She went upstairs, moving slowly and heavily, straight to her dainty -little writing-table, and sat down, drawing out a sheet of paper. She -wrote the conventional words of address to Dennis Falconer, and then she -stopped suddenly and lifted her face. It was ghastly. The eyes, sunken -and dim, seemed to be confronting the very irony of fate. - - - - -CHAPTER XIV - - -“The jolliest week I’ve ever had in my life!” - -“I wonder how often you’ve said that before?” - -August had come and gone, the greater part of September had followed in -its wake, and a ruddy September sun was making the end of the summer -glorious. In the large garden of a large country house in Norfolk, -everything seen in its wonderful radiance seemed to be even overcharged -with colour, if such a thing is possible with nature; it was as though -all the beauty of the summer had been intensified and arrested in its -maturity into one final glow. The rich green of the smooth lawns, the -colours of the autumnal flowers, the tints of the foliage, the very -atmosphere, seemed all alike to be pausing for the moment at the most -perfect point of radiance. But nature never pauses; and that this was -indeed the final glow, the end of her summer beauty, was revealed here -and there by little significant touches, or written across earth and sky -in broader letters. The birds were gone or going. Even as Julian Romayne -spoke a flight of swallows overhead was wheeling and darting hither and -thither in preparation for an imminent departure; the very glory of the -trees meant decay, and in spite of all the efforts of indefatigable -gardeners, dead leaves strewed the trim lawns and gravel paths. - -All these signs and tokens of the approach of the inevitable end were -particularly conspicuous about the narrow grass path shut in by high yew -hedges, up and down which Julian Romayne and Hilda Newton were -sauntering together. Fallen leaves were thick upon it, and in the -flower-beds, by which it was bordered, the summer flowers, whose day was -long since done, had not been replaced by their autumn successors. -Apparently, the walk was a secluded and little frequented one, on which -it was not worth while to spend much pains. Judging from the coquettish -toss of the head, tempered by a certain softness of tone, with which -Miss Newton replied to the insinuated regret of Julian’s words, it -seemed not improbable that those characteristics had something to do -with their selection of that particular spot for their stroll. They had -been staying in this pleasant country house together for the last week, -the hostess having taken a fancy to Mrs. Halse’s cousin in town; and now -in another hour Julian and his mother would be on their way home. - -As the half-mocking, half-inviting words fell from his companion’s lips, -Julian turned impetuously towards the pretty, piquant face; it was -shaded by a bewitching garden hat. - -“I never meant it so much before, on my honour,” he said impulsively; -adding with a boyish suggestion of tender reproach in his voice: “I -should have thought you might have known that. It’s awfully hard lines -to think it’s over.” - -Miss Newton had a large crimson dahlia in her hand, and she was plucking -the petals slowly away and scattering them at her feet. - -“Is it?” she said. - -“You know it is,” he returned ardently, trying to catch a glimpse of the -dark face bent over the crimson flower. “Won’t you tell me that you’re a -little sorry, too? Miss Newton--Hilda----” - -His vigorous young hand was just closing over the pretty little fingers -that held the dahlia; the dainty little figure was yielding to him -nothing loath, it seemed, when from the further end of the grass walk a -third voice broke in upon their _tête-à-tête_, and as they started -instinctively apart Mrs. Romayne, accompanied by their hostess, came -sauntering towards them. - -“Taking a farewell look at the quaint old walk, Julian?” she said with -suave carelessness as she drew near them. “The garden is looking too -beautiful this morning, isn’t it, Miss Newton? What a lovely dahlia that -is you were showing Julian!” - -She looked smilingly at Miss Newton as she spoke, apparently quite -unconscious that the girl’s face was white--not with embarrassment, -disappointment, or emotion, but with sheer angry resentment--and she -moved on as she spoke, tacitly compelling Miss Newton to move on at her -side, while Julian and the other lady followed, perforce together. - -“We have only about ten minutes more, I’m afraid,” she said. “I was just -taking a last stroll round the place with Mrs. Ponsonby. I’m afraid we -shall find London rather unbearable to-night. The call of duty is always -so very inconvenient!” - -She was leading the way toward the house, and her little high-pitched -laugh eliciting only a monosyllabic response from the girl at her side, -she resumed what was practically a monologue, carried on with a suavity -and ease which was perhaps over-elaborated by just a touch. Her -farewells, which followed almost immediately on their arrival at the -house, when a little bustle of departure ensued--in which Miss Newton -took no part, that young lady having promptly disappeared--were -characterised by the same manner, about which there was also a little -touch of suppressed excitement. It was not until she and Julian were -alone together in a first-class carriage of the London express that her -gay words and laughs ceased, and she let herself sink back in her -corner, unfolding a newspaper with a short, hardly audible sigh of -relief. - -A very slight and indefinable change had come to Mrs. Romayne’s face in -the course of the last two months. It had been perceptible in her -animation, and was still more perceptible in her repose. The lines about -her face which had needed special influences to bring them into -prominence during the winter were always plainly perceptible now; and -they gave her face a very slightly careworn look, which was emphasized -by the expression of her eyes and mouth. - -The eyes had always a slightly restless look in them in these days; even -now, as she read her paper, or appeared to read it, there was no -concentration in them; and every now and then they were lifted hastily, -almost furtively, over the paper’s edge. The mouth was at once weaker -and more determined; weaker, inasmuch as it had grown more sensitive, -more nervously responsive to the movements of her restless eyes; and -more determined, as though with the expression of a constant mental -attitude. - -There was a good deal of indecision in her face, and its expression -varied slightly, but incessantly, as she fixed her eyes anew on the -printed words before her after each fleeting glance at the boyish face -outlined by the cushions opposite. She laid down her paper at last, with -a little deliberate rustle, apparently intended to attract attention, -and as she did so her face assumed its ordinary superficial vivacity; an -expression which harmonised less well with the rather sharpened features -than it had done three months before. - -“A good novel, Julian?” she said airily, smothering a yawn as she spoke, -and indicating with a little gesture of her head the book in Julian’s -hand. - -Julian had been holding the book in his hand, ever since they left the -little Norfolk station from which they had started, but he had scarcely -turned a page. His features were composed into an expression of boyish -resentment, about which there was that distinct suggestion of sullenness -which is the usual outward expression of the hauteur of youth. As his -mother spoke he flushed hotly with angry self-consciousness. - -“Not particularly,” he said, without lifting his eyes. - -There was a moment’s pause, during which Mrs. Romayne’s eyes were fixed -upon him with concentration enough in them now; and then she broke into -a light laugh, and leaning suddenly forward laid one of her hands on -his. - -“Poor old boy!” she said, in a tone half mocking, half sympathising. “It -was very hard on you, wasn’t it? It’s a cruel fate that makes young men -so ineligible, and girls so pretty, and throws the two perversely -together! If you’ve any thought to spare from yourself, sir, though, I -think you should bestow a little gratitude upon me for my very timely -arrival!” - -She laughed again, and in her laugh, as in her voice, there was the -faintest possible touch of reality, and that reality was anxiety. Then, -as Julian twisted his hand from under hers with a gruff and almost -inaudible: “I don’t see that!” she leant back in her seat again with a -smile. - -“My dear boy,” she said gaily; “it’s a very sad position for you, I -admit; but for the present you’re dependent on your mother--not such a -very stingy mother, eh, sir? I think you’ll find it will be all right -for you, when the right young woman turns up, as no doubt she will some -day. Perhaps you’ll find that your mother won’t abdicate so very -ungracefully. But, you see, it must be the right young woman!” - -In spite of the laugh in it, there was a ring in the tone in which the -words were spoken which was full of significance, and the significance -and the laughter seemed to be doing battle together as Mrs. Romayne went -on, ignoring Julian’s interjection: - -“I don’t think you would have found it a very pleasant situation, to be -engaged to Miss Newton with the prospect before you of keeping her -waiting until you had made your fortune at the bar; and I’m sorry to say -I don’t share your conviction of the moment, that she is the right young -woman. She is very pretty, I allow, and a very nice girl, no doubt.” -Mrs. Romayne’s voice grew a little hard as she said the last words. -“But she’s not at all the sort of girl that I should like you to marry. -She has no money, in the first place.” - -“I have enough for both,” said Julian impetuously, and then stopped -short and coloured crimson. - -His mother broke into a merry laugh. - -“No, poor boy!” she said. “I have enough for both! That’s just what I -want you to remember in your intercourse with pretty girls. After all, -you know, the position has its advantages! You may flirt as much as you -like while you’re known to be dependent on your mother, and no one will -take you too seriously.” - -Julian did not echo her laugh, nor did he make any comment on her words. -He sat with his face turned away from her, and a rather strange -expression in his eyes--an expression which was at once unformed and -mutinous. His mother could not see it, but the outline of his profile -apparently disturbed her. The anxiety in her face deepened again, mixed -this time with an expression of doubt and self-distrust. As though to -emphasize the lightness of her preceding tone, she turned the -conversation into a comment on the landscape, and took up her paper -again. - -The remainder of the journey passed in total silence; and the drive home -from the station was silent, too. An arrival in London at the end of -September is not a very pleasant proceeding, unless it is approached -with considerable industry, determination, and a large stock of energy. -The butterflies of society, and, indeed, a large proportion of the bees, -have not yet returned. Those who have returned have done so under stern -compulsion to begin the winter’s work; and there is a general, -all-pervading sentiment as of the end of holidays and the beginning of -term time. - -The day that had been so radiantly lovely in Norfolk had evidently been -oppressively hot and airless in town, and the general air of exhaustion -and squalor, which such circumstances are apt to produce in London, did -not help to render its appearance more attractive. - -Number twenty-two, Queen Anne Street, Chelsea, itself seemed to be -touched by the general depression. The summer flowers in the -window-boxes had been taken away, and their successors were apparently -waiting for orders from the mistress of the house; and as Mrs. Romayne -and Julian entered the hall, there was that indefinable atmosphere about -the house which two months’ abandonment to even the best of servants is -apt to produce--an atmosphere which is the reverse of cheerful. There -were letters lying on the hall-table, one of which Mrs. Romayne handed -to Julian with the comment: “From Mr. Allardyce, isn’t it, Julian? Will -he be ready for you to-morrow?” - -Julian’s legal studies were, in fact, to begin in earnest on the -following day; and when, the next morning, he said good-bye to his -mother and set out for the Temple, she followed him to the door with a -laughing “Good speed.” That, at least, was her ostensible motive, but -there was something in her face as she laid her hand on his arm as he -turned away on the doorstep which suggested that the last words she said -to him were those that she had really followed him to say. - -“What time shall you be back, Julian?” - -And as he answered carelessly: - -“I can’t tell; not till dinner-time, I expect,” there came into her eyes -a curious shadow of yearning anxiety. - -“Take care of yourself, sir!” she said lightly, and went back into the -house. - -That shadow lived in her eyes all day as she went about giving orders -and “putting things to rights,” as she said; striving in fact, with a -concealed earnestness which seemed somewhat disproportionate to its -object, to give the house that peculiar air of brightness which had been -so characteristic of it, and which somehow did not seem so easily to be -obtained as formerly. - -Her face was gaiety itself, however, when she stood in the drawing-room -as the dinner-bell rang, very daintily dressed in a tea-gown which -Julian had admired, waiting for her son. A moment elapsed and Julian -dashed downstairs, breathless and apologetic, but rather sparing of his -words. His first day’s work hardly seemed to have dissipated the cloud -which had hung about him that morning at breakfast, and as his mother -slipped her hand playfully into his arm with a laughing word or two of -forgiveness, he turned and led her out of the room without the response -which would have been natural to him. - -“Have you had a pleasant day?” said Mrs. Romayne lightly, as they sat -down to dinner. - -“Pretty well,” returned Julian indifferently. He said no more, and Mrs. -Romayne, with one of her quick, half-furtive glances at him, began to -talk of her own day. She had paid some calls in the afternoon, and had a -great deal of news for him as to who had and who had not returned to -town; and a great deal of gossip which was both amusing in itself, and -rendered more amusing by the piquant animation with which she retailed -it. It failed to rouse much interest in Julian, apparently, however, and -after a time his mother returned to her original topic--again with a -quick, anxious glance at his face. - -“Did you find Mr. Allardyce easy to work with?” she enquired, -interestedly this time. - -“Yes: I suppose so,” was the unresponsive response. - -“How long did he keep you?” - -“I got away at four o’clock.” - -Something seemed to leap in Mrs. Romayne’s eyes--to be instantly -suppressed--as she said, with an indifference which any ear keener than -Julian’s might have detected to be forced: - -“Four o’clock! And what have you been doing since then, may I ask? You -did not come in till a quarter past seven.” - -Perhaps Julian felt the inquisition in the question, though he was -conscious of nothing unusual in his mother’s voice; for he answered, -rather briefly: - -“I went to the Garrick with a fellow.” - -“What fellow?” demanded his mother in the same tone. - -Julian moved impatiently. - -“There’s another fellow reading with Allardyce,” he answered. -“Griffiths--he took me in.” - -As though the suppressed impatience of his tone had not escaped her, -Mrs. Romayne found herself reminded at this point of something she had -heard that afternoon during one of her visits. And she proceeded to -place her little piece of news before Julian with every advantage that -narration could give it, though her face looked rather thin and sharp as -she talked. Dinner was over by this time, and as she finished with a -laugh, she rose from her seat, and put her hand on Julian’s arm. His -face was somewhat bored and dissatisfied, as though his mother’s effort -for his entertainment entirely failed to compensate him for the merry -house-parties of the last month. - -“I think I shall have to come and keep you company while you smoke your -cigar,” she said lightly; adding, with an assumption of a sudden thought -on the subject which was not wholly successful: “By-the-bye, the Garrick -Club must be a most attractive spot if you stayed there from four -o’clock till seven?” - -Julian took a quick step forward. The movement might have been due to -his desire to open the door for her, or it might have been an expression -of the irritation of which his face was full. - -“I didn’t get there at four,” he said. “I really don’t know what time it -was, but it must have been nearly five. And I walked home; so I left -somewhere about half-past six.” - -The irritation was in his voice as well as in his face; and his mother -patted him gaily on the shoulder, with her most artificially -self-deriding laugh. - -“He’s quite annoyed at being asked so many questions!” she exclaimed. -“It’s a dreadful nuisance to have such a silly old mother, isn’t it? But -you haven’t told me what Mr. Griffiths is like yet?” - -Julian had tried to laugh in answer to her first words; but the sound -produced had been almost as greatly wanting in reality as had been the -ease of his mother’s tone, and he answered now with undisguised -impatience. - -“Like? Oh, he’s like--any other fellow, mother. Nothing particular, one -way or the other.” He paused a moment, and then added hastily: “I was -rather thinking of running down to the club this evening, dear, if you -wouldn’t mind being alone. I want to hear whether Loring has come back. -There’s just a chance he might be there, you know.” - -He had said that morning that there was no likelihood of Loring’s -returning for another two or three days; but Mrs. Romayne forbore to -remind him of that fact. Nor did she allude to the conviction which had -turned her suddenly rather pale; namely, that his thoughts of going down -to the club had arisen within the last few minutes. - -“Very well, dear,” she said, smiling up at him. “Go, by all means. Oh, -no! I shall be quite happy with a book.” - -He did not look back at her as he left the room after another word or -two, or the expression on her face might have arrested even his -youthfully self-centred and preoccupied attention. - -Loring was not at the club, nor was there any information to be obtained -there as to his movements. Julian played a game of billiards and lost it -through sheer carelessness, and then determined to go home again. He -would walk part of the way, he said to himself, though he had had one -walk that day. He wanted to “think things over.” - -The phrase was serious, and by comparison with the process to which it -was attached, grandiloquent. Julian’s mental apparatus was at present as -undeveloped as that of a fashionable young man of four-and-twenty may -usually be taken to be. The process of “thinking things over,” as -conducted within his good-looking head, involved no stern process of -reasoning, no exhaustive system of logical deduction from cause to -effect, no carefully-balanced opinions of the past or decisions for the -future. When he proposed to himself to “think things over,” in short, he -simply meant that he should ring a strictly limited number of changes on -the fact that, as he expressed it vaguely to himself, it was “awfully -hard lines.” - -It had taken him some time to come to this conclusion. He had flirted -with Miss Hilda Newton very happily for the last ten days, with a great -deal of wholly unnecessary assistance from that young lady herself, -without the very faintest definite intentions towards her. He had -enjoyed it, and she had enjoyed it; and the idea which had occurred to -him once or twice, that his mother did not enjoy it, had not -particularly affected him. Circumstances alone would have been -responsible for the proposal which had so nearly been an accomplished -fact on the day before. And had the speech to Miss Newton, interrupted -by Mrs. Romayne, reached its legitimate conclusion, and received its -inevitable response, it was extremely likely that he might by this time -have been the victim of a vague consciousness of having made a mistake. -But it had been interrupted; and a deeply-injured sense of having been -thwarted was consequently not unnatural in its author. That sense of -injury which might have passed away in mere sentiment, but which, on the -other hand, might, if it had been left untouched by words, have -developed into a secret breach between mother and son, had been focussed -and rendered definite and tangible, as it were, by his mother’s laughing -speeches in the train. It was as he had sat gazing blankly out of the -window during the last half-hour of their journey, that he had come to -the conclusion before mentioned that it was “awfully hard lines.” - -“It makes a fellow feel such a fool!” he said to himself as morosely as -the undeveloped nature of his temperament permitted, as he issued -moodily from his club and started in the direction of Piccadilly. “It -makes a fellow feel such a confounded fool!” He could not reduce this -general principle to detail, but what he really felt was something of -the sensation of the child who realises suddenly and for the first time -the “pretence” of the fairyland of shadows in which he has been -performing prodigies of valour. - -All the intercourse with the pretty girls of his “sets” which Julian had -hitherto accepted simply and unquestioningly, had suddenly become flat, -stale, and unprofitable to him. All illusions had gone from it, and the -reality was painfully unsatisfying, and wounding to his self-love. There -is all the difference in the world between a vague understanding and a -practical realisation. Julian had known, of course, from the very first -that he was dependent on his mother, but he had never felt it until the -previous day. He had known that marriage without her consent was -practically impossible for him; but the fact had never before been -brought home to him. The veto which had descended so impalpably and -decisively upon what he was now prepared to characterise as his hopes, -with regard to Miss Newton, shrivelling them to nothingness, had also -shrivelled away all the embellishing haze by which the conditions of his -life had been surrounded. - -The background to all his thoughts on the subject; the background which -had grown up almost without consciousness on his own part, with his -first humiliated realisation of the facts of the case, and which -remained a vague, brooding shadow in his mind; was resentment against -his mother; a resentment which, taken in conjunction with the careless -and effusive affection of his attitude to her hitherto, threw a curious -light on his relations with her. But against this background, and -affecting him far more keenly, was a sore sense that life had suddenly -lost its savour for him. The charm of flirtation had vanished utterly -before his mother’s words as to its harmlessness. The privilege which -she assigned to him seemed to reduce him to the level of a shadow among -substances, to put him at a hopeless disadvantage with all the women of -his world, and render his intercourse with them a farce of which both -they and he must be perfectly conscious. - -“It’s all such utter humbug!” he said to himself, that being the nearest -definition he could attain of the vague thoughts that were passing -through his mind. Then he ceased to express himself, even mentally, and -walked along, meditating moodily and discontentedly. He was walking -along Piccadilly when he found his thoughts gradually returning to his -actual surroundings as though something were drawing them, unconsciously -to himself, as extraneous objects which one is not even aware of -noticing will sometimes do. - -It was about eleven o’clock: not a very pleasant time in Piccadilly; and -the pavement was by no means crowded. The first detail to which he awoke -was the hilarious demeanour of a young man just in front of him, who was -walking, very unsteadily, in the same direction as himself. He was a -young man of the commonest cockney type, obviously in the maudlin stage -of intoxication. - -As Julian’s senses became more fully alive he noticed, a pace or two in -front of the young man, the shabbily-dressed figure of a girl. She was -walking hurriedly and nervously, and as the young man quickened his -uneven steps in response to a sudden quickening of hers, Julian saw that -the intoxicated speeches which had first grown into his own meditation -were addressed to the girl, and that she was trying in vain to escape -from them. It was not a particularly uncommon sight for a London street, -and a half-indignant, half-careless glance would naturally have been all -the attention Julian would have vouchsafed it. But as the pair preceded -him up Piccadilly; the girl shrinking and afraid; afraid to attract -attention by too rapid movements; as much afraid, as her nervous, -undecided glances around her showed, of the help a protest might attract -to her as of her pursuer; the man, sodden and brutal, absolutely -destitute for the moment of reasoning faculty; Julian found his -attention fascinated by them. - -A spark of natural youthful chivalry, entirely undeveloped by his life, -stirred in him. He quickened his steps, involuntarily apparently, and -with no definite intention, for he was just passing them with a quick, -undecided glance at the girl, when he saw her stop suddenly and shrink -back against a neighbouring shop-front. Whether a faint shriek really -came from her, or not, he never knew, but her eyes met his and appealed -to him almost as if without the owner’s consciousness. The man had laid -a hot, drunken hand upon the worn, ungloved fingers. - -Julian stopped. - -“Let go!” he said peremptorily. His tone was so sharp, and the -interference was so sudden and unlooked-for, that the man, stupid with -drink, did as he was bidden as if involuntarily. “Be off!” continued -Julian in the same tone. - -The man stared at him for a minute, and broke into a maudlin laugh, a -discordant snatch of a comic song, and staggered on his way, as though -the sudden breaking of his chain of ideas had obliterated the girl from -his memory. - -She was standing, as Julian turned to her, leaning back against the -shop-front, shaking from head to foot, but evidently making a violent -effort to control herself. - -“Thank you, sir,” she murmured tremulously, and was moving to go on her -way with faltering, trembling footsteps, when Julian stopped her. - -“This is not a nice place for you to be alone in,” he said almost -involuntarily. “Have you far to go?” - -He had looked at her for that moment during which she had stood -motionless, with her face outlined against the dark shutter, with a -strangely mingled feeling that her face was wonderfully unlike any with -which he was acquainted; and yet that he had actually seen it -before--seen it, and experienced the same half-startled, half-wondering -sensation. It was white now to the very lips, and the great, brown eyes, -dark and liquid, looked out from under their soft lashes and level -eyebrows, wide with terror and distress. Her features were beautifully -formed, though they were so thin and worn that it would never have -occurred to Julian to class her among the ranks of pretty girls. But the -real charm of her face lay about her mouth. It was very strong--though -the strength was latent and entirely unconscious; very simple, and very -sweet; and even the pallor of her lips and the slight trembling about -them could not detract from the beauty of the line they made. Her hair, -as Julian noticed, was of a soft black and very luxuriant. She was -rather tall, and her shabby jacket concealed and spoilt the outline of -her figure; but the set of her well-shaped head was full of instinctive -grace. - -She paused a moment before she answered him, looking into his face with -a simple directness which had a dignity of its own. - -“Yes, sir,” she said in a low voice, which shook a little in spite of -her evident efforts to steady it; “to the Hammersmith Road.” - -“But you’re not going to walk, are you?” said Julian. - -Apparently her glance at his face had satisfied her. She answered him -this time without hesitation. - -“Yes, sir,” she said. - -Her voice was very musical and refined. It harmonised better with her -face than with her worn, work-girl’s dress, and the dignified deference -of her manner. - -“Then you must let me see you safely part of the way, at any rate,” -said Julian impulsively. - -She hesitated, and looked at him again, and this time the large eyes -grew moist with tears. - -“It’s very silly of me,” she said tremulously. “I--I think it was his -touching me that upset me so.” - -She had been rubbing one hand, all this time, mechanically and -involuntarily, as it seemed, over the hand on which that drunken touch -had fallen. - -“I did try to get a ’bus, but they were all full. I couldn’t let you -take such trouble.” - -It needed only the unconscious gratitude of those words to convince -Julian that it would be no trouble whatever. And he asserted the same -with an assumption of authority and masterfulness quite new to him. - -It was an hour and a half later when his mother, sitting up, wakeful, in -her own room, caught the slight sound made by his latch-key in the door, -and noticed a moment’s pause before the door was opened. In that pause -there had come to Julian one of those sudden flashes of light which -sometimes illuminate a vainly-pondered question. - -“Of course!” he said to himself, as he shut the door with a bang. “Of -course! I knew I’d seen her before! In the thunderstorm, the night I -dined with Garstin!” - -END OF VOL. I - -F. M. 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You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license - - -Title: A Valiant Ignorance; vol. 1 of 3 - A Novel in Three Volumes - -Author: Mary Angela Dickens - -Release Date: February 2, 2017 [EBook #54093] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VALIANT IGNORANCE; VOL. 1 OF 3 *** - - - - -Produced by Chuck Greif, MFR and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - -</pre> - -<hr class="full" /> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<a href="images/cover_lg.jpg"> -<img src="images/cover.jpg" width="358" height="500" alt="" title="" /></a> -</div> - -<p class="c">A VALIANT IGNORANCE</p> - -<h1> -A<br /> -<br /> -VALIANT IGNORANCE</h1> - -<p class="c"> -<span class="eng">A Novel</span><br /> -<br /><br /> -BY<br /> -<br /> -MARY ANGELA DICKENS<br /> -<br /> -<small>AUTHOR OF “CROSS CURRENTS,” “A MERE CYPHER,” ETC.</small> -</p> - -<div class="poetry"><div class="poem"> -<div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Thy gold is brass!”<br /></span> -<span class="i5"><span class="smcap">Prince Hohenstiel Schwangau</span><br /></span> -</div></div> -</div> - -<p class="c"> -<i>IN THREE VOLUMES</i><br /> - -VOL. I.<br /> -<br /> -<span class="eng">London</span><br /> MACMILLAN & CO.<br /> -AND NEW YORK<br /> -1894<br /> -</p> - -<p class="chp"> -<a href="#CHAPTER_I"><span class="smcap">Chapter</span> I, </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_II">II, </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_III">III, </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_IV">IV, </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_V">V, </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_VI">VI, </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_VII">VII, </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">VIII, </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_IX">IX, </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_X">X, </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XI">XI, </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XII">XII, </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">XIII, </a> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">XIV.</a> -</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_001" id="page_001"></a>{1}</span></p> - -<h1>A VALIANT IGNORANCE</h1> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I</h2> - -<div class="blockquot"><p class="nind"> -“<span class="smcap">My dear Mamma</span>,<br /> -</p> - -<p>“I hope you are quite well. I am quite well, and Smut is quite -well. Her tail is very fat. I hope papa is quite well. I have a box -of soldiers. The captain has a horse. Uncle Richard gave them to -me. There is a hole in the horse, and he sticks in tight. Auntie is -quite well, and so is nurse, and so is cook.</p> - -<p class="r"> -<span style="margin-right: 2em;">“I am, your loving Son,</span><br /> -“<span class="smcap">Julian</span>.”<br /> -</p></div> - -<p>It was the table d’hôte room of one of the best hotels in Nice; a large -room, gay and attractive, according to its kind, as fresh paint, bright -decoration, and expanse of looking-glass could make it. From end to end -were ranged small tables, varying in size but<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_002" id="page_002"></a>{2}</span> uniform in the radiant -spotlessness of their white cloths, and the brightness of their silver, -china, or glass; and to and fro between the tables, and from the tables -to the door, moved active waiters, whose one aim in life seemed to be -the anticipation of the wishes of the visitors for whose pleasure alone -they apparently existed.</p> - -<p>It was early, and <i>déjeuner</i> proper was hardly in full swing as yet. But -a good many of the tables were occupied, and a subdued hum of -conversation pervaded the air; a hum compounded of the high-pitched -chatter of American women and the quick, eager volubility of French -tongues, backed by a less pronounced but perfectly perceptible -undercurrent of German and English; the whole diversified now and then -by a light laugh.</p> - -<p>The sounds were subdued because the room was large and sparsely filled, -but they were gay. The smiling alacrity of the waiters was apparently at -once a symptom of, and a subtle tribute to, the humour of the hour. -There were sundry strongly-marked faces here and there among the little -groups; middle-aged men to whom neither ambition<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_003" id="page_003"></a>{3}</span> nor care could have -been empty words; middle-aged women with lines about their faces not -lightly come by; young girls with the vague desire and unrest of youth; -young men with its secrets and its aspirations. But all individuality of -care, anxiety, or desire seemed to be in abeyance for the time being; -enjoyment—somewhat conventional, well-dressed enjoyment, of the kind -that rather covers up trouble as not “the thing” than disperses it—was -evidently the order of the day. It was within three days of the -carnival, and the visitors who were crowding into Nice came one and all -with fixedly and obviously light-hearted intention.</p> - -<p>The link between the little letter—not little by any means in a -material sense, since its capitals sprawled and staggered over a large -sheet of foreign letter paper—and the smart, pleasure-seeking -atmosphere of the Nice table d’hôte room, was a woman who sat at a -little table by one of the open windows. And she was much more easily to -be identified, arguing from her appearance and manner, with her present -surroundings than with the images conjured up by the blotted<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_004" id="page_004"></a>{4}</span> letter in -her hand. She was a small woman, with a very erect little figure, the -trimness of which was accentuated by the conventional perfection of the -dress she wore; it was not such a dress as would commend itself to the -fashionable woman of to-day—at that date, eighteen hundred and -seventy-two, tailor-made garments for ladies were not—but it had won a -glance of respect, nevertheless, from every woman in the room in the -course of the few minutes which had elapsed since its wearer had -entered. Her hair was fair; very plentiful and very fashionably dressed. -Her eyes were blue; her colouring pale. If she had had no other claims -on a critic’s attention, no more marked characteristics, she might have -been called rather pretty. She was rather pretty, as a matter of fact, -but her prettiness was dwarfed, and put out of sight by the stronger -influence of her manner and expression.</p> - -<p>As she sat there reading her letter, neither moving nor speaking, she -was stamped from head to foot—as far as externals went—as one of a -type of woman which commands more superficial homage than perhaps any -other—the woman of the world. The self-possession,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_005" id="page_005"></a>{5}</span> the quiet, -unquestioning assurance, even the superficiality of her expression in -its total absence of intellectuality or emotionalism, spoke to -character; the narrow character, truly, which is cognisant only of -shallow waters, knows them, and reigns in them. But it was a noticeable -feature about her that even this character had gone to the accentuation -of the type in her. As to her age, it would have been extremely -difficult to guess it from her appearance. Her face was quite -unworn—evidently such emotions as she had known had gone by no means -deep—and yet it was not young; there was too much knowledge of the -world about it for youthfulness. As a matter of fact, she was twenty-six -years old. She was sitting alone at the little table by the window, and -her perfect freedom from nervousness, or even consciousness of the -admiring glances cast at her, emphasized her perfect self-possession.</p> - -<p>A waiter, smiling and assiduous even beyond the smiling assiduity with -which he had waited at other tables, appeared with her breakfast, and as -he arranged it on the table, she replaced the blotted letter in its -envelope<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_006" id="page_006"></a>{6}</span> with a certain lingering touch that was apparently quite -unconscious, and contrasted rather oddly with her self-possessed face.</p> - -<p>The envelope was addressed in a woman’s writing to “Mrs. William -Romayne, Hôtel Florian, Nice.” It was one of a pile, and she took up the -others and looked them through. They all bore the same name.</p> - -<p>“There are no letters for Mr. Romayne?” she said to the waiter -carelessly.</p> - -<p>The voice was rather thin, and, as would have been expected from her -face, slightly unsympathetic, but it was refined and well modulated. Her -French was excellent.</p> - -<p>The waiter thus questioned showed a letter—a business-like looking -letter in a blue envelope—which he had brought in on his tray; and -presented it with a torrent of explanation and apology. It had arrived -last night, before the arrival of monsieur and madame, and with -unheard-of carelessness, but with quite amazing carelessness indeed, it -had been placed in a private sitting-room ordered by another English -monsieur, who had arrived only this morning. By the valet of this -English monsieur it had been given to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_007" id="page_007"></a>{7}</span> waiter this moment only; by -the waiter it was now given to madame with ten million desolations that -such an accident should have occurred. Monsieur had seemed so anxious -for letters on his arrival! If madame would have the goodness to -explain!</p> - -<p>Madame stopped the flood of protestations with a little gesture. However -it might affect monsieur, the accident did not appear to disturb her -greatly. Indeed, it was inconceivable that she should be easily ruffled.</p> - -<p>“Let Mr. Romayne have the letter at once,” she said, “and send him also -a cup of coffee and an English newspaper!”</p> - -<p>The waiter signified his readiness to do her bidding with the greatest -alacrity, took the letter from her with an apologetic bow, laid by her -side a newspaper for madame’s own reading, as he said, and retired. Left -once more alone, madame proceeded to breakfast in a dainty, leisurely -fashion, ignoring the newspaper for the present, and drawing from the -envelope in which she had replaced the childish little epistle, a second -letter. It was a long one, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_008" id="page_008"></a>{8}</span> she read it placidly as she went on with -her breakfast.</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p>“<span class="smcap">My dear Hermia</span>,” it ran, “Julian has just accomplished the -enclosed with a great deal of pride and excitement. The wild -scrawls that occur here and there were the result of imperative -demands on his part to be allowed to write ‘all by himself’! The -dear pet is very well, and grows sweeter every day, I believe. You -were to meet Mr. Romayne at Mentone, on the second, I think he -said, and to go on to Nice the next day, so I hope you will get -this soon after you arrive there. I hope the change will do Mr. -Romayne good. He came here to see Julian yesterday, and I did not -think him looking well, nor did father. He only laughed when father -told him so. We were so glad to get your last letter. You are not a -very good correspondent, are you? But, of course, you were going -out a great deal in Paris and had not much time for writing. You -seem to have had a delightful time there.</p> - -<p>“Dennis Falconer came back last week. He has been away nearly a -year, you know.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_009" id="page_009"></a>{9}</span> He is very brown, and has a long beard, which is -rather becoming. The Royal Geographical are beginning to think -rather highly of him, father is told, and he will probably get -something important to do before long. Father wanted him to come -and stay here, but he has gone back to his old chambers. Not very -cousinly of him, I think!</p> - -<p>“You don’t say whether you are coming to London for the season? I -asked Mr. Romayne, but he said he did not know what your plans -were. I do so hope you will come, though I am afraid I should not -be pleased if the spirit should move you to settle down in England -and demand Julian! However, I suppose that is not very likely?</p> - -<p class="c"> -“With much love, dear Hermia,<br /> -“Your very affectionate Cousin,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 8em;">“<span class="smcap">Frances Falconer</span>.”</span><br /> -</p></div> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne finished the letter, which she had read with leisurely -calm, as though her interest in it was by no means of a thrilling -nature, and then opened and glanced<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_010" id="page_010"></a>{10}</span> through, the others which were -waiting their turn. They were of various natures; one or two came from -villas about Nice, and consisted of more or less pressing invitations; -one was from a well-known leader of society in Rome—a long, chatty -letter, which the recipient read with evident amusement and interest. -There were also one or two bills, at which Mrs. Romayne glanced with the -composure of a woman with whom money is plentiful.</p> - -<p>Breakfast and correspondence were alike disposed of at last, and by this -time the room was nearly full. The laughter and talk was louder now, the -atmosphere of gaiety was more accentuated. Outside in the sunshine in -the public gardens a band was playing. Mrs. Romayne was alone, it is -true, and her voice consequently added nothing to the pervading note, -but her presence, solitary as it was, was no jarring element. She was -not lonely; her solitude was evidently an affair of the moment merely; -she was absolutely in touch with the spirit of the hour, and no -laughing, excited girl there witnessed more eloquently or more<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_011" id="page_011"></a>{11}</span> -unconsciously to the all-pervading dominion of the pleasures of life -than did the self-possessed looking little woman, to whom its pleasures -were also its businesses—the only businesses she knew.</p> - -<p>She had gathered her letters together, and was rising from her seat with -a certain amount of indecision in her face, when a waiter entered the -room and came up to her. “Some ladies wishing to see madame were in the -salon,” he said, and he handed her as he spoke a visiting-card bearing -the name, “Lady Cloughton.” Underneath the name was written in pencil, -“An unconscionable hour to invade you, but we are going this afternoon -to La Turbie, and we hope we may perhaps persuade you to join us.”</p> - -<p>“The ladies are in the salon, you say?” said Mrs. Romayne, glancing up -with the careless satisfaction of a woman to whom the turn of events -usually does bring satisfaction; perhaps because her demands and her -experience are alike of the most superficial description.</p> - -<p>“In the salon, madame,” returned the waiter. “Three ladies and two -gentlemen.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_012" id="page_012"></a>{12}</span></p> - -<p>He was conducting her obsequiously across the room as he spoke, and a -moment later he opened the door of the salon and stood aside to let her -pass in.</p> - -<p>A little well-bred clamour ensued upon her entrance; greetings, -questions and answers as between acquaintances who had not met for some -time, and met now with a pleasure which seemed rather part and parcel of -the gaiety to which the atmosphere of the dining-room had witnessed than -an affair of the feelings. All Mrs. Romayne’s five visitors were -apparently under five-and-thirty, the eldest being a man of perhaps -three or four-and-thirty, addressed by Mrs. Romayne as Lord Cloughton; -the youngest a pretty girl who was introduced by the leader of the -party, presumably Lady Cloughton, herself quite a young woman, as “my -little sister.” They were all well-dressed; they were all apparently in -the best possible spirits, and bent upon enjoyment; and gay little -laughs interspersed the chatter, incessantly breaking from one or the -other on little or no apparent provocation. Eventually Lady Cloughton’s -voice detached itself and went on alone.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_013" id="page_013"></a>{13}</span></p> - -<p>“We heard you were here,” she said, “from a man who is staying here. We -are at the Français, you know. And we said at once, ‘Supposing Mrs. -Romayne is not engaged for to-morrow’—so many people don’t come, you -see, until the day before the carnival, and consequently, of course, one -has fewer friends and fewer engagements, and this week is not so full, -don’t you know—‘supposing she has no engagement for to-morrow,’ we -said, ‘how pleasant it would be if she would come with us to La Turbie.’ -We have to make Mr. Romayne’s acquaintance, you know. So charmed to have -the opportunity! I hope he is well?”</p> - -<p>“Fairly well, thanks,” replied his wife. “He has been in London all the -winter—his business always seems to take him to the wrong place at the -wrong time—and either the climate or his work seems to have knocked him -up a little. He seems to have got into a shocking habit of sitting up -all night and staying in bed all day. At least he has acted on that -principle during the week we have been together. He is actually not up -yet.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_014" id="page_014"></a>{14}</span></p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne smiled as she spoke; her husband’s “shocking habits” -apparently sat very lightly on her; in fact, there was something -singularly disengaged and impersonal in her manner of speaking of him, -altogether. Her visitor received her smile with a pretty little -unmeaning laugh, and went on with much superficial eagerness:</p> - -<p>“He may, perhaps, be up in time for our expedition, though! We thought -of starting in about two hours’ time. They say the place is perfectly -beautiful at this time of year. Perhaps you know it.”</p> - -<p>“No,” returned Mrs. Romayne. “Oddly enough I have never been to Nice -before. I have often talked of wintering here, but I have always -eventually gone somewhere else! Are you here for the first time?” she -added, turning to the young man, whom she had received as Mr. Allan, and -who evidently occupied the position of mutual acquaintance between -herself and her other visitors. He was answering her in the affirmative -when Lord Cloughton struck in with a cheery laugh.</p> - -<p>“He’s been here two days, and he has come to the conclusion that Nice is -a beastly<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_015" id="page_015"></a>{15}</span> hole, Mrs. Romayne!” he said. “This afternoon’s expedition is -really a device on our part for cheering him up. He let himself be -persuaded into putting some money into a new bank, and the new bank has -smashed. Have you seen the papers? Now, Allan hasn’t lost much, -fortunately; it isn’t that that weighs upon him. But he is oppressed by -a sense of his own imbecility, aren’t you, old fellow?”</p> - -<p>The young man laughed, freely enough.</p> - -<p>“Perhaps I am,” he said. “So would you be, Cloughton, wouldn’t he, Mrs. -Romayne? And don’t tell me you wouldn’t have done the same, because any -fellow would, in my place. However, if Mrs. Romayne is more likely to -join us this afternoon if the proceedings are presented to her in the -light of a charity, I’m quite willing to pose as an object! Take pity on -me, Mrs. Romayne, do!”</p> - -<p>“I shan’t pity you,” answered Mrs. Romayne lightly. “You don’t seem to -me to be much depressed, and your misfortunes appear to be of your own -making. But I shall be delighted to go with you this<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_016" id="page_016"></a>{16}</span> afternoon,” she -continued, turning to Lady Cloughton. “And I feel sure that Mr. Romayne -will also be delighted.”</p> - -<p>“That is quite charming of you!” exclaimed Lady Cloughton, rising as she -spoke. “Well, then, I think if we were to call for you—yes, we will -call for you in two hours from now. So glad you can come! The little boy -quite well? So glad. In two hours, then! Au revoir.”</p> - -<p>There was a flutter of departure, a chorus of bright, meaningless, last -words, and Mrs. Romayne stood at the head of the great staircase, waving -her hand in farewell as her visitors, with a last backward glance and -parting smiles and gestures, disappeared from view. She stood a moment -watching some people in the hall below, whose appearance had struck her -at dinner on the previous evening, and as she looked idly at them she -saw a man come in—an Englishman, evidently just off a journey, and “not -a gentleman” as she decided absently—and go up to a waiter who was -standing in the dining-room doorway. The Englishman evidently asked a -question and then another<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_017" id="page_017"></a>{17}</span> and another, and finally the waiter glanced -up the stairs to where Mrs. Romayne stood carelessly watching, and -obviously pointed her out to his interlocutor, asking a question in his -turn. The Englishman, after looking quickly in Mrs. Romayne’s direction, -shook his head in answer and walked into the dining-room.</p> - -<p>With a vague feeling of surprise and curiosity Mrs. Romayne turned and -moved away. She retraced her steps, evidently intending to go upstairs, -but as she passed the open door of the drawing-room she hesitated; her -eyes caught by the bright prospect visible through the open windows -which looked out over the public gardens and the blue Mediterranean; her -ears caught by the sounds from the band still playing outside. She -re-entered the room, crossed to the window and stood there, looking out -with inattentive pleasure, the dialogue she had witnessed in the hall -quite forgotten as she thought of her own affairs. She thought of the -immediate prospects of the next few weeks; wholly satisfactory prospects -they were, to judge from her expression. She thought of the letters she<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_018" id="page_018"></a>{18}</span> -had received that morning, mentally answering the invitations she had -received. She thought of the acquaintances who had just left her, and of -the engagement she had made for that afternoon; and then, as if the -necessity for seeing her husband on the subject had by this means become -freshly present to her, she turned away from the window and went out of -the room and up the staircase. On her way she chanced to glance down -into the hall and noticed the Englishman to whom the waiter had pointed -her out, leaning in a reposeful and eminently stationary attitude -against the entrance. She would ask who he was, she resolved idly. She -went on until she came to a door at the end of a long corridor, outside -which stood a dainty little pair of walking shoes and a pair of man’s -boots. She glanced at them and lifted her eyebrows slightly—a -characteristic gesture—and then opened the door.</p> - -<p>It led into a little dressing-room, from which another doorway on the -left led, evidently, into a larger room beyond. The glimpse of the -latter afforded by the partly open door showed it dim and dark by -contrast<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_019" id="page_019"></a>{19}</span> with the light outside; apparently the blind was but slightly -raised. There was no sunshine in the dressing-room, either, though it -was light enough; and as Mrs. Romayne went in and shut the door she -seemed to pass into a silence that was almost oppressive. The band, the -strains of which had reached her at the very threshold, was not audible -in the room; in shutting the door she seemed to shut out all external -sounds, and within the room was absolute stillness.</p> - -<p>The contrast, however, made no impression whatever upon Mrs. Romayne. -She was by no means sensitive, evidently, to such subtle influence. She -glanced carelessly through the doorway into the dim vista of the bedroom -beyond, and going to the other end of the dressing-room knelt down by a -portmanteau, and began to search in it with the uncertainty of a woman -whose packing is done for her by a maid. She found what she wanted; -sundry dainty adjuncts to out-of-door attire, one of which, a large lace -sunshade, required a little attention. She took up an elaborate little -case for work implements that lay on the table, and selected a needle -and thread,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_020" id="page_020"></a>{20}</span> and a thimble; and perhaps the dead silence about her -oppressed her a little, unconsciously to herself, for she hummed as she -did so a bar or two of the waltz she had shut out as she shut the door. -Then with the needle moving deftly to and fro in her white, well-shaped -hands, she moved down the dressing-room, and standing in the light for -the sake of her work, she spoke through the doorway into the still, dark -bedroom.</p> - -<p>“The Cloughtons have been here, William,” she said. “The people I met in -Rome this winter; I think I told you, didn’t I? They wanted us to go to -La Turbie with them this afternoon, and I said we would. That is to say, -I only answered conditionally for you, of course. Will you go?”</p> - -<p>There was no answer, no sound of any kind. Not so much as a stir or a -rustle to indicate that the sleep of the man hidden in the dimness -beyond—and only sleep surely could account for his silence—was even -broken by the words addressed to him. Yet the voice which proceeded from -the serene, well-appointed little figure standing in the sombre light of -the dressing-room, with its attention<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_021" id="page_021"></a>{21}</span> more or less given to the trivial -work in its hands, was penetrating in its quality, though not loud.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne paused a moment, listening. Then, with that expressive -movement of her eyebrows, she went back again to the dressing-table she -had left, took up a little pair of scissors which were necessary to give -the finishing touch to her work, gave that finishing touch with careless -deliberation, studied the effect with satisfaction, and then laid down -the sunshade, and returned to the doorway into the bedroom. She stood on -the threshold this time, and the darkness before her and the sombre -light behind her seemed to meet upon her figure; the silence and -stillness all about her seemed to claim even the space she occupied.</p> - -<p>“William!” she said crisply. “William!”</p> - -<p>Again there was no answer; no sound or stir of any sort or kind. And for -the first time the silence seemed to strike her. She moved quickly -forward into the dimness.</p> - -<p>“William! Are you asleep——”</p> - -<p>Her eyes had fallen on the bed, and she stopped suddenly. For it was -empty. She<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_022" id="page_022"></a>{22}</span> paused an instant, and in that instant the silence seemed to -rise and dominate the atmosphere as with a grim and mighty presence, -before which everything shallow or superficial sank into insignificance. -All that was typical and conventional about the woman standing in the -midst of the stillness, arrested by she knew not what, suddenly seemed -to stand out jarring and incongruous, as though unreality had been met -and touched into self-revelation by a great reality. Then it subsided -altogether, and only the simplest elements of womanhood were left—the -womanhood common to the peasant and the princess—as the wife took two -or three quick steps forward. She turned the corner of the bed that hid -the greater part of the room from her, and then staggered back with a -sharp cry. At her feet, partly dressed, there lay the figure of the man -to whom she had been talking; his right hand, dropped straight by his -side, clenched a revolver; his face—a handsome face probably an hour -ago—was white and fixed; his eyes were glassy. On the floor beside him -lay an open letter—a letter written on blue paper.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_023" id="page_023"></a>{23}</span></p> - -<p>William Romayne was asleep indeed. His wife might tear at the bell-rope; -the hotel servants might hurry and rush to and fro; even the -recently-arrived Englishman might render his assistance. But it was all -in vain. William Romayne was beyond their reach.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_024" id="page_024"></a>{24}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">The</span> long railway journey from Paris to Nice was nearly over. The -passengers, jaded and tired out, for the most part, after a night in the -train, were beginning to rouse to a languid interest in the landscape; -to become aware that dawn and the uncomfortable and unfamiliar early day -had some time since given place to a fuller and maturer light; and to -consult their watches, reminding themselves—or one another, as the case -might be—that they were due at Nice at twelve-fifteen.</p> - -<p>Alone in one of the first-class carriages was a passenger who had -accepted the situation with the most matter-of-fact indifference from -first to last. He had made his arrangements for the night, with the -skill and deliberation of an experienced traveller; and as the morning -advanced he had composed<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_025" id="page_025"></a>{25}</span> himself, as comfortably as circumstances -permitted, in a corner of his carriage, now and then casting a keen, -comprehensive glance at the country through which he was being carried. -These glances, however, were evidently instinctive and almost -unconscious. For the most part he gazed straight before him with a -preoccupied frown and a grave and anxious expression in marked contrast -with his physical imperturbability. He was a man of apparently three or -four-and-thirty; tall; rather lean than thin; and very muscular-looking. -His face, and the right hand from which he had pulled off the glove, -were bronzed a deep red-brown, and he wore a long brown beard; but he -was not otherwise remarkable-looking. His eyes, indeed, were very keen -and steady, but the rest of his face conveyed the impression that he -owed these characteristics rather to trained habits of material -observation than to general intellectual depths; the mouth was firm and -strong, but neither sensitive nor sympathetic, and the straight, -well-cut nose was as distinctly too thin as the rather high forehead was -too narrow. On a much-worn travelling-bag on<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_026" id="page_026"></a>{26}</span> the seat beside him, was -the name Dennis Falconer.</p> - -<p>The train steamed slowly into the station at Nice at last; the traveller -stepped out on to the platform, and the shade of grave preoccupation -which had touched him seemed to descend on him more heavily and -all-absorbingly as he did so. He was walking down the platform, looking -neither to the right nor the left, when he was stopped by a quick -exclamation from a little wiry man with a shrewd, clever face who had -just come into the station.</p> - -<p>“Falconer, as I’m alive,” he cried. “Well met, my boy!”</p> - -<p>The gravity of the younger man’s face relaxed for the moment into a -smile of well-pleased astonishment.</p> - -<p>“Dr. Aston!” he exclaimed. “Why, I was thinking of looking you up in -London! I’d no idea you were abroad!”</p> - -<p>The other man laughed, a very pleasant, jovial laugh.</p> - -<p>“I’m taking a holiday,” he said. “I don’t know that I’ve any particular -right to it! But I don’t know these places, and I took it into my head -that I should like to have a look at<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_027" id="page_027"></a>{27}</span> a carnival in Nice. And you, my -boy? Just back from Africa, you are, I know. You’ve come for the -carnival by way of a change, eh?”</p> - -<p>Falconer’s face altered.</p> - -<p>“No!” he said gravely, and with a good deal of restraint. “I’ve not come -for pleasure. Very much the reverse, I’m sorry to say.”</p> - -<p>He paused, apparently intending to say no more on the subject. But the -keen, kindly interest in his hearer’s face, or something magnetic about -the man, influenced him in spite of himself.</p> - -<p>“I don’t know whether the facts about this bank business are known here -yet,” he said, “but if they are you’ll understand, Aston, when I tell -you that I and my old uncle are the only male relations of William -Romayne’s wife.”</p> - -<p>A quick flash of grave intelligence passed across Dr. Aston’s face. He -hesitated, and glanced dubiously at the younger man.</p> - -<p>“When did you leave London?” he said abruptly.</p> - -<p>“Yesterday morning,” was the somewhat surprised reply.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_028" id="page_028"></a>{28}</span></p> - -<p>“You’ve come in good time, my boy,” said Dr. Aston very gravely. “Mrs. -Romayne wants a relation with her if ever she did in her life. Was her -husband ever a friend of yours, Dennis?”</p> - -<p>“I have never met him. I know very little even of his wife. What is it, -doctor?”</p> - -<p>“William Romayne shot himself yesterday morning!”</p> - -<p>A short, sharp exclamation broke from Falconer, and then there was a -moment’s total silence between the two men as the sudden, unspeakable -horror in Falconer’s face resolved itself into a shocked, almost -awestruck gravity.</p> - -<p>“I am thankful to have met you,” he said at last in a low, stern voice; -“and I am more than thankful that I came.”</p> - -<p>He held out his hand as he spoke, as though what he had heard impelled -him to go on his way, and Dr. Aston wrung it with warm sympathy.</p> - -<p>“We shall meet again,” he said. “Let me know if I can be of any use. I -am staying at the Français.”</p> - -<p>Grave and stern, but not apparently<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_029" id="page_029"></a>{29}</span> shaken or rendered nervous by the -news he had heard, or by the prospect of the meeting before him, as a -sympathetic or emotional man must have been, Dennis Falconer strode out -of the station. Grave and stern he reached his destination, and enquired -for Mrs. Romayne. His question was answered by the proprietor himself, -supplemented by half-audible ejaculations from attendant waiters, in a -tone in which sympathetic interest, familiarity, and even a certain -amount of resentment were inextricably blended.</p> - -<p>Monsieur would see Madame Romayne—<i>cette pauvre madame</i>, of a demeanour -so beautiful, yes, even in these frightful circumstances, so beautiful -and so distinguished? Monsieur had but just arrived from -England—monsieur had then perhaps not heard? Monsieur was aware? He was -a kinsman of madame? Monsieur would then doubtless appreciate the so -great inconvenience occasioned, the hardly-to-be-reckoned damage -sustained by one of the first hotels in Nice, by the event? Monsieur -would see madame at once? But yes, madame was visible. There was, in -fact, a monsieur with her even now—an English<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_030" id="page_030"></a>{30}</span> monsieur from the -English Scotland Yard. Madame had sent—— But monsieur was indeed in -haste.</p> - -<p>Monsieur left no possibility of doubt on that score. The waiter, told -off by a wave of the proprietor’s hand on the vigorous demonstration to -that effect evoked by the mention of the monsieur from Scotland Yard, -had to hasten his usual pace considerably to keep ahead of those quick, -firm footsteps, and it was almost breathlessly that he at last threw -open a door at the end of a long corridor.</p> - -<p>“Mr. Romayne’s name is public property in connection with the affair, -then, in London, since yesterday morning?”</p> - -<p>The words, spoken in a hard, thin, woman’s voice, came to Falconer’s ear -as the door opened; and the waiter’s announcement, “A kinsman of -madame,” passed unheeded as he moved hastily forward into the room.</p> - -<p>It was a small private sitting-room, evidently by no means the best in -the hotel. With his back to the door stood a young man in an attitude of -professional calm, rather belied by a certain nervous fingering of the -hat he held, which seemed to say that he<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_031" id="page_031"></a>{31}</span> found his position a somewhat -embarrassing one. Facing him, and indirectly facing the door, stood Mrs. -Romayne.</p> - -<p>She was dressed in black from head to foot, but the gown she wore was -one that she had had in her wardrobe—very fashionably made, with no -trace of mourning about it other than its hue.</p> - -<p>Emphasized, perhaps, by the incongruity of her conventional smartness, -but a result of the past twenty-four hours independent of any such -emphasis, all the more salient points of her demeanour of the day before -seemed to be accentuated into hardness. Her perfect self-possession, as -she faced the young man before her—it was the man she had noticed on -the previous morning questioning the waiter—was hard; her perfect -freedom from any touch of emotion or agitation was hard; her face, a -little sharpened and haggard, and reddened slightly about the eyelids, -apparently rather from want of sleep than from tears, was very hard; her -eyes, brighter than usual, and her rather thin mouth, were eloquent of -bitterness, rather than desolation, of spirit.</p> - -<p>She turned quickly towards the door as<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_032" id="page_032"></a>{32}</span> Falconer entered, and looked at -him for an instant with an unrecognising stare. Then, as he advanced to -her without speaking, and with outstretched hand, something that was -almost a spasm of comprehension passed across her face, settling into a -stiff little society smile.</p> - -<p>“It is Dennis Falconer, isn’t it?” she said, holding out her hand to -him. “I ought to have known you at once. I am very glad to see you.”</p> - -<p>“My uncle thought—— We decided yesterday morning——”</p> - -<p>Dennis Falconer hesitated and stopped. He was thrown out of his -reckoning, taken hopelessly aback, as it were, by something so entirely -unlike what he had expected as was her whole bearing; though, indeed, he -had been quite unconscious of expecting anything. But Mrs. Romayne -remained completely mistress of the situation.</p> - -<p>“It is very kind of you,” she said, with the same hard composure. “It -was very kind of my uncle.” She hesitated, hardly perceptibly, and then -said, the lines about her mouth growing more bitter, “You have heard?”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_033" id="page_033"></a>{33}</span></p> - -<p>Falconer bowed his head in assent, and she turned toward the young man, -who had drawn a little apart during this colloquy.</p> - -<p>“This gentleman comes from Scotland Yard,” she said. “Perhaps you will -be so kind as to go into matters with him. I do not understand business -or legal details. Mr. Falconer will represent me,” she added to the -young man, who bowed with an alacrity that suggested, as did his glance -at Falconer, that the prospect of conferring with a man rather than a -woman was a distinct relief to him. Then, before Falconer’s not very -rapid mind had adjusted itself to the situation, she had bowed slightly -to the young man and left the room.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_034" id="page_034"></a>{34}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Three</span> days before, the name of William Romayne had been widely known and -respected throughout Europe as the name of a successful and -distinguished financier. Now, it was the centre of a nine-days’ wonder -as the name of a master swindler, detected.</p> - -<p>A bank, established in London within the last twelve months in -connection with a company offering an exceptionally high rate of -interest, had suddenly suspended payment. The circumstances were so -ordinary, and the explanation offered so plausible, that at first no -suspicion of underhand dealings presented itself. It was in connection -with the first whispers—which ran like wildfire through financial -London—of something beneath the surface, that it first became known -that<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_035" id="page_035"></a>{35}</span> William Romayne had some connection, as yet undefined by rumour, -with the bank in question; a fact hitherto quite unknown. The whispers -grew with rapidity which was almost incredible even to the whisperers, -into a definite and authentic shout of accusation; and with the exposure -of an outline of such daring and ingenious fraud as had not been -perpetrated for many a day, another fact had become public property. The -exposure had been brought about by an incredibly short-sighted blunder -on the part of the master mind by which the whole affair had been -conceived. William Romayne’s was the master mind, and William Romayne, -in trying to overreach alike his dupes and his confederates, had -overreached himself. His own hand had created the clue which had led -eventually to the ruin of the scheme he had originated. His death, with -the news of which the London Stock Exchange was ringing only a few hours -after it was known in Nice, was the forfeit paid by a strong nature to -which success in all its undertakings was the very salt of life.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne, on leaving the sitting-room,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_036" id="page_036"></a>{36}</span> passed along the passages to -her own room—not that which she had entered twenty-four hours before to -consult with her husband as to the pleasure expedition of the -afternoon—her face and manner altering not at all. Her composure was -evidently neither forced nor unreal. The emotion created in her by the -tragic circumstances through which she was living was obviously not the -heartbroken shame and despair naturally to be attributed to a wife so -situated, but a bitter and burning resentment. Had William Romayne -passed away in the ordinary course of nature, or by any violent -accident, his widow would have mourned him with conventional lamentation -and with a certain amount of genuine regret. He had committed suicide, -as the letter lying by his side revealed to his wife even while she -hardly realised that he was indeed dead, as his only way of escape from -the consequences of fraud on the brink of detection; and his widow’s -attitude to his memory under these circumstances was the natural outcome -of the character of their married life.</p> - -<p>Hermia Stirling at nineteen had been a pretty, practical, matter-of-fact -girl, with her<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_037" id="page_037"></a>{37}</span> rather shallow nature somewhat prematurely matured. She -had been an orphan from her babyhood, and having no near relations in -England, her nineteen years of life had been lived under varied -auspices, resulting in more desultory education, moral as well as -mental, than was good for her. The most impressionable of those years, -however—those from fourteen to nineteen—had been passed with -connections of her mother’s, young and wealthy society women, with no -ideas beyond society life, and with little perceptible principle but -that of social expediency. Hermia was just nineteen, just out, and -taking to the life before her with the ease and zest of a born woman of -the world, when one of these ladies died, and the other married and went -away to America with her husband. At this juncture the girl’s guardian, -her father’s only brother, returned from India to settle in London with -his only child, a girl two years older than Hermia; and it was obvious -that his home must be also Hermia’s. But neither old Mr. Falconer nor -his daughter had the slightest taste or capacity for fashionable life, -and before she had spent six months with them the world<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_038" id="page_038"></a>{38}</span> had become to -Hermia an insufferably dull and tiresome place.</p> - -<p>She had known William Romayne in society. He was rich, he was handsome, -and he was very popular; there was that indefinable something about him, -manner, magnetism, or tact, which constitutes a kind of dominating -charm. He was not the less “somebody” in that he was vaguely understood -to be a business man of some sort, with dealings in shares and stocks -all over the world—a locality which lent a picturesque haziness to his -affairs. Consequently, when he followed Hermia into her new life and -asked her to marry him, she passed over the fact that he was -five-and-twenty years her senior, and consented with the practical -promptitude of a nature for which romance and sentiment were not. For -eighteen months she and her husband had lived in a large house in Eaton -Square, entertaining and being entertained through two brilliant -seasons, which took away any girlishness which Hermia had ever -possessed, and gave her qualities which she admired infinitely more. She -found her husband very pleasant, very easy to live with, and, after the -first six months,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_039" id="page_039"></a>{39}</span> quite unexacting. His business took him into the City -every day at this time, though, as his wife said, complacently, he was -not the least like the ordinary City man; but at the end of the season -which followed on the birth of their child he announced that he would -have to spend certainly six months, possibly more, in America.</p> - -<p>He showed no ardent desire to take his wife with him, and his wife had -no desire whatever to go. She wanted to spend the rest of the summer at -one of the fashionable health resorts, and to winter in Rome. Such an -arrangement was accordingly made between them in the simplest, most -matter-of-fact way, arguing no shadow of ill-will on either side; and -during the four years which had elapsed since then, husband and wife had -each gone his or her own way, meeting when occasion served for a month -or two at a time, now in London, now in Paris, now in Rome; and -presumably finding the arrangement mutually satisfactory. The little boy -had been left for the most part to the care of Mrs. Romayne’s cousin, -Frances Falconer. Mrs. Romayne regarded him with the careless, -half-dormant<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_040" id="page_040"></a>{40}</span> affection of a woman to whom her child owes nothing but -bare life; to whom its arrival in the world has been rather a tiresome -interlude, merely, in her round of pleasures and pursuits; who has had -no time since, and has seen no occasion to make time, to give it that -care which other people, as it seemed to her, could give it quite as -well as she; and who is waiting, vaguely, until it shall be “grown up,” -to find it interesting.</p> - -<p>That her husband’s “business” had taken him in the course of those four -years into every corner of the globe where the passing of money from -hand to hand is elevated into a science, Mrs. Romayne knew; and with -that fact her knowledge of his affairs began and ended. He made her an -ample allowance; whenever they met she found him the same handsome, -rather callous, but withal fascinating man; clever with a cleverness -which she could appreciate—the cleverness which made money, and held a -position in society—and she had asked nothing more of him. Her regard -for him, if regard that could be called which was more truly -indifference, had been founded on appreciation<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_041" id="page_041"></a>{41}</span> of his success. Before -failure, before the social disgrace which must be the lot of a detected -swindler and suicide, it disappeared totally and instantaneously, to be -replaced by a burning sense of personal outrage and insult.</p> - -<p>It was late in the afternoon before she left her room again. Dennis -Falconer received a message to the effect that Mrs. Romayne was sure -that he must be tired, and begged that he would not think of her until -he had lunched and rested.</p> - -<p>When she did reappear she was in widow’s weeds, and the contrast between -her dress, with its tragic significance of desolation, and her face, -untouched with feeling, was inexpressible.</p> - -<p>Dennis Falconer was in the sitting-room when she entered it. His sense -of duty was largely developed, and he was also keenly sensible of the -moral aspect of the affair with which he was brought into such close -contact. The first of these senses kept him in waiting in anticipation -of the appearance of the woman for whose assistance he was there; and -the second weighed so heavily<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_042" id="page_042"></a>{42}</span> upon him that the publicity of the hotel -smoking-room would have been intolerable to him under the circumstances.</p> - -<p>He rose quickly as Mrs. Romayne came in, a look of slight constraint on -his face.</p> - -<p>Dennis Falconer had no near relation, and perhaps this absence of close -ties to England had had something to do with his adoption of the life of -a traveller and explorer in connection with the Royal Geographical -Society. Old Mr. Falconer, Mrs. Romayne’s uncle, was his second cousin -only, though the younger man had been brought up to address him as -uncle; but in so small a clan distant relationship counts for more than -in a family where first cousins and brothers and sisters abound, and -there was nothing strange to Dennis Falconer or to Mrs. Romayne in the -fact of his coming to her support, even though they hardly knew one -another. But Falconer had been chilled and even repelled by her manner -of the morning, and he was very conscious now of having his cousin’s -acquaintance to make, and of approaching the process with a vague -prejudice against her in his mind.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_043" id="page_043"></a>{43}</span></p> - -<p>This prejudice was not dissipated by her first words, spoken with a -suavity somewhat low in pitch, truly, but with a tacit ignoring of the -significance of their meeting which seemed to the man she addressed—to -whom society life with its obligations and conventionalities was -practically an unknown quantity—simply jarring and unsuitable.</p> - -<p>“I hope you are rested!” she said. “I suppose, though, that to such a -traveller as you are, the journey from London to Nice is nothing. I hear -from Frances constantly about your exploits, and she tells me that we -are to expect great things of you. What a long time it is since we met!”</p> - -<p>She sat down as she spoke, with a hard little smile, and Falconer -murmured something almost unintelligible. Thinking that his manner arose -from mere embarrassment, instinct dictated to her to set him at his -ease; and with no faintest comprehension of his attitude of mind she -proceeded to chat to him about his own affairs, asking him questions -which elicited coherent answers indeed, but answers which grew terser -and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_044" id="page_044"></a>{44}</span> sterner until she thought indifferently that her cousin was a -rather heavy person. At last there came a pause; a pause during which -Falconer gazed grimly and uncomfortably at the floor. And when Mrs. -Romayne broke it, it was with a different tone and manner, hard and -matter-of-fact.</p> - -<p>“The detective told you more than he told me, possibly,” she said. “If -there is anything more for me to hear, I should like to hear it. You had -better, I think, read this letter. Mr. Romayne received it yesterday -morning.”</p> - -<p>She handed him that letter written on blue paper which had lain by the -dead man’s side, and Falconer took it in silence.</p> - -<p>The letter was from one of William Romayne’s confederates. It was the -desperate letter of a desperate man who knew himself to be addressing -the man to whom he was to owe ruin and disgrace. The crisis had -evidently been so wholly unexpected that detection was actually imminent -before the criminals recognised it as even possible. The gist of the -letter was contained in the statement that before it met the eyes of the -man<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_045" id="page_045"></a>{45}</span> for whom it was intended, the whole scheme would be exploded.</p> - -<p>Falconer read it through, his face very stern. He finished it and -refolded it, still in silence, and Mrs. Romayne said in a dry, thin -voice:</p> - -<p>“It bears out, as you see, what the detective no doubt told you—that -there was so little ground for suspicion three days ago that he was sent -out merely to watch, and without even a warrant. He found a telegram -waiting for him here from his authorities yesterday morning.”</p> - -<p>“He told me so!” answered Falconer distantly and constrainedly, handing -her back the letter as he spoke without comment.</p> - -<p>“There is not the faintest possibility of hushing it up, I conclude?” -she asked, in the same hard voice.</p> - -<p>Falconer looked at her for a moment, the indefinite disapprobation of -her, which had been growing in him almost with every word she said, -taking form in his face in a distinct expression of reprobation.</p> - -<p>“Not the faintest!” he said emphatically. “Nor do I see that such a -possibility is in any way to be desired.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_046" id="page_046"></a>{46}</span></p> - -<p>She glanced at him with a quick movement of her eyebrows. She did not -speak, however, and a silence ensued between them; one of those -uncomfortable silences eloquent of conscious want of sympathy. It was -broken this time by Falconer, who spoke with formal politeness and -restraint.</p> - -<p>“You will wish to get away from this place as soon as possible, no -doubt,” he said. “There may be some slight delay before we are put into -possession of the papers and other effects at present in the hands of -the authorities here. But I will, of course, do all I can to hasten -matters.”</p> - -<p>“Thanks!” she said. “The papers? Oh, you mean Mr. Romayne’s papers! Are -there any, do you think? A will, I suppose?”</p> - -<p>“The will, if there is one, will be so much waste paper, I fear,” said -Falconer with uncompromising sternness. “There is no chance of any -property being saved, even if it was possible to wish for such a thing. -But there may be papers, nevertheless; in fact, no doubt there must be; -and you will, of course, wish to have them.”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” said Mrs. Romayne thoughtfully;<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_047" id="page_047"></a>{47}</span> “yes, of course.” She paused a -moment, and then added in a dry, constrained voice: “Do you mean me to -understand that I am absolutely penniless?”</p> - -<p>“Was your own money in your own hands, or in Mr. Romayne’s?”</p> - -<p>“In Mr. Romayne’s.”</p> - -<p>“Then I fear there can be no doubt that such is the case.”</p> - -<p>Falconer spoke very stiffly and distantly, and Mrs. Romayne rose from -her chair a little abruptly, and walked to the window. When she turned -to him again it was to speak of the formalities necessary with the Nice -authorities, and a few moments later the interview was ended by the -appearance of dinner.</p> - -<p>During the few days that followed, the distance between them, which that -first interview established so imperceptibly but so certainly, never -lessened; it grew, indeed, with their contact with one another.</p> - -<p>To Falconer Mrs. Romayne’s whole attitude of mind, her whole -personality, was simply and entirely antipathetic. That a woman under -such circumstances should speak,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_048" id="page_048"></a>{48}</span> and act, and think as Mrs. Romayne -spoke, and acted, and—as far as he could tell—thought; with so little -sense of any but the social aspect of her husband’s crime; with so -little realisation of the ruin that crime had brought to hundreds of -innocent people; with so little moral feeling of any kind; was in the -highest degree reprehensible to him. Having assumed a mental attitude of -reprehension, he stopped short; his perceptions were not sufficiently -keen to allow of his understanding that some pity might be due also.</p> - -<p>Suffering is not always to be estimated by the worth of the object -through which it is inflicted; not often, indeed, in this world, where -the sum of man’s suffering is out of all proportion greater than the sum -of man’s spirituality. Mrs. Romayne’s conception of life might be in the -last degree narrow and selfish, and as such it might be in the highest -degree to be deprecated; but such as it was it was all she had, and -within its limits her life was now in ruin. Her aims and ends in life -might be of the poorest, and deserving of unsparing condemnation; but -she had nothing beyond, and the pain of their overthrow was<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_049" id="page_049"></a>{49}</span> to her -dormant sensibility not so very disproportionate to the suffering -inflicted on a more sensitive organisation by the shattering of higher -hopes.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne, for her part, found her cousin, with the reserve and -formality of demeanour which the situation developed in him, simply a -tiresome and uncongenial companion. He was very attentive to her. His -manner, as she acknowledged to herself more than once with a heavy sigh, -was excellent, and he managed her difficult and painful affairs with -admirable strength and tact; she learnt in the course of those few days -to respect him and depend on him, in spite of herself and even against -her will. But it was not surprising that the end of their enforced dual -solitude should be looked for more or less eagerly by both parties. They -were almost entirely dependent on one another for companionship. -Falconer, it is true, saw Dr. Aston once or twice; but of Mrs. Romayne’s -acquaintances not one had even left a card of condolence upon her. -Neither the Cloughtons nor any other of the pleasure-seekers who had -previously been so anxious for her society,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_050" id="page_050"></a>{50}</span> showed any sign of being -aware of her existence under her present circumstances.</p> - -<p>The form taken by Falconer’s first allusion to the probable limits of -their detention in Nice had created in both of them, by one of those -vague chains of idea which are so unaccountable and so often -experienced, a tendency to think and speak of the termination of that -detention, when they did speak together on the subject, as “when the -papers are given up.” There was some question, at one time, as to -whether or no even the private papers of William Romayne would be -returned to his widow. And these same papers, thus surrounded by an -element of painful uncertainty, and at the same time elevated into a -kind of order of release, obtained in the minds of both a fictitious -importance on their own account. Mrs. Romayne found herself thinking -about them, conjecturing about them, even dreaming about them; until at -last, when they were actually placed in her hand, they possessed a -curious fascination for her.</p> - -<p>It was about midday when she and Falconer returned from their final -appearance<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_051" id="page_051"></a>{51}</span> before the authorities. She stood in the middle of the room -holding the large, shabby despatch-box, lately handed to her with a -grave “Private papers, madame”; the noise of the carnival floated in at -the window in striking contrast with the two sombre figures.</p> - -<p>“I think I will go and look them over!” she said in a low, rather -surprised voice. “You would like to go out, perhaps. Please don’t think -about me. I will spend the day quietly indoors.”</p> - -<p>He answered her courteously, and she left the room slowly, with her eyes -fixed curiously on the despatch-box in her hand.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_052" id="page_052"></a>{52}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Mrs. Romayne</span> carried the despatch-box to her bedroom and set it down on -a small table. She and Falconer were leaving Nice on the following -morning, and her maid was just finishing her packing. Mrs. Romayne -inspected the woman’s arrangements, gave her sundry orders, and then -dismissed her. Left alone, she made one or two trifling preparations for -the journey on her own account, and when these were completed to her -satisfaction, she drew the table on which she had placed the -despatch-box to the open window, and seated herself.</p> - -<p>She drew the box towards her and unlocked it, and there was nothing in -her face as she did so but the hard resentment which had grown upon it -during the last few days, just touched by an indefinite and equally -hard<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_053" id="page_053"></a>{53}</span> curiosity. The interest which those papers possessed for her had -been created by purely artificial means; intrinsically they were nothing -to her. The position which the possession of them had occupied in her -thoughts lately was the sole source of the impulse under which she was -acting now; under any other circumstances she might hardly have cared to -look at them.</p> - -<p>She raised the lid and paused a moment, looking down at the compact mass -of papers within with a sudden vague touch of more personal interest. -The box was nearly full. The various sets of papers were carefully and -methodically fastened together, and endorsed evidently upon a system. -Mrs. Romayne hesitated a moment, and then took out a packet at random.</p> - -<p>It consisted of bills all bearing dates within the last six months; all -sent in by leading London tradesmen, and all for large amounts. Mrs. -Romayne glanced at the figures, and her eyebrows moved with an -expression of slight surprise, which was almost immediately dominated by -bitter acceptance and comprehension. She opened none, however, until<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_054" id="page_054"></a>{54}</span> -she came to one bearing the name of a well-known London jeweller. She -read the name and the amount of the bill, and paused; then a new -curiosity came into her eyes, and she unfolded the paper quickly. The -account was a very long one, and as her eyes travelled quickly down it, -taking in item after item, a dull red colour crept into her face, and -her eyes sparkled with contemptuous resentment. She was evidently -surprised, and yet half-annoyed with herself for being surprised. -Two-thirds of the items in the bill in her hand were for articles of -jewellery not worn by men, and not one of these had ever been seen by -William Romayne’s wife.</p> - -<p>She stuffed the paper back into its fastening, tossed the bundle away -and took another packet from the box with quickened interest. It -consisted of miscellaneous documents, all, likewise, connected with her -husband’s life in London during the past winter, but of no particular -interest. The next packet she opened was of the same nature, and with -that the top layer of the box came to an end.</p> - -<p>The papers below were evidently older; of varying ages, indeed, to judge -from their<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_055" id="page_055"></a>{55}</span> varying tints of yellow. Disarranging a lower layer in -taking out the packet nearest to her hand, Mrs. Romayne saw that there -were older papers still, beneath, and realised that the box before her -contained the private papers of many years; probably all the private -papers which William Romayne had preserved throughout his life. She -opened the packet she had drawn out, hastily and with an angry glitter -in her eyes. It consisted of businesslike-looking documents, not likely, -as it seemed, to be of any interest to her.</p> - -<p>She glanced through the first unheedingly enough, and then, as she -reached the end, something seemed suddenly to touch her attention. She -paused a moment, with a startled, incredulous expression on her face, -and began to re-read it slowly and carefully. She read it to the end -again, and her face, as she finished, was a little pale and -chilled-looking. She freed another paper from the packet almost -mechanically, with an absorbed, preoccupied look in her eyes, opened it -and read it with a strained, hardly comprehending attention which grew -gradually and imperceptibly,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_056" id="page_056"></a>{56}</span> as she went on from paper to paper, into a -kind of stupefied horror. She finished the thick packet in her hands, -and then she paused, lifting her pale face for a moment and gazing -straight before her with an indescribable expression on its shallow -hardness, as though she was realising something almost incredibly bitter -and repugnant to her, and was stunned by the realisation. Then her -instincts and habits of life and thought seemed to assert themselves, as -it were, and to dominate the situation. Her expression changed; the -stupefied look gave place to what was little deeper than bitter -excitement; a patch of angry colour succeeded the pallor of a moment -earlier; and her eyes glittered.</p> - -<p>Turning to the despatch-box again, she proceeded to ransack it with a -hasty eagerness of touch which differed markedly from the careless -composure of her earlier proceedings. Paper after paper was torn open, -glanced through—sometimes even re-read with a feverish attention—and -tossed aside; sometimes with a sudden deepening of that angry flush; -sometimes with a movement of the lips, as though an interjection formed<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_057" id="page_057"></a>{57}</span> -itself upon them; always with a heightening of her excitement; until one -packet only remained at the bottom of the box. Mrs. Romayne snatched it -out, and then started slightly as she saw that it did not consist, as -the majority of the others had done, of business papers, but of letters -in a woman’s handwriting. Nor was it so old as many of the papers she -had looked at, some of which had borne dates twenty-five years back. She -opened it with a sudden hardening of her excitement, which seemed to -mark the change from almost impersonal to intensely personal interest. -She saw that the date was that of the second year after her marriage; -that each letter was annotated in her husband’s writing; and then she -began deliberately to read, her lips very thin and set, her eyes cold -and hard. She read the letters all through, with every comment inscribed -on them, and by the time she laid the last upon the table her very lips -were white with vindictive feeling strangely incongruous on her little -conventional face. She sat quite still for a moment, and then rose -abruptly and stood by the window with her back to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_058" id="page_058"></a>{58}</span> the table, looking -out upon the evening sky.</p> - -<p>The strength of feeling died out of her face, however, in the course of -a very few minutes, leaving it only very white and rather -strange-looking, as though she had received a series of shocks which had -made a mark even on material so difficult to impress as her artificial -personality; and she turned, by-and-by, and contemplated the table, -littered now with documents of all sorts, as though she saw, not the -actual heaps of papers, but something beyond them contemptible and -disgusting to her beyond expression. Then suddenly she moved forward, -crammed the papers indiscriminately into the despatch-box, forced down -the lid, and carried the box out of the room down the stairs towards the -sitting-room where she had left Dennis Falconer.</p> - -<p>It was an impulse not wholly consistent with the self-reliance of her -ordinary manner; but that manner had been acquired in a world where -shocks and difficulties were more or less disbelieved in. Face to face -with so unconventional a condition of affairs Mrs.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_059" id="page_059"></a>{59}</span> Romayne’s -conventional instincts were necessarily at fault; and there being no -strong motive power in her to supply their place, it was only natural -that she should relieve herself by turning to the man on whom the past -few days had taught her to rely.</p> - -<p>Dennis Falconer was not in the sitting-room when she opened the door, -but as she stood in the doorway contemplating the empty room, he came -down the corridor behind her.</p> - -<p>“Were you looking for me?” he said with distant courtesy as he reached -her. He made a movement to relieve her of the box she carried, and as he -did so he was struck by her expression. “Is there anything here you wish -me to see?” he said quickly and gravely.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” she said; she spoke in a dry, hard voice, about which there was a -ring of excitement which made him look at her again, and realise vaguely -that something was wrong.</p> - -<p>He followed her into the room, and she motioned to him to put the box on -the table.</p> - -<p>“I have been looking them over,” she<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_060" id="page_060"></a>{60}</span> said, indicating the papers with a -gesture, “and I have brought them to you. They are very interesting.”</p> - -<p>She laughed a bitter, crackling little laugh, and the disapproval in -ambush in Dennis Falconer’s expression developed a little.</p> - -<p>“Do you wish me to go over them now, and with you?” he enquired stiffly.</p> - -<p>“Not with me, I think, thank you,” she answered, the novel excitement -about her manner finding expression once more in that harsh laugh. “One -reading is enough. But now, if you don’t mind. There are business points -on which I may possibly be mistaken”—she did not look as though she -spoke from conviction—“and—I should like you to read them. I will go -out into the garden; it is quite empty always at this time, and I want -some air.”</p> - -<p>Her tone and the glance she cast at the despatch-box as she spoke made -it evident that it was not closeness of material atmosphere alone that -had created the necessity.</p> - -<p>“I will read them now, certainly, if you wish it,” he returned.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_061" id="page_061"></a>{61}</span></p> - -<p>Then, as she took up a book which lay on a table with a mechanical -gesture of acknowledgement, he opened the door for her and she went out -of the room. He came back to the table, drew up a chair, and opened the -despatch-box.</p> - -<p>Two hours later Dennis Falconer was still sitting in that same chair, -his right hand, which rested on the table, clenched until the knuckles -were white, his face pale to the very lips beneath its tan. In his eyes, -fixed in a kind of dreadful fascination on the innocent-looking piles of -papers before him, there was a look of shocked, almost incredulous -horror, which seemed to touch all that was narrow and dogmatic about his -ordinary expression into something deep and almost solemn. The door -opened, and he started painfully. It was only the waiter with -preliminary preparations for dinner, and recovering himself with an -effort Falconer rose, and slowly, almost as though their very touch was -repugnant to him, began to replace the papers in the box. He locked it, -and then left the room, carrying it with him.</p> - -<p>Dinner was served, and Mrs. Romayne<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_062" id="page_062"></a>{62}</span> had been waiting some two or three -minutes before he reappeared. He was still pale, and the horror had -rather settled down on to his face than left it; but it had changed its -character somewhat; the breadth was gone from it. It was as though he -had passed through a moment of expansion and insight to contract again -to his ordinary limits. Mrs. Romayne was standing near the window; the -excitement had almost entirely subsided from her manner, leaving her -only harder and more bitter in expression than she had been three hours -before. She glanced sharply at Falconer as he came towards her with a -constrained, conventional word or two of apology; answered him with the -words his speech demanded; and they sat down to dinner.</p> - -<p>It was a silent meal. Mrs. Romayne made two or three remarks on general -topics, and asked one or two questions as to their journey of the -following day; and Falconer responded as briefly as courtesy allowed. On -his own account he originated no observation whatever until dinner was -over, and the final disappearance of the waiter had been succeeded by a -total silence.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_063" id="page_063"></a>{63}</span></p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne was still sitting opposite him, one elbow resting on the -table, her head leaning on her hand as she absently played with some -grapes on which her eyes were fixed. Falconer glanced across at her once -or twice, evidently with a growing conviction that it was incumbent on -him to speak, and with a growing uncertainty as to what he should say. -This latter condition of things helped to make his tone even unusually -formal and dogmatic as he said at last:</p> - -<p>“Sympathy, I fear, must seem almost a farce!”</p> - -<p>She glanced up quickly, her eyes very bright and hard.</p> - -<p>“Sympathy?” she said drily. “I don’t know that there is any new call for -sympathy, is there? After all, things are very much where they were!”</p> - -<p>A kind of shock passed across Falconer’s face; a materialisation of a -mental process.</p> - -<p>“What we know now——” he began stiffly.</p> - -<p>“What we knew before was quite enough!” interrupted Mrs. Romayne. “When -one has arrived violently at the foot of the precipice, it is of no -particular moment how long one<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_064" id="page_064"></a>{64}</span> has been living on the precipice’s edge. -While nothing was known, Mr. Romayne was only on the precipice’s edge, -and as no one knew of the precipice it was practically as though none -existed. Directly one thing came out it was all over! He was over the -edge. Nothing could make it either better or worse.”</p> - -<p>She spoke almost carelessly, though very bitterly, as though she felt -her words to be almost truisms, and Falconer stared at her for a moment -in silence. Then he said with stern formality, as though he were making -a deliberate effort to realise her point of view:</p> - -<p>“You imply that Mr. Romayne’s fall—his going over the edge of the -precipice, if I may adopt your figure—consisted in the discovery of his -misdeeds. Do you mean that you think it would have been better if -nothing had ever been known?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne raised her eyebrows.</p> - -<p>“Of course!” she said amazedly. Then catching sight of her cousin’s face -she shrugged her shoulders with a little gesture of deprecating -concession. “Oh, of course, I don’t<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_065" id="page_065"></a>{65}</span> mean that Mr. Romayne himself would -have been any better if nothing had ever come out,” she said -impatiently. “The right and wrong and all that kind of thing would have -been the same, I suppose. But I don’t see how ruin and suicide improve -the position.”</p> - -<p>She rose as she spoke, and Falconer made no answer.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne had touched on the great realities of life, the everlasting -mystery of the spirit of man with its unfathomable obligations and -disabilities; had touched on them carelessly, patronisingly, as “all -that kind of thing.” She was as absolutely blind to the depth of their -significance as is a man without eyesight to the illimitable spaces of -the sky above him. To Falconer her tone was simply scandalising. He did -not understand her ignorance. He could not touch the pathos of its -limitations and the possibilities by which it was surrounded. The grim -irony of such a tone as used by the ephemeral of the immutable was -beyond his ken.</p> - -<p>“I have several things to see to upstairs,” Mrs. Romayne went on after a -moment’s pause. “I shall go up now, and I think,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_066" id="page_066"></a>{66}</span> if you will excuse me, -I will not come down again. We start so early. Good night!”</p> - -<p>“Good night!” he returned stiffly; and with a little superior, -contemptuous smile on her face she went away.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_067" id="page_067"></a>{67}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Dennis Falconer</span> had been alone for nearly an hour, when his solitude was -broken up by the appearance of a waiter, who presented him with a card, -and the information that the gentleman whose name it bore was in the -smoking-room. The name was Dr. Aston’s, and after a moment’s reflection -Falconer told the waiter to ask the gentleman to come upstairs. Falconer -had spent that last hour in meditation, which had grown steadily deeper -and graver. It seemed to have carried him beyond the formal and dogmatic -attitude of mind with which he had met Mrs. Romayne, back to the borders -of those larger regions he had touched when he sat looking at William -Romayne’s papers; and there was a warmth and gratitude in his reception -of Dr. Aston when that gentleman appeared,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_068" id="page_068"></a>{68}</span> that suggested that he was -not so completely sufficient for himself as usual.</p> - -<p>“The smoking-room is very full, I imagine?” he said, as he welcomed the -little doctor. “My cousin has gone to bed, and I thought if you didn’t -mind coming up, doctor, we should be better off here.”</p> - -<p>Dr. Aston’s answer was characteristically hearty and alert. Knowing it -to be Falconer’s last night at Nice, he had come round, he said, just -for a farewell word, and to arrange, if possible, for a meeting later on -under happier circumstances. A quiet chat over a cigar was what he had -not hoped for, but the thing of all others he would like. He settled -himself with a genial instinct for comfort in the arm-chair Falconer -pulled round to the window for him; accepted a cigar and prepared to -light it; glancing now and again at the younger man’s face with shrewd, -kindly eyes, which had already noticed something unusual in its -expression.</p> - -<p>Dr. Aston and Dennis Falconer had met, some six years before, in Africa, -under circumstances which had brought out all that was best in the young -man’s character; and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_069" id="page_069"></a>{69}</span> Dr. Aston had been warmly attracted by him. Being -a particularly shrewd student of human nature, he had taken his measure -accurately enough, subsequently, and knew as certainly as one man may of -another where his weak points lay, and how time was dealing with them. -But his kindness for, and interest in, Dennis Falconer had never abated; -perhaps because his insight did not, as so much human insight does, stop -at the weak points.</p> - -<p>Dennis Falconer, for his part, regarded Dr. Aston with an affectionate -respect which he gave to hardly any other man on earth.</p> - -<p>There was a short silence as the two men lit their cigars, and then Dr. -Aston, with another glance at Falconer’s face, broke it with a kindly, -delicate enquiry after Mrs. Romayne. Falconer answered it almost -absently, but with an instinctive stiffening, so to speak, of his face -and voice, and there was another pause. The doctor was trying the -experiment of waiting for a lead. He was just deciding that he must make -another attempt on his own account when Falconer took his cigar from -between his lips and said, with his eyes fixed on the evening sky:<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_070" id="page_070"></a>{70}</span></p> - -<p>“I’m always glad to see you, doctor; but I never was more glad than -to-night.”</p> - -<p>A sound proceeded from the doctor which might have been described as a -grunt if it had been less delicately sympathetic, and Falconer -continued:</p> - -<p>“I’ve been trying to think out a problem, and it was one too many for -me: the origin of evil.”</p> - -<p>He was thoroughly in earnest, and nothing was further from him than any -thought of lightness or flippancy. But there was a calm familiarity and -matter-of-course acquaintanceship with his subject about his tone that -produced a slight quiver about the corners of the little doctor’s mouth. -He did not speak, however, and the movement with which he took his cigar -from between his lips and turned to Falconer was merely sympathetic and -interested.</p> - -<p>“Of course, I know it’s an unprofitable subject enough,” continued -Falconer almost apologetically. “We shall never be much the wiser on the -subject, struggle as we may. But still, now and then it seems to be -forced on one. It has been forced on me to-day.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_071" id="page_071"></a>{71}</span></p> - -<p>“Apropos of William Romayne?” suggested Dr. Aston, so delicately that -the words seemed rather a sympathetic comment than a question.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” returned Falconer. “We have been looking through his private -papers.” He paused a moment, and then continued as if drawn on almost in -spite of himself. “You knew him by repute, I dare say, doctor. He had -one of those strong personalities which get conveyed even by hearsay. A -clever man, striking and dominating, universally liked and deferred to. -Yet he must have been as absolutely without principle as this table is -without feeling.”</p> - -<p>He struck the little table between them with his open hand as he spoke; -and then, as though the expression of his feelings had begotten, as is -often the case, an irresistible desire to relieve himself further, he -answered Dr. Aston’s interested ejaculation as if it had been the -question the doctor was at once too well-bred and too full of tact to -put.</p> - -<p>“There were no papers connected with this last disgraceful affair, of -course; those, as you know, I dare say, were all seized in London.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_072" id="page_072"></a>{72}</span> It’s -the man’s past life that these private papers throw light on. Light, did -I say? It was a life of systematic, cold-blooded villainy, for which no -colours could be dark enough.”</p> - -<p>He had uttered his last sentence involuntarily, as it seemed, and now he -laid down his cigar, and turning to Dr. Aston, began to speak low and -quickly.</p> - -<p>“They are papers of all kinds,” he said. “Letters, business documents, -memoranda of every description, and two-thirds of them at least have -reference to fraud and wrong of one kind or another. Not one penny that -man possessed can have been honestly come by. His business was -swindling; every one of his business transactions was founded on fraud. -He can have had no faith or honesty of any sort or kind. He was living -with another woman before he had been married a year. All that woman’s -letters—he deceived her abominably, and it’s fortunate that she -died—are annotated and endorsed like his ‘business’ memoranda; -evidently kept deliberately as so much stored experience for future -use!”</p> - -<p>Dr. Aston had listened with a keen, alert<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_073" id="page_073"></a>{73}</span> expression of intent -interest. His cigar was forgotten, and he laid it down now as if -impatient of any distraction, and leant forward over the table with his -shrewd, kindly little eyes fixed eagerly on Falconer. Human nature was a -hobby of his.</p> - -<p>Falconer’s confidence, or more truly perhaps the manner of it, had swept -away all conventional barriers, and the elder man asked two or three -quick, penetrating questions.</p> - -<p>“How far back do these records go?” he asked finally.</p> - -<p>“They cover five-and-twenty years, I should say,” returned Falconer. -“The first note on a successful fraud must have been made when he was -about four-and-twenty. Why, even then—when he was a mere boy—he must -have been entirely without moral sense!”</p> - -<p>“Yes!” said the doctor, with a certain dry briskness of manner which was -apt to come to him in moments of excitement. “That is exactly what he -was, my boy! It was that, in conjunction with his powerful brain, that -made him what you called, just now, dominating. It gave him -vantage-ground<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_074" id="page_074"></a>{74}</span> over his fellow-men. He was as literally without moral -sense as a colour-blind man is without a sense of colour, or a homicidal -maniac without a sense of the sanctity of human life.”</p> - -<p>An expression of rather horrified and entirely uncomprehending protest -spread itself over Falconer’s face.</p> - -<p>“Romayne was not mad,” he objected, with that incapacity for penetrating -beneath the surface which was characteristic of him. “I never even heard -that there was madness in the family.”</p> - -<p>“You would find it if you looked far enough, without a doubt!” answered -the doctor decidedly. “This is a most interesting subject, Dennis, and -it’s one that it’s very difficult to look into without upsetting the -whole theory of moral responsibility, and doing more harm than enough. I -don’t say Romayne was mad, as the word is usually understood, but all -you tell me confirms a notion I have had about him ever since this -affair came out. He was what we call morally insane. I’ll tell you what -first put the idea<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_075" id="page_075"></a>{75}</span> into my head. It was the extraordinary obtuseness, -the extraordinary want of perception, of that blunder of his that burst -up the whole thing. Look at it for yourself. It was a flaw in his -comprehension of moral sense only possible in a man who knew of the -quality by hearsay alone. He must have been a very remarkable man. I -wish I had known him!”</p> - -<p>“I have heard the term ‘moral insanity,’ of course,” said Falconer -slowly and distastefully, ignoring the doctor’s last, purely æsthetic -sentence, “but it has always seemed to me, doctor, if you’ll pardon my -saying so, a very dangerous tampering with things that should be sacred -even from science. I cannot believe that any man is actually incapable -of knowing right from wrong.”</p> - -<p>“The difficulty is,” said the doctor drily, “that the words right and -wrong sometimes convey nothing to him, as the words red and blue convey -nothing to a colour-blind man, and the endearments of his wife convey -nothing to the lunatic who is convinced that she is trying to poison -him.” He paused a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_076" id="page_076"></a>{76}</span> moment, and then said abruptly: “Are there any -children?”</p> - -<p>Falconer glanced at him and changed colour slightly.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” he said slowly. “One boy!”</p> - -<p>The keen, shrewd face of the elder man softened suddenly and -indescribably under one of those quick sympathetic impulses which were -Dr. Aston’s great charm.</p> - -<p>“Heaven help his mother!” he said gently.</p> - -<p>Falconer moved quickly and protestingly, and there was a touch of -something like rebuke in his voice as he said:</p> - -<p>“Doctor, you don’t mean to say that you think——”</p> - -<p>“You believe in heredity, I suppose?” interrupted the doctor quickly. -“Well, at least, you believe in the heredity you can’t deny—that a -child may—or rather must—inherit, not only physical traits and -infirmities, but mental tendencies; likes, dislikes, aptitudes, -incapacities, or what not. Be consistent, man, and acknowledge the -sequel, though it’s pleasanter to shut one’s eyes to it, I admit. Put -the theory of moral insanity out of the question for the moment if you -like; say that<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_077" id="page_077"></a>{77}</span> Romayne was a pronounced specimen of the common -criminal. Why should not his child inherit his father’s tendency to -crime, his father’s aptitude for lying and thieving, as he might inherit -his father’s eyes, or his father’s liking for music—if he had had a -turn that way? You’re a religious man, Falconer, I know. You believe, I -take it, that the sins of the fathers shall be visited on the children. -How can they be visited more heavily than in their reproduction? You -mark my words, my boy, that little child of Romayne’s—unless he -inherits strong counter influences from his mother, or some far-away -ancestor—will go the way his father has gone, and may end as his father -has ended!”</p> - -<p>There was a slight sound by the door behind the two men as Dr. Aston -finished—finished with a force and solemnity that carried a painful -thrill of conviction even through the not very penetrable outer crust of -dogma which enwrapped Dennis Falconer—and the latter turned his head -involuntarily. The next instant both men had sprung to their feet, and -were standing dumb and aghast face to face with Mrs. Romayne. She was<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_078" id="page_078"></a>{78}</span> -standing with her hand still on the lock of the door as if her attention -had been arrested just as she was entering the room; she had apparently -recoiled, for she was pressed now tightly against the door; her face was -white to the very lips, and a vague thought passed through Falconer that -he had never seen it before. It was as though the look in her eyes, as -she gazed at Dr. Aston, had changed it beyond recognition.</p> - -<p>There was a moment’s dead silence; a moment during which Dr. Aston -turned from red to white and from white to red again, and struggled -vainly to find words; a moment during which Falconer could only stare -blankly at that unfamiliar woman’s face. Then, while the two men were -still utterly at a loss, Mrs. Romayne seemed gradually to command -herself, as if with a tremendous effort. Gradually, as he looked at her, -Falconer saw the face with which he was familiar shape itself, so to -speak, upon that other face he did not know. He saw her eyes change and -harden as if with the effort necessitated by her conventional instinct -against a scene. He saw the quivering horror of her mouth alter and -subside in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_079" id="page_079"></a>{79}</span> hard society smile he knew well, only rather stiffer -than usual as her face was whiter; and then he heard her speak.</p> - -<p>With a little movement of her head in civil recognition of Dr. Aston’s -presence, she said to Falconer:</p> - -<p>“My book is on that table. Will you give it to me, please?”</p> - -<p>Her voice was quite steady, though thin. Almost mechanically Falconer -handed her the book she asked for, and with another slight inclination -of her head, before Dr. Aston had recovered his balance sufficiently to -speak, she was gone.</p> - -<p>The door closed behind her, and a low ejaculation broke from the doctor. -Then he drew a long breath, and said slowly:</p> - -<p>“That’s a remarkable woman.”</p> - -<p>Falconer drew his hand across his forehead as though he were a little -dazed.</p> - -<p>“I think not!” he said stupidly. “Not when you know her!”</p> - -<p>“Ah!” returned the doctor, with a shrewd glance at him. “And you do know -her?”</p> - -<p>If Falconer could have seen Mrs. Romayne an hour later, he would have -been more than<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_080" id="page_080"></a>{80}</span> ever convinced of the correctness of his judgement. The -preparations for departure were nearly concluded; she had dismissed her -maid and was finishing them herself with her usual quiet deliberation, -though her face was very pale and set.</p> - -<p>But it might have perplexed him somewhat if he had seen her, when -everything was done, stop short in the middle of the room and lift her -hands to her head as though something oppressed her almost more heavily -than she could bear.</p> - -<p>“End as his father ended!” she said below her breath. “Ruin and -disgrace!”</p> - -<p>She turned and crossed the room to where her travelling-bag stood, and -drew from it a letter, thrust into a pocket with several others.</p> - -<p>It was the blotted little letter which began “My dear Mamma,” and when -she returned it to the bag at last, her face was once again the face -that Dennis Falconer did not know.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_081" id="page_081"></a>{81}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">There</span> are two diametrically opposed points of view from which London -life is regarded by those who know of it only by hearsay; that from -which life in the metropolis is contemplated with somewhat awestruck and -dubious eyes as necessarily involving a continuous vortex of society and -dissipation; and that which recognises no so-called “society life” -except during the eight or ten weeks of high pressure known as the -season. Both these points of view are essentially false. In no place is -it possible to lead a more completely hermit-like life than in London; -in no place is it possible to lead a simpler and more hard-working life. -On the other hand, that feverish access of stir and movement which makes -the months of May and June stand out and focus, so to speak, the -attention of onlookers,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_082" id="page_082"></a>{82}</span> is only an acceleration and accentuation of the -life which is lived in certain strata of the London world for eight or -nine months in the year. A large proportion of the intellectual work of -the world is done in London; to be in society is a great assistance to -the intellectual worker of to-day on his road to material prosperity; -consequently a large section of “society” is of necessity in London from -October to July; and, since people must have some occupation, even out -of the season, social life, in a somewhat lower key, indeed, than the -pitch of the season, but on the same artificial foundations, goes on -undisturbed, gathering about it, as any institution will do, a crowd of -that unattached host of idlers, male and female, whose movements are -dictated solely by their own pleasure—or their own weariness.</p> - -<p>It was the March of one of the last of the eighties. A wild March wind -was taking the most radical liberties with the aristocratic -neighbourhood of Grosvenor Place, racing and tearing and shrieking down -the chimneys with a total absence of the respect due to wealth. If it -could have got in at one in particular of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_083" id="page_083"></a>{83}</span> the many drawing-room windows -at which it rushed so vigorously, it might have swept round the room and -out again with a whoop of amusement. For the room contained some twelve -ladies of varying ages and demeanours, and, with perhaps one or two -exceptions, each lady was talking at the top of her speed—which, in -some cases, was very considerable—and of her voice—which as a rule was -penetrating. Every speaker was apparently addressing the same elderly -and placid lady, who sat comfortably back in an arm-chair, and made no -attempt to listen to any one. Perhaps she recognised the futility of -such a course.</p> - -<p>The elderly and placid lady was the mistress of the very handsomely and -fashionably furnished drawing-room and of the house to which it -belonged. Her dress bore traces—so near to vanishing point that their -actual presence had something a little ludicrous about it—of the last -lingering stage of widow’s mourning. Her name was Pomeroy, Mrs. Robert -Pomeroy, and she was presiding over the ladies’ committee for a charity -bazaar.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_084" id="page_084"></a>{84}</span></p> - -<p>Fashionable charities and their frequent concomitant, the fashionable -bazaars which have superseded the fashionable private theatricals of -some years ago, are generally and perhaps uncharitably supposed by a -certain class of cynical unfashionables to have their motive power in a -feminine love of excitement and desire for conspicuousness. Perhaps -there is another aspect under which they may present themselves; namely, -as a proof that not even a long course of society life can destroy the -heaven-sent instinct for work, even though the circumstances under which -it struggles may render it so mere a travesty of the real thing. From -this point of view, and when the promoter of a charitable folly is a -middle-aged woman, who puts into the business an almost painfully -earnest enthusiasm which might have been so useful if she had only known -more of any life outside her own narrow round, the situation is not -without its pathos. But when, as in the present instance, a -long-established, self-reliant, and venerable philanthropic institution -is suddenly “discovered,” taken up, and patronised by such a woman as -the secretary and treasurer<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_085" id="page_085"></a>{85}</span> of the present committee; a woman who would -have been empty-headed and vociferous in any sphere, and who had been -moulded by circumstances into a pronounced specimen of a certain type of -fashionable woman, dashing, loud, essentially unsympathetic; the -position, in the incongruities and discrepancies involved, becomes -wholly humorous.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Ralph Halse, in virtue of her office as secretary and treasurer, -was sitting at Mrs. Pomeroy’s right hand; her conception as to the -duties of her office seemed to be limited to a sense that it behoved her -never for a single instant to leave off addressing the chair, and this -duty she fulfilled with a conscientious energy worthy of the highest -praise. She had “discovered” the well-known and well-to-do institution -before alluded to about a month earlier.</p> - -<p>“Such a capital time of year, you know, when one has nothing to do and -can attend to things thoroughly!” she had explained to her friends. She -had determined that “something must be done,” as she had rather vaguely -phrased it, and she had applied herself exuberantly and forthwith to -the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_086" id="page_086"></a>{86}</span> organisation of a bazaar. The season was Lent; philanthropy was the -fashion; Mrs. Halse’s scheme became the pet hobby of the moment, and the -ladies’ committee was selected exclusively from among women well known -in society.</p> - -<p>The committee was tremendously in earnest; nobody could listen to it and -doubt that fact for a moment. At the same time a listener would have -found some difficulty in determining what was the particular point which -had evoked such enthusiasm, because, as has been said, the members were -all talking at once. Their eloquence was checked at last, not, as might -have been the case with a cold-blooded male committee, by a few short -and pithy words from the gently smiling president, but by the appearance -of five o’clock tea. The torrent of declamatory enthusiasm thereupon -subsided, quenched in the individual consciousness that took possession -of each lady that she was “dying for her tea,” and had “really been -working like a slave.” The committee broke up with charming informality -into low-toned duets and trios. Even Mrs. Ralph Halse ceased to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_087" id="page_087"></a>{87}</span> address -the chair, though she could not cease to express her views on the vital -point which had roused the committee to a state bordering on frenzy; she -turned to her nearest neighbour. Mrs. Halse was a tall woman, -good-looking in a well-developed, highly coloured style, and appearing -younger than her thirty-eight years. She was dressed from head to foot -in grey, and the delicate sobriety of her attire was oddly out of -keeping with her florid personality. As a matter of fact, the hobby -which had preceded the present all-absorbing idea of the bazaar in her -mind—Mrs. Halse was a woman of hobbies—had been ritualism of an -advanced type; perhaps some of the fervour with which her latest -interest had been embraced was due to a certain sense of flatness in its -predecessor; but be that as it may, her present very fashionable attire -represented her idea of Lenten mourning.</p> - -<p>“I don’t see myself how there can be two opinions on the subject,” she -said. Mrs. Ralph Halse very seldom did see how there could be two -opinions on a subject on which her own views were decided. “Fancy dress -is<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_088" id="page_088"></a>{88}</span> a distinct feature, and of course there must be more effect and more -variety when each woman is dressed as suits her best, than when there is -any attempt at uniform. You agree with me, Lady Bracondale, I’m sure?”</p> - -<p>The woman she addressed was of the pronounced elderly aristocratic type, -tall and thin, aquiline-nosed and sallow of complexion. She seemed to be -altogether superior to enthusiasm of any kind, and her manner was of -that unreal kind of dignity and chilling suavity, in which nothing is -genuine but its slight touch of condescension.</p> - -<p>“Fancy dress is a pretty sight,” she said. “But it is perhaps a drawback -that of course all the stall-holders cannot be expected to wear it.” The -words were spoken with an emphasis which plainly conveyed the speaker’s -sense that no such abrogation of dignity could by any possibility be -expected of herself. “What is your opinion, Mrs. Pomeroy?” Lady -Bracondale added, turning to the chairwoman of the committee.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Pomeroy’s attention was not claimed for the moment otherwise than -by her serene<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_089" id="page_089"></a>{89}</span> enjoyment of her cup of tea, which she was sipping with -the air of a woman who has done, and is conscious of having done, a hard -afternoon’s work. Perhaps it is somewhat fatiguing to be talked to by -twelve ladies all at once. Lady Bracondale’s question was one which Mrs. -Pomeroy rarely answered, however, even in her secret heart, so she only -smiled now and shook her head thoughtfully.</p> - -<p>“Miscellaneous fancy dress gives so much scope for individual taste, -don’t you think?” said Mrs. Halse.</p> - -<p>“Of course it does, my dear Mrs. Halse. Every one can wear what they -like, and that is very nice,” answered Mrs. Pomeroy comfortably.</p> - -<p>“But, on the other hand, a quiet uniform can be worn by any one,” said -Lady Bracondale with explanatory condescension.</p> - -<p>“By any one, of course. So important,” assented the chairwoman with -bland cheerfulness. Then, as Mrs. Halse’s lips parted to give vent to a -flood of eloquence, she continued placidly, in her gentle, contented<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_090" id="page_090"></a>{90}</span> -voice: “Mrs. Romayne is not here yet. I wonder what she will say!”</p> - -<p>“I met her at the French Embassy last night,” said Mrs. Halse, with a -slightly aggressive inflection in her voice, “and she told me she meant -to come if she could make time. Apparently she has not been able to!”</p> - -<p>“Mrs. Romayne?” repeated Lady Bracondale interrogatively. “I don’t think -I’ve met her? Really, one feels quite out of the world.”</p> - -<p>There was a fine affectation of sincerity about the words which would, -however, hardly have deceived the most unsophisticated hearer as to the -speaker’s position in society, or her own appreciation of it. Lady -Bracondale was distinctly a person to be known by anybody wishing to -make good a claim to be considered in society, and she was loftily -conscious of the fact. She had only just returned to town from -Bracondale, where she had been spending the last two months.</p> - -<p>“Romayne?” she repeated. “Mrs. Romayne! Ah, yes! To be sure! The name<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_091" id="page_091"></a>{91}</span> -is familiar to me. I thought it was. There was a little woman, years -ago, whom we met on the Continent. Her husband—dear me, now, what was -it? Ah, yes! Her husband failed or—no, of course! I recollect! He was a -swindler of some sort. Of course, one never met her again!”</p> - -<p>“This Mrs. Romayne is the same, Ralph says,” said Mrs. Halse, sipping -her tea. “At least, her husband was William Romayne, who was the moving -spirit in a big bank swindle—and a lot of other things, I -believe—years ago. She turned up about two months ago, and took a house -in Chelsea. Lots of money, apparently. She has a grown-up son—he would -be grown-up, of course—who is going to the bar.”</p> - -<p>“But, dear me!” said Lady Bracondale with freezing stateliness, “does -she propose to go into society? It was a most scandalous affair, my dear -Mrs. Pomeroy, as far as I remember. A connection of Lord Bracondale’s -lost some money, I recollect; and I think the man—Romayne, I mean, of -course—poisoned himself or something. We were at Nice when it happened. -He<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_092" id="page_092"></a>{92}</span> committed suicide there, and it was most unpleasant! She can’t -expect one to know her!”</p> - -<p>Eighteen years had passed since the same woman had expressed herself as -eager to make the acquaintance of “the man,” and the haze which had -wrapped itself in her mind about the tragedy which had frustrated her -desire in that direction, was not the only outcome for her of the -passing of those years. Lady Bracondale had been Lady Cloughton eighteen -years ago, the wife of the eldest son of the Earl of Bracondale; poor, -and with a somewhat perfunctorily yielded position. She and her husband -had been, moreover, a cheery, easy-tempered pair, living chiefly on the -Continent, and getting a good deal of pleasure out of life. His father’s -death had given to Lord Cloughton the family title and the family lands; -and with his accession to wealth, importance, and responsibilities, his -wife’s whole personality had gradually seemed to become transformed. Her -satisfaction in her new dignities took the form of living rigidly up to -what she considered their obligations. Laxity, frivolity of any kind, -seemed<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_093" id="page_093"></a>{93}</span> to her to abrogate from the importance of her position. She -ranged herself on the side of strict decorum and respectability, and -became more precise than the precisians. Her husband at the same time -developed talents latent in his obscurity, and became a prominent -politician; and the ultra-correct and exclusive Lady Bracondale was now -in truth a power in society.</p> - -<p>Consequently, the tone in which she disposed of the intruder, who had -ventured unauthorised to obtain recognition during her absence, was -crushing and conclusive. But Mrs. Pomeroy’s individuality was of too -soft a consistency to allow of her being crushed; and she replied -placidly, and with unconscious practicality.</p> - -<p>“People do know her, dear Lady Bracondale,” she said. “She had some -friends among really nice people to begin with, and every one has called -on her. I really don’t know how it has happened, but it is years and -years ago, you know, and she really is a delightful little woman. Quite -wrapped up in her boy!”</p> - -<p>Almost before the words were well uttered,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_094" id="page_094"></a>{94}</span> before Lady Bracondale could -translate into speech the aristocratic disapproval written stiffly on -her face, the door was flung open, and the footman announced “Mrs. -Romayne!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_095" id="page_095"></a>{95}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Eighteen</span> years lay between the events which Lady Bracondale recalled so -hazily and the Mrs. Romayne who crossed the threshold of Mrs. Pomeroy’s -drawing-room as the footman spoke her name. Those eighteen years had -changed her at once curiously more and curiously less than the years -between six-and-twenty and four-and-forty usually change a woman. She -looked at the first glance very little older than she had done eighteen -years ago; younger, indeed, than she had looked during those early days -of her widowhood. Such changes as time had made in her appearance seemed -mainly due to the immense difference in the styles of dress now -obtaining. The dainty colouring, the cut of her frock, the pose of her -bonnet, the arrangement of her hair, with its fluffy curls, all seemed -to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_096" id="page_096"></a>{96}</span> accentuate her prettiness and to bring out the youthfulness which a -little woman without strongly marked features may keep for so long. The -fluffy hair was a red-brown now, instead of a pale yellow, and the -change was becoming, although it helped greatly, though very subtly, to -alter the character of her face. The outline of her features was perhaps -a trifle sharper than it had been, and there were sundry lines about the -mouth and eyes when it was in repose. But these were obliterated, as a -rule, by a characteristic to which all the minor changes in her seemed -to have more or less direct reference; a characteristic which seemed to -make the very similarity between the woman of to-day and the woman of -eighteen years before, seem unreal; the singular brightness and vivacity -of her expression. Her features were animated, eager, almost restless; -her gestures and movements were alert and quick; her voice, as she spoke -to an acquaintance here and there, as she moved up Mrs. Pomeroy’s -drawing-room, was brisk and laughing. Her dress and demeanour were the -dress and demeanour of the day to the subtlest shade; she had<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_097" id="page_097"></a>{97}</span> been a -typical woman of the world eighteen years before; she was a typical -woman of the world now. But in the old days the personality of the woman -had been dominated by and merged in the type. Now the type seemed to be -penetrated by something from within, which was not to be wholly -suppressed.</p> - -<p>She came quickly down the long drawing-room, smiling and nodding as she -came, and greeted Mrs. Pomeroy with a little exaggerated gesture of -despair and apology.</p> - -<p>“Have you really finished?” she cried. “Is everything settled? How -shocking of me!” Then, as she shook hands with Mrs. Halse, she added, -with a sweetness of tone which seemed to cover an underlying tendency -which was not sweet: “However, we have such a host in our secretary that -really one voice more or less makes very little difference.”</p> - -<p>“Well, really, I don’t know that we have settled anything!” said Mrs. -Pomeroy. “We have talked things over, you know. It is such a mistake to -be in a hurry! Don’t you think so?”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_098" id="page_098"></a>{98}</span></p> - -<p>“I’ve not a doubt of it,” was the answer, given with a laugh. “My dear -Mrs. Pomeroy, I have been in a hurry for the last six weeks, and it’s a -frightful state of things. You’ve had a capital meeting, though. Why, I -believe I am actually the only defaulter!”</p> - -<p>The hard blue eyes were moving rapidly over the room as Mrs. Romayne -spoke; there was an eager comprehensive glance in them as though the -survey taken was in some sense a survey of material or—at one -instant—of a battle-ground; and it gave a certain unreality to their -carelessness.</p> - -<p>“The only defaulter. Yes,” agreed Mrs. Pomeroy comfortably. “And now, -Mrs. Romayne, you must let me introduce you to a new member of our -committee; quite an acquisition! Why, where—oh!” and serenely oblivious -of the stony stare with which Lady Bracondale, a few paces off, was -regarding the opposite wall of the room just over the newcomer’s bonnet, -Mrs. Pomeroy, with her kind fat hand on Mrs. Romayne’s arm, approached -the exclusive acquisition. “Let me introduce Mrs. Romayne, dear Lady -Bracondale!” she said with unimpaired placidity.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_099" id="page_099"></a>{99}</span></p> - -<p>The stony stare was lowered an inch or two until it was about on a level -with Mrs. Romayne’s eyebrows, and Lady Bracondale bowed icily; but at -the same moment Mrs. Romayne held out her hand with a graceful little -exclamation of surprise. It was not genuine, though it sounded so; those -keen, quick, blue eyes had seen Lady Bracondale and recognised her in -the course of their owner’s progress up the room, and had observed her -withdrawal of herself those two or three paces from Mrs. Pomeroy’s -vicinity; and it was as they rested for an instant only on her in their -subsequent survey of the room that that subtle change suggestive of a -sense of coming battle had come to them. They looked full into Lady -Bracondale’s face now with a smiling ease, which was just touched with a -suggestion of pleasure in the meeting.</p> - -<p>“I hardly know whether we require an introduction,” said Mrs. Romayne; -she spoke with cordiality which was just sufficiently careless to be -thoroughly “good form.” “It is so many years since we met, though, that -perhaps our former acquaintanceship must be considered to have died a -natural death. I<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_100" id="page_100"></a>{100}</span> am very pleased that it should have a resurrection!”</p> - -<p>She finished with a little light laugh, and Lady Bracondale found, -almost to her own surprise, that they were shaking hands. If she had -been able to analyse cause and effect—which she was not—she would have -known that it was that carelessness in Mrs. Romayne’s manner that -influenced her. A powerful prompter to a freezing demeanour is withdrawn -when the other party is obviously insensible to cold.</p> - -<p>“It is really too bad of me to be so late!” continued Mrs. Romayne, -proceeding to pass over their past acquaintance as a half forgotten -recollection to which they were both indifferent, and taking up matters -as they stood with the easy unconcern and casual conversationalism of a -society woman. “At least it would be if my time were my own just now. -But as a matter of fact my sole <i>raison d’être</i> for the moment is the -getting ready of our little place for my boy. I ought to have shut -myself up with carpenters and upholsterers until it was done! I assure -you I can’t even dine out without a guilty feeling that I ought<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_101" id="page_101"></a>{101}</span> to be -seeing after something or other connected with chairs and tables!”</p> - -<p>She finished with a laugh about which there was a touch of -artificiality, as there had been about her tone as she alluded to her -“boy.” Perhaps the only thoroughly genuine point about her, at that -moment, was a certain intent watchfulness, strongly repressed, in the -eyes with which she met Lady Bracondale’s gorgon-like stare; and -something about the spirited pose of her head and the lines of her face, -always recalling, vaguely and indefinitely, that idea of single combat. -Lady Bracondale, however, was not a judge of artificiality, and Mrs. -Romayne’s manner, with its perfect assurance and careless assumption of -a position and a footing in society, affected her in spite of herself. -The stony stare relaxed perceptibly as she said, stiffly enough, but -with condescending interest:</p> - -<p>“You are expecting your son in town?”</p> - -<p>“I am expecting him every day, I am delighted to say!” answered Mrs. -Romayne, with a little conventional gush of superficial enthusiasm. -“Really, you have no idea how forlorn I am without him! We are quite<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_102" id="page_102"></a>{102}</span> -absurdly devoted to one another, as I often tell him, stupid fellow. But -I always think—don’t you?—that a man is much better out of the way -during the agonies of furnishing, so I insisted on his making a little -tour while I plunged into the fray. He was very anxious to help, of -course, dear fellow. But I told him frankly that he would be more -hindrance than help, and packed him off—and made a great baby of myself -when he was gone. Of course I have had to console myself by making our -little place as perfect as possible, as a surprise for him! You know how -these things grow! One little surprise after another comes into one’s -head, and one excuses oneself for one’s extravagance when it’s for one’s -boy.”</p> - -<p>“Are you thinking of settling in London?” enquired Lady Bracondale.</p> - -<p>She was unbending moment by moment in direct contradiction of her -preconceived determination. Mrs. Romayne was so bright and so -unconscious. She ran off her pretty maternal platitudes with such -careless confidence, that iciness on Lady Bracondale’s part would have -assumed a futile and even ridiculous appearance.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_103" id="page_103"></a>{103}</span></p> - -<p>“Yes!” was the answer. “We are going to settle down a regular cosy -couple. It has been our castle in the air all the time his education has -been going on. He is to read for the bar, and I tell him that he will -value a holiday more in another year or two, poor fellow. But I’m afraid -I bore about him frightfully!” she added, with another laugh. “And it is -rather hard on him, poor boy, for he really is not a bore! I think you -will like him, Lady Bracondale. I remember young men always adored you!”</p> - -<p>Lady Bracondale smiled, absolutely smiled, and said -graciously—graciously for her, that is to say:</p> - -<p>“You must bring him to see me! I should like to call upon you if you -will give me your card.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne was in the act of complying—complying with smiling -indifference, which was the very perfection of society manner—when Mrs. -Pomeroy, evidently moved solely by the impetus of the excited group of -ladies of which she was the serenely smiling centre, bore cheerfully -down upon them.</p> - -<p>“Perhaps we ought to vote about the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_104" id="page_104"></a>{104}</span> fancy dress before we separate this -afternoon,” she suggested, “or shall we talk it over a little more at -the next meeting? Perhaps that would be wiser. Mrs. Romayne——”</p> - -<p>She looked invitingly at Mrs. Romayne as if for her opinion on the -subject, and the invitation was responded to with that ever-ready little -laugh.</p> - -<p>“Oh, let us put it off until the next meeting,” she said. “I am ashamed -to say that I really must run away now. But at the next meeting I -promise faithfully to be here at the beginning and stay until the very -end.”</p> - -<p>Whereupon it became evident that the greater part of the committee was -anxious to postpone the decision on the knotty point in question, and -was conscious of more or less pressing engagements. A general exodus -ensued, Mrs. Halse alone remaining to expound her views to Mrs. Pomeroy -all by herself and in a higher and more conclusive tone than before.</p> - -<p>A neat little coupé was waiting for Mrs. Romayne. She gave the coachman -the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_105" id="page_105"></a>{105}</span> order “home” at first, and then paused and told him to go to a -famous cigar merchant’s. She got into the carriage with a smiling -gesture of farewell to Lady Bracondale, whose brougham passed her at the -moment; but as she leant back against the cushions the smile died from -her lips with singular suddenness. It left her face very intent; the -eyes very bright and hard, the lips set and a little compressed. The -lines about them and about her eyes showed out faintly under this new -aspect of her face in spite of the eager satisfaction which was its -dominant expression. The battle had evidently been fought and won and -the victor was ready and braced for the next.</p> - -<p>She got out at the cigar merchant’s, and when she returned to her -carriage there was that expression of elation about her which often -attends the perpetration of a piece of extravagance. But as she was -driven through the fading sunlight of the March afternoon towards -Chelsea, her face settled once more into that intent reflection and -satisfaction.</p> - -<p>It was a narrow slip of a house at which her<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_106" id="page_106"></a>{106}</span> coupé eventually stopped, -wedged in among much more imposing-looking mansions in the most -fashionable part of Chelsea. But what it lacked in size it made up in -brightness and general smartness. It had evidently been recently done up -with all the latest improvements in paint, window-boxes, and fittings -generally, and it presented a very attractive appearance indeed.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne let herself in with a latch-key, and went quickly across -the prettily decorated hall into a room at the back of what was -evidently the dining-room. She opened the door, and then stood still -upon the threshold.</p> - -<p>The light of the setting sun was stealing in at the window, the lower -half of which was filled in with Indian blinds; and as it fell in long -slanting rays across the silent room, it seemed to emphasize and, at the -same time, to soften and beautify an impression of waiting and of -expectancy that seemed to emanate from everything that room contained. -It was furnished—it was not large—as a compromise between a -smoking-room and a study, and its every item, from the bookcases and -the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_107" id="page_107"></a>{107}</span> writing-table to the bronzes on the mantelpiece, was in the most -approved and latest style, and of the very best kind. Every conceivable -detail had evidently been thought out and attended to; the room was -obviously absolutely complete and perfect—only on the writing-table -something seemed lacking, and some brown paper parcels lay there waiting -to be unfastened—and it had as obviously never been lived in. It was -like a body without a soul.</p> - -<p>The lingering light stole along the wall, touching here and there those -unused objects waiting, characterless, for that strange character which -the personality of a man impresses always on the room in which he lives, -and its last touch fell upon the face of the woman standing in the -doorway. The artificiality of its expression was standing out in strong -relief as if in half conscious, half instinctive struggle with something -that lay behind, something which the aspect of that empty room had -developed out of its previous intentness and excitement. With a little -affected laugh, as though some one else had been present—or as though -affectation were<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_108" id="page_108"></a>{108}</span> indeed second nature to her—Mrs. Romayne went up to -the writing-table and began to undo the parcels lying there. They -contained a very handsome set of fittings for a man’s writing-table, and -she arranged them in their places, clearing away the paper with -scrupulous care, and with another little laugh.</p> - -<p>“What a ridiculous woman!” she said half aloud, with just the intonation -she had used in speaking to Lady Bracondale of her “little surprises” -for “her boy.” “And what a spoilt fellow!”</p> - -<p>She turned away, went out of the room, with one backward glance as she -closed the door, and upstairs to the drawing-room. She had just entered -the room when a thought seemed to strike her.</p> - -<p>“How utterly ridiculous!” she said to herself. “I quite forgot to notice -whether there were any letters!”</p> - -<p>She was just crossing the room to ring for a servant when the front-door -bell rang vigorously and she stopped short. With an exclamation of -surprise she went to the door and stood there listening, that she might -prepare herself beforehand for the possible<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_109" id="page_109"></a>{109}</span> visitor, for whom she -evidently had no desire. “How tiresome!” she said to herself. “Who is -it, I wonder?” She heard the parlourmaid go down the hall and open the -door.</p> - -<p>“Mrs. Romayne at home?”</p> - -<p>With a shock and convulsion, which only the wildest leap of the heart -can produce, the listening face in the drawing-room doorway, with the -conventional smile which might momently be called for just quivering on -it, half in abeyance, half in evidence, was suddenly transformed. Every -trace of artificiality fell away, blotted out utterly before the swift, -involuntary flash of mother love and longing with which those hard blue -eyes, those pretty, superficial little features were, in that instant, -transfigured. The elaborately dressed figure caught at the door-post, as -any homely drudge might have done; the woman of the world, startled out -of—or into—herself, forgot the world.</p> - -<p>“It’s Julian!” the white, trembling lips murmured. “Julian!”</p> - -<p>As she spoke the word, up the stairs two steps at a time, there dashed a -tall, fair-haired<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_110" id="page_110"></a>{110}</span> young man who caught her in his arms with a delighted -laugh—her own laugh, but with a boyish ring of sincerity in it.</p> - -<p>“I’ve taken you by surprise, mother!” he cried. “You’ve never opened my -telegram!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_111" id="page_111"></a>{111}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Mrs. Romayne</span> had been left, eighteen years before, absolutely penniless. -When Dennis Falconer took her back from Nice to her uncle’s home in -London, she had returned to that house wholly dependent, for herself and -for her little five-year-old boy, on the generosity she would meet with -there. Fortunately old Mr. Falconer was a rich man. There had been a -good deal of money in the Falconer family, and as its representatives -decreased in number, that money had collected itself in the hands of a -few survivors.</p> - -<p>A long nervous illness, slight enough in itself, but begetting -considerable restlessness and irritability, had followed on her return -to London. So natural, her tender-hearted cousin and uncle had said, -though, as a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_112" id="page_112"></a>{112}</span> matter of fact, such an illness was anything but natural -in such a woman as Mrs. Romayne, and anything but consistent with her -demeanour during the early days of her widowhood. Partly by the advice -of the doctor, partly by reason of the sense, unexpressed but shared by -all concerned, that London was by no means a desirable residence for the -widow of William Romayne, old Mr. Falconer and his daughter left their -quiet London home and went abroad with her. No definite period was -talked of for their return to England, and they settled down in a -charming little house near the Lake of Geneva.</p> - -<p>In the same house, when Julian was seven years old, Frances Falconer -died. Her death was comparatively sudden, and the blow broke her -father’s heart. From that time forward his only close interests in life -were Mrs. Romayne and her boy. The vague expectation of a return to -London at some future time faded out altogether. Mr. Falconer’s only -desire was to please his niece, and she, with the same tendency towards -seclusion which had dictated their first choice of a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_113" id="page_113"></a>{113}</span> Continental home, -suggested a place near Heidelberg. Here they lived for five years more, -and then Mr. Falconer, also, died, leaving the bulk of his property to -Mrs. Romayne. The remainder was to go to Dennis Falconer; to his only -other near relation, William Romayne’s little son, he left no money.</p> - -<p>So seven years after her husband’s death Mrs. Romayne was a rich woman -again; rich and independent as she had never been before, and -practically alone in the world with her son. In her relations with her -son, those seven years had brought about a curious alteration or -developement.</p> - -<p>The dawnings of this change had been observed by Frances Falconer during -the early months of Mrs. Romayne’s widowhood. She had spoken to her -father with tears in her eyes of her belief that her cousin was turning -for consolation to her child. Blindly attached to her cousin, she had -never acknowledged her previous easy indifference as a mother. She stood -by while the first place in little Julian’s easy affections was -gradually won away from herself not only without a thought of -resentment, but without any capacity for the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_114" id="page_114"></a>{114}</span> criticism of Mrs. -Romayne’s demeanour in her new capacity as a devoted mother. To her that -devotion was the natural and beautiful outcome of the overthrow of her -cousin’s married life. To sundry other people the new departure -presented other aspects. Dennis Falconer, spending a few days at the -house near the Lake of Geneva, regarded with eyes of stern distaste what -seemed to him the most affected, superficial travesty of the maternal -sentiment ever exhibited. Meditating upon the subject by himself, he -referred Mrs. Romayne’s assumption of the character of devoted mother to -the innate artificiality of a fashionable woman denied the legitimate -outlet of society life. He went away marvelling at the blindness of his -uncle and cousin, and asking himself with heavy disapprobation how long -the pose would last.</p> - -<p>Time, as a matter of fact, seemed only to confirm it. The half-laughing, -wholly artificial manner with which Mrs. Romayne had alluded to her -“boy” in Mrs. Pomeroy’s drawing-room was the same manner with which, in -his early school-days, she had alluded to her “little boy,” only -developed by<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_115" id="page_115"></a>{115}</span> years. Mr. Falconer’s death and her own consequent -independence had made no difference in her way of life. Julian’s -education had been proceeded with on the Continent as had been already -arranged, his mother living always near at hand that they might be -together whenever it was possible. In his holidays they took little -luxurious tours together. But into society Mrs. Romayne went not at all -until Julian was over twenty; when the haze of fifteen years had wound -itself about the memory of William Romayne and his misdeeds.</p> - -<p>Of those misdeeds William Romayne’s son knew nothing. The one point of -discord between old Mr. Falconer and his niece had been her alleged -intention of keeping the truth from him, if possible, for ever. Mr. -Falconer’s death removed the only creature who had a right to protest -against her decision. When Julian, as he grew older, asked his first -questions about his father, she told him that he had “failed,” and had -died suddenly, and begged him not to question her. And the boy, careless -and easy-going, had taken her at her word.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_116" id="page_116"></a>{116}</span></p> - -<p>With the termination of Julian’s university career, it became necessary -that some arrangement should be made for his future. As Julian grew up, -the topic had come up between the mother and son with increasing -frequency, introduced as a rule not, as might have been expected, by the -young man, whom it most concerned, but by Mrs. Romayne. From the very -first it had been presented to him as a foregone conclusion that the -start in life to which he was to look forward was to be made in London. -London was to be their home, and he was to read for the English bar; on -these premises all Mrs. Romayne’s plans and suggestions were grounded, -and Julian’s was not the nature to carve out the idea of a future for -himself in opposition to that presented to him. Consequently the -arrangements, of which the bright little house in Chelsea was the -preliminary outcome, were matured with much gaiety and enthusiasm, in -what Mrs. Romayne called merrily “a family council of two”; and a -certain touch of feverish excitement which had pervaded his mother’s -consideration of the subject, moved Julian to a carelessly affectionate -compunction<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_117" id="page_117"></a>{117}</span> in that it was presumably for his sake that she had -remained so long away from the life she apparently preferred.</p> - -<p>The arrangement by which Mrs. Romayne eventually came to London alone -was not part of the original scheme. As the time fixed for their -departure thither drew nearer, that feverish excitement increased upon -her strangely. It seemed as an expression of the nervous restlessness -that possessed her that she finally insisted on his joining some friends -who were going for two months to Egypt, and leaving her to “struggle -with the agonies of furnishing,” as she said, alone.</p> - -<p>The arrangement had separated the mother and son for the first time -within Julian’s memory. The fact had, perhaps, had little practical -influence on his enjoyment in the interval, but it gave an added fervour -to his boyish demonstration of delight in that first moment of meeting -as he held her in his vigorous young arms, and kissed her again and -again.</p> - -<p>“To think of my having surprised you, after all!” he cried gleefully, at -last. “You ought to have had my telegram this morning.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_118" id="page_118"></a>{118}</span> Why, you’ve got -nervous while you’ve been alone, mother! You’re quite trembling!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne laughed a rather uncertain little laugh. She was indeed -trembling from head to foot. Her face was very pale still, but as she -raised it to her son the strange, transfigured look had passed from it -utterly, and her normal expression had returned to it in all its -superficial liveliness, brought back by an effort of will, conscious or -instinctive, which was perceptible in the slight stiffness of all the -lines. At the same moment she seemed to become aware of the close, -clinging pressure with which her hand had closed upon the arm which held -her, and she relaxed it in a gesture of playful rebuke and deprecation.</p> - -<p>“What would you have, bad boy?” she said lightly. “Don’t you know I hate -surprises? Oh, I suppose you want to flatter yourself that your poor -little mother can’t get on without you to take care of her! Well, -perhaps she can’t, very well. There’s a demoralising confession for you, -sir!”</p> - -<p>But it was not such a confession as her face had been only a few minutes -before; in fact, the spoken words seemed rather to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_119" id="page_119"></a>{119}</span> belie that mute -witness. They were spoken in her ordinary tone, and the gesture with -which she laid her hand on his arm to draw him into the drawing-room was -one of her usual pretty, affected gestures—as sharp a contrast as -possible to the first clinging, unconscious touch.</p> - -<p>“Let me look at you,” she said gaily, “and make sure that I have got my -own bad penny back from Africa, and not somebody else’s!”</p> - -<p>She drew him laughingly into the fullest light the fading day afforded, -and proceeded to “inspect” him, as she said, her face full of a -superficial vivacity, which seemed to be doing battle all the time with -something behind—something which looked out of her hard, bright eyes, -eager and insistent.</p> - -<p>Julian Romayne was a tall, well-made young man—taller by a head than -the mother smiling up at him; he was well developed for his twenty-three -years, slight and athletic-looking, and carrying himself more gracefully -than most young Englishmen. But except in this particular, and in a -slight tendency towards the use of more gesture than is<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_120" id="page_120"></a>{120}</span> common in -England, his foreign training was in no wise perceptible in his -appearance. The first impression he made on people who knew them both -was that he was exactly like his mother, and that his mother’s features -touched into manliness were a very desirable inheritance for her son; -for he was distinctly good-looking. But as a matter of fact, only the -upper part of his face, and his colouring, were Mrs. Romayne’s. He had -the fair hair which had been hers eighteen years ago; he had her blue -eyes and her pale complexion, and his nose and the shape of his brow -were hers. But his mouth was larger and rather fuller-lipped than his -mother’s, and the line of the chin and jaw was totally different. No -strongly-marked characteristics, either intellectual or moral, were to -be read in his face; his expression was simply bright and good-tempered -with the good temper which has never been tried, and is the result -rather of circumstances than of principle.</p> - -<p>That strange something in Mrs. Romayne’s face seemed to retreat into the -depths from which it had come as she looked at him. She<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_121" id="page_121"></a>{121}</span> finished her -inspection with a gay tirade against the coat which he was wearing, and -Julian replied with a boyish laugh.</p> - -<p>“I knew you’d be down upon it!” he said. “I say, does it look so very -bad? I’ll get a new fit out to-morrow—two or three, in fact! Mother, -what an awfully pretty little drawing-room! What an awfully clever -little mother you are!”</p> - -<p>He flung his arm round her again with the careless, affectionate -demonstrativeness which her manner seemed to produce in him, and looked -round the room with admiring eyes. They were the eyes of a young man who -knew better than some men twice his age how a room should look, and -whose appreciation was better worth having than it seemed.</p> - -<p>“You’re quite ready for me, you see!” he declared delightedly. “What did -you mean, I should like to know, by wanting to keep me away for another -fortnight?”</p> - -<p>There was a moment’s pause before Mrs. Romayne spoke. She looked up into -his face with a rather strange expression in her eyes, and then looked -away across the room to where<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_122" id="page_122"></a>{122}</span> a little pile of accepted invitations lay -on her writing-table. That curious light at once of battle and of -triumph was strong upon her face as it had not been yet.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” she said at last, and there was an unusual ring about her voice. -“I am quite ready for you!”</p> - -<p>Something more than the furnishing of a house had gone to the -preparation of a place in society for the widow and son of William -Romayne, and only the woman who had effected that preparation knew how, -and how completely it had been achieved.</p> - -<p>A moment later Mrs. Romayne’s face had changed again, and she was -laughing lightly at Julian’s comments as she disengaged herself from his -hold, and went towards the bell.</p> - -<p>“Foolish boy!” she said as she rang. “I’m glad you think it’s nice. -We’ll have some tea.”</p> - -<p>She had just poured him out a cup of tea, and quick, easy question and -answer as to his crossing were passing between them, when the front-door -bell rang, and she broke off suddenly in her speech.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_123" id="page_123"></a>{123}</span></p> - -<p>“Who can that be?” she said. “Hardly a caller; it must be six o’clock! -Now, I wonder whether, if it should be a caller, Dawson will have the -sense to say not at home? Perhaps I had better——” she rose as she -spoke, and moved quickly across the room to the door. But she was too -late! As she opened the drawing-room door she heard the street door open -below, and heard the words, “At home, ma’am.” With the softest possible -ejaculation of annoyance she closed the door stealthily.</p> - -<p>“Such a nuisance!” she said rapidly. “What a time to call! I trust they -won’t——” And thereupon her face changed suddenly and completely into -her usual society smile as the door opened again, and she rose to -receive her visitors. “My dear Mrs. Halse!” she exclaimed, “why, what a -delightful surprise! Now, don’t say that you have come to tell me that -anything has gone wrong about the bazaar?” she continued agitatedly. -“Don’t tell me that, Miss Pomeroy!”</p> - -<p>She was shaking hands with her younger visitor as she spoke, a girl of -apparently<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_124" id="page_124"></a>{124}</span> about twenty, very correctly dressed, as pretty as a girl -can be with neither colour, expression, nor startlingly correct -features, whose eyes are for the most part fastened on the ground. She -was Mrs. Pomeroy’s only child. She did not deal Mrs. Romayne the blow -which the latter appeared to anticipate, but reassured her in a neatly -constructed sentence uttered in a rather demure but perfectly -self-possessed voice.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Halse had been prevented for the moment from monopolising the -conversation by reason of her keen interest in the good-looking young -man standing by the fireplace; but Miss Pomeroy’s words were hardly -uttered before she turned excitedly to Mrs. Romayne. If she was going to -make a mistake the disagreeables of the position would be with her -hostess, she had decided.</p> - -<p>“It’s your son, Mrs. Romayne?” she cried. “It must be, surely! Such a -wonderful likeness! Only, really, I can hardly believe that your son—I -was ridiculous enough to expect quite a boy! Oh, don’t say that he has -just arrived and we are interrupting your first <i>tête-à-tête</i>! How -truly<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_125" id="page_125"></a>{125}</span> frightful! Let me tell you this moment what I came for and fly!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne answered her with a suave smile.</p> - -<p>“I am going to introduce my boy first, if you don’t mind,” she said, and -then as Julian, in obedience to her look, came forward, with the easy -alacrity of a young man whose social instincts are of the highly -civilised kind, she laid her hand on his arm with an artificial air of -affectionate pride, and continued lightly: “Your first London -introduction, Julian. Mrs. Ralph Halse, Miss Pomeroy! He has only just -arrived, as you guessed,” she added in an aside to Mrs. Halse, “and no -doubt he is furiously angry with me for allowing him to be caught with -the dust of his journey on him.”</p> - -<p>But Julian’s anger was not perceptible in his face, or in his manner, -which was very pleasant and ready. Even after he had handed tea and cake -and subsided into conversation with Miss Pomeroy, Mrs. Halse found it -difficult to concentrate herself on the business which had brought her -to Chelsea. Her speech to Mrs. Romayne, as<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_126" id="page_126"></a>{126}</span> to the brilliant idea which -had struck her just after the committee broke up, was as voluble as -usual, certainly, but less connected than it might have been.</p> - -<p>“That’s all right, then. Such a weight off my mind!” she said, as she -copied an address into her note-book with a circumstance and importance -which would have befitted the settlement of the fate of nations. “It is -so important to get things settled at once, don’t you think so? The -moment it occurred to me I saw how important it was that there should -not be a moment’s delay, and I said to Maud Pomeroy: ‘Let us go at once -to Mrs. Romayne, and she will give us the address, and then dear Mrs. -Pomeroy can write the letter to-night.’<span class="lftspc">”</span> Here Mrs. Halse’s breath gave -out for the moment, and she let her eyes, which had strayed constantly -in the direction of Julian and Miss Pomeroy, rest on the young man’s -good-looking, well-bred face. “We must have your son among the stewards, -Mrs. Romayne,” she said. “So important! Now, I wonder whether it has -occurred to you, as it has occurred to me, that a man or two—just a man -or two”—with<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_127" id="page_127"></a>{127}</span> an impressive emphasis on the last word, as though three -men would be altogether beside the mark—“would be rather an advantage -on the ladies’ committee? Now, what is your opinion, Mr. Romayne? Don’t -you think you could be very useful to us?”</p> - -<p>She turned towards Julian as she spoke, quite regardless of the fact -that Miss Pomeroy’s correctly modulated little voice was stopped by her -tones; and Mrs. Romayne turned towards him also. He and Miss Pomeroy -were sitting together on the other side of the room, and as her eye fell -upon the pair, a curious little flash, as of an idea or a revelation, -leaped for an instant into Mrs. Romayne’s eye.</p> - -<p>Julian moved and transferred his attention to Mrs. Halse, with an easy -courtesy which was a curiously natural reproduction of his mother’s more -artificial manner, and which was at the same time very young and -unassuming. He laughed lightly.</p> - -<p>“I shall be delighted to be a steward,” he said, “or to be useful in any -way. But the idea of a ladies’ committee is awe-inspiring.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_128" id="page_128"></a>{128}</span></p> - -<p>“You would make great fun of us at your horrid clubs, no doubt,” -retorted Mrs. Halse. “Oh, I know what you young men are! But you can be -rather useful in these cases sometimes, though, of course, it doesn’t do -to tell you so.”</p> - -<p>She laughed loudly, and then rose with a sudden access of haste.</p> - -<p>“We must really go!” she said. “Maud”—Mrs. Halse had innumerable girl -friends, all of whom she was wont to address by their Christian -names—“Maud, we are behaving abominably. We mustn’t stay another -moment, not another second.”</p> - -<p>But they did stay a great many other seconds, while Mrs. Halse pressed -Julian into the service of the bazaar in all sorts and kinds of -capacities, and managed to find out a great deal about his past life in -the process. When at last she swooped down upon Maud Pomeroy, -metaphorically speaking, as though that eminently decorous young lady -had been responsible for the delay, and carried her off in a very -tornado of protestation, attended to the front door, as in courtesy -bound, by Julian, Mrs. Romayne, left alone in the drawing-room,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_129" id="page_129"></a>{129}</span> let her -face relax suddenly from its responsive brightness into an unmistakeable -expression of feminine irritation and dislike.</p> - -<p>“Horrid woman!” she said to herself. “Patronises me! Well, she will talk -about nothing but Julian all this evening, wherever she may be—and she -goes everywhere—so perhaps it has been worth while to endure her.” -Then, as Julian appeared again, she said gaily: “My dear boy, they’ve -been here an hour, and we shall both be late for dinner! Be off with you -and dress!”</p> - -<p>It was a very cosy little dinner that followed. Mrs. Romayne, as -carefully dressed for her son as she could have been for the most -critical stranger, was also at her brightest and most responsive. They -talked for the most part of people and their doings; society gossip. -Mrs. Romayne told Julian all about Mrs. Halse’s bazaar; deriding the -whole affair as an excuse for deriding its promoter, but with no -realisation of its innate absurdity; and giving Julian to understand, at -the same time, that it was “the thing” to be in it; an idea which he was -evidently quite capable of appreciating. Dinner over, she drew his arm<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_130" id="page_130"></a>{130}</span> -playfully through hers and took him all over the house.</p> - -<p>“Let me see that you approve!” she said with a laughing assumption of -burlesque suspense.</p> - -<p>The last room into which she took him was the little room at the back of -the dining-room; and as his previous tone of appreciation and pleasure -developed into genuine boyish exclamations of delight at the sight of -it, the instant’s intense satisfaction in her face struck oddly on her -manner.</p> - -<p>“You like it, my lord?” she said. “My disgraceful extravagance is -rewarded by your gracious approval? Then your ridiculous mother is silly -enough to be pleased.” She gave him a little careless touch, half shake -and half caress, and Julian threw his arm round her rapturously.</p> - -<p>“I should think I did like it!” he said boyishly. “I say, shan’t I have -to work hard here! Mother, what an awfully jolly smoking table!”</p> - -<p>“Suppose you smoke here now,” suggested Mrs. Romayne, “by way of taking -possession? Oh, yes! I’ll stay with you.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_131" id="page_131"></a>{131}</span></p> - -<p>She sat down, as she spoke, in one of the low basket-chairs by the fire, -taking a little hand-screen from the mantelpiece as she did so. And -Julian, with an exclamation of supreme satisfaction, threw himself into -a long lounging-chair with an air of general proprietorship which sat -oddly on his youthful figure; and proceeded to select and light a cigar.</p> - -<p>A silence followed—rather a long silence. Julian lay back in his chair, -and smoked in luxurious contentment. Mrs. Romayne sat with her dainty -head, with its elaborate arrangement of red-brown hair, resting against -a cushion, her face half hidden by the shade thrown by the fire-screen -as she held it up in one slender, ringed hand. She seemed to be looking -straight into the fire; as a matter of fact her eyes were fixed on the -boyish face beside her. She was the first to break silence.</p> - -<p>“It is two, nearly three, months since we were together,” she said.</p> - -<p>The words might have been the merest comment in themselves; but there -was something in the bright tone in which they were<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_132" id="page_132"></a>{132}</span> spoken, -something—half suggestion, half invitation—which implied a desire to -make them the opening of a conversation. Julian Romayne’s perceptions, -however, were by no means of the acutest, and he detected no undertone.</p> - -<p>“So it is!” he assented, with dreamy cheerfulness.</p> - -<p>“How long did you spend in Cairo?”</p> - -<p>The question, which came after a pause, was evidently another attempt on -a new line. Again it failed.</p> - -<p>“Didn’t I tell you? Ten days!” said Julian lazily.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne changed her position. She leant forward, her elbow on her -knee, her cheek resting on her hand, the screen still shading her face.</p> - -<p>“The catechism is going to begin,” she said gaily.</p> - -<p>Julian’s cigar was finished. He roused himself, and dropped the end into -the ash-tray by his side as he said with a smile:</p> - -<p>“What catechism?”</p> - -<p>“Your catechism, sir,” returned his mother. “Do you suppose I am going -to let<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_133" id="page_133"></a>{133}</span> you off without insisting on a full and particular account of -all your doings during the last ten weeks?”</p> - -<p>“A full and particular account of all my doings!” he said. “I say, that -sounds formidable, doesn’t it? The only thing is, you’ve had it in my -letters.”</p> - -<p>“The fullest and most particular?” she laughed.</p> - -<p>“The fullest and most particular!”</p> - -<p>“Never mind,” she exclaimed, leaning back in her chair again with a -restless movement, “I shall catechise all the same. My curiosity knows -no limits, you see. Now, you are on your honour as a—as a spoilt boy, -understand.”</p> - -<p>“On my honour as a spoilt boy! All right. Fire away, mum!”</p> - -<p>He pulled himself up, folding his hands with an assumption of “good -little boy” demeanour, and laughing into her face. She also drew herself -up, and laughed back at him.</p> - -<p>“Question one: Have you lost your heart to any pretty girl in the past -ten weeks?”</p> - -<p>“No, mum.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_134" id="page_134"></a>{134}</span></p> - -<p>“Question two: Have you flirted—much—with any girl, pretty or plain?”</p> - -<p>“No, mum.”</p> - -<p>“Have you overdrawn your allowance?”</p> - -<p>“No, mum. I’ve got such a jolly generous mother, mum!”</p> - -<p>“Have you—— Oh! Have you any secrets from your mother?”</p> - -<p>The question broke from her in a kind of cry, but she turned it before -it was finished into burlesque, and Julian burst into a shout of -laughter.</p> - -<p>“Not a solitary secret! There, will that do?”</p> - -<p>She was looking straight into his face—her own still in shadow—and -there was a moment’s pause; almost a breathless pause on her part it -seemed; then she broke into a laugh.</p> - -<p>“That will do capitally,” she said. “The catechism is over.”</p> - -<p>She rose as she spoke, and added a word or two about a note she had to -write.</p> - -<p>“We may as well go up into the drawing-room if you have finished -smoking,” she said. “It is an invitation from some friends of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_135" id="page_135"></a>{135}</span> the -Pomeroys—a dinner. By-the-bye, don’t you think Miss Pomeroy a very -pretty girl?”</p> - -<p>Julian’s response was rather languid, but his mother did not press the -point. She turned away to replace the screen on the mantelpiece, and as -she did so a thought seemed to strike her.</p> - -<p>“Oh, Julian!” she said. “Did you go to Alexandria? What about those -curtains you were to get me?”</p> - -<p>Her back was towards Julian, and she did not notice the instant’s -hesitation which preceded his reply. He was putting his cigar-case into -his pocket, and the process seemed to demand all his attention.</p> - -<p>“I didn’t go to Alexandria, unfortunately,” he said lightly. “The -Fosters had been there, and didn’t care to go again.”</p> - -<p>The clock struck twelve that night when Mrs. Romayne rose at last from -the chair in front of her bedroom fireplace in which she had been -sitting for more than an hour. The fire had gone out before her eyes -unnoticed, and she shivered a little as she rose. Her face was strangely -pale<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_136" id="page_136"></a>{136}</span> and haggard-looking, and the red-brown hair harmonised ill with -the anxiety of its look.</p> - -<p>“It begins from to-night!” she said to herself. “It is his man’s life -that begins from to-night!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_137" id="page_137"></a>{137}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX</h2> - -<p class="nind">“<span class="smcap">Quite</span> a presentable fellow!”</p> - -<p>There was an unusual ring of excitement in Mrs. Romayne’s voice; it was -about ten o’clock in the evening, and she was standing in the middle of -her own drawing-room, looking up into Julian’s face, as he stood before -her, having just come into the room, smiling back at her with a certain -touch of excitement about his appearance also. He was in evening dress; -he had evidently bestowed particular pains upon his attire, and the -flower in his buttonhole was an exceptionally dainty one.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne was also in evening dress, and in evening dress of the most -elaborate description. From the point of view of the fashion of the day, -her appearance was absolutely perfect; no detail,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_138" id="page_138"></a>{138}</span> from the arrangement -of her hair to the point of the silk shoe just visible beneath her -skirt, had been neglected; everything was in good taste and in the -height of fashion, and the effect of the whole, heightened by the -background afforded by the quiet little drawing-room with its softly -shaded lamps, was almost startling in its suggestion of luxury and -refinement. The fashion of the moment was peculiarly becoming to Mrs. -Romayne, and evening dress, with its artificialities and its -conventionalities, always enhanced her good points, strictly -conventional as they were. With that light of excitement on her face, -and a certain suggestion about her of verve and vivacity, she looked -almost charming enough to justify the boyish exclamations of exaggerated -admiration into which Julian had broken on entering the room.</p> - -<p>There was an eager, restless happiness in her eyes, which leapt up into -almost triumphant life as she gave a little touch to Julian’s -buttonhole; and then pushed him a step or two further back, that she -might look at him again, and repeated her<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_139" id="page_139"></a>{139}</span> commendatory words with a -laugh. Then, on a little gesture from her, he picked up her cloak, which -lay on a chair near, put it carefully about her, and, opening the door -for her, followed her downstairs.</p> - -<p>Nearly three weeks had elapsed since Julian’s arrival in London, and in -that time, short as it was, his expression had changed somewhat. There -was a quickened interest and alertness about it which detracted from his -boyishness, inasmuch as it made him look as though life had actually -begun for him. It would have been wholly untrue to say that any touch of -responsibility or ambition had dawned upon his good-looking young face; -but a subtle something had come to it which was, perhaps, a -materialisation of a mental movement which did duty for those emotions. -In the course of those three weeks he had had several interviews with -the man with whom he was to read; all the preliminaries of his legal -career had been settled; and in more than one half-laughing talk with -his mother on the conclusion of some arrangement, the preliminaries<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_140" id="page_140"></a>{140}</span> had -been far outstripped, and he had been conducted in triumph to the bench -itself.</p> - -<p>But in all these buildings of castles in the air, there was a factor in -the foundations of his fortunes never allowed by his mother to drop out -of sight; the main factor it became when she was the architect, -relegating to a subordinate position even the hard work on which Julian -was wont to expatiate with enthusiasm and energy. Sometimes as a means, -sometimes as an end, sometimes as the sum total of all human ambition, -social success, social position were woven into all his schemes for the -future as they talked together; woven in with no direct statements or -precepts; but with an insidious insistence, and a tacit assumption of -their value in the scale of things as a truism in no need of -formulation.</p> - -<p>Society life had begun for him with the very day after his arrival in -town, and had moved briskly with him through the following weeks; -briskly, but in a small way. Easter had intervened, and no large -entertainments had been given. To-night was to be, as Mrs. Romayne said -gaily as she<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_141" id="page_141"></a>{141}</span> settled her train and her cloak in the brougham into which -he had followed her, his first public appearance. They were on their way -to the first “smart affair” of the coming season; a dance to be given at -a house in Park Lane; not very large, but very desirable, at -which—again on Mrs. Romayne’s authority—all the right people would be.</p> - -<p>“You must dance, of course, but not all the evening, Julian!” his mother -said, as their drive drew to an end. “I shall want to introduce you a -good deal. And don’t engage yourself for supper if you can help it. I’m -sorry to be so hard upon you!”</p> - -<p>She finished with a laugh, light as her tone had been throughout. Then -their carriage drew up suddenly, and her face, in shadow for the moment, -changed strangely. For an instant all the happiness, all the excitement -and superficiality died out of it, quenched in a kind of revelation of -heartsick anxiety so utterly out of all proportion with the occasion, as -to be absolutely ghastly; ghastly as only a momentary revelation of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_142" id="page_142"></a>{142}</span> the -cruel cross-purposes and incongruities of life can be. The next moment, -as Julian sprang out of the carriage and turned to help her out, her -expression changed again.</p> - -<p>It took them some time to get up to the drawing-room, for though the -party was by no means a crush, they had arrived at the most fashionable -moment, and the staircase was crowded. Salutations, conveyed by graceful -movements of the head, passed across an intervening barrier of gay -dresses and black coats between Mrs. Romayne and numbers of -acquaintances above her or below her on the stairs; and as she smiled -and bowed she murmured comments to Julian—names or data, criticisms of -dress or appearance—until at last patience, and the continual movement -of the stream of which they made part, brought them face to face with -their hostess. The conventional handshake, the conventional words of -greeting passed between that lady and Mrs. Romayne, and then the latter -indicated Julian with a smiling gesture.</p> - -<p>“Let me introduce my boy, Lady<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_143" id="page_143"></a>{143}</span> Arden,” she said. “So glad to have the -opportunity!”</p> - -<p>She spoke with an accentuation of that self-conscious, self-deriding -maternal pride which was her usual pose, setting, as it were, her tone -for the night. And certainly Julian, as he bowed, and then shook the -hand Lady Arden held out to him, was a legitimate subject for pride. His -sense of the importance of the occasion had given to his manner and -expression not only that touch of excitement which made him positively -handsome, but a certain added readiness and assurance, by no means -presuming and very attractive. Lady Arden’s eyes rested on him with -obvious approval, as she said the few words the situation demanded with -unusual graciousness, and a sign from her brought one of her daughters -to her side. She introduced Julian to the girl.</p> - -<p>“Take care of Mr. Romayne, Ida,” she said. “He has only lately come to -London. Find him some nice partners.”</p> - -<p>“And let me have him back by-and-by, please, Lady Ida!” laughed Mrs. -Romayne, as they passed on with the girl into the room.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_144" id="page_144"></a>{144}</span> “There are some -friends of his mother’s to whom he must spare a little time to-night.”</p> - -<p>The gay replies with which Julian and his guide—who after a -comprehensive glance at him had shown considerable readiness to do her -mother’s bidding—disappeared in the crowd were lost to Mrs. Romayne; -her attention was claimed by a man at her elbow.</p> - -<p>“May I have a dance, Mrs. Romayne?” he said.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne shook hands and laughed.</p> - -<p>“Well, really I don’t know,” she said; “I think I must give up dancing -from to-night. I’ve got a great grown-up son here, do you know. Look, -there he is with Lady Ida Arden! Nice-looking boy, isn’t he? It doesn’t -seem the right thing for his mother to be dancing about, now does it?”</p> - -<p>She laughed again, a gay little laugh, well in the key she had set in -her first introduction of Julian, and the man to whom she spoke -protested vigorously.</p> - -<p>“It seems to me exactly the right thing,” he said. “The idea of your -having a grown-up<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_145" id="page_145"></a>{145}</span> son is the preposterous point, don’t you know. Come, -I say, Mrs. Romayne, don’t be so horribly hard-hearted!”</p> - -<p>“But I must introduce him, don’t you see. I must do my duty as a -mother.”</p> - -<p>“Lady Ida is introducing him! She has introduced him to half-a-dozen of -the best girls in the room already.”</p> - -<p>The colloquy, carried on on either side in the lightest of tones, -finally ended in Mrs. Romayne’s promising a “turn by-and-by,” and the -couple drifted apart; Mrs. Romayne to find acquaintances close at hand. -Among the first she met was Lady Bracondale, condescendingly amiable, to -whom she pointed out Julian, with laughing self-excuse. He was dancing -now, and dancing extremely well.</p> - -<p>“I am so absurdly proud of him!” she said. “I want to introduce him to -you by-and-by, if I can catch him. But dancing men are so inconveniently -useful.”</p> - -<p>Some time had worn away, and she had repeated the substance of this -speech in sundry forms to sundry persons, before Julian rejoined her. -She had cast several<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_146" id="page_146"></a>{146}</span> rather preoccupied glances in his direction, when -she became aware of him on the opposite side of the room, threading his -way through the intervening groups in her direction, just as she was -accosted by a rather distinguished-looking, elderly man.</p> - -<p>“How do you do, Mrs. Romayne? They tell me that you have a grown-up son -here, and I decline to believe it.”</p> - -<p>He spoke in a pleasant, refined voice, marred, however, by all the -affectation of the day, and with a tone about it as of a man absolutely -secure of position and used to some amount of homage. He was a certain -Lord Garstin, a distinguished figure in London society, rich, well-bred, -and idle. He was troubled with no ideals. Fashionable women, with all -the weaknesses which he knew quite well, were quite as high a type of -woman as he thought possible; or, at least, desirable; and he had a -considerable admiration for Mrs. Romayne as a very highly-finished and -attractive specimen of the type he preferred.</p> - -<p>She shook hands with him with a laugh, and a gathering together of her -social resources,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_147" id="page_147"></a>{147}</span> so to speak, which suggested that in her scheme of -things he was a power whose suffrage was eminently desirable.</p> - -<p>“It is true, notwithstanding,” she said brightly. “I am the proud -possessor of a grown-up son, Lord Garstin; a very dear boy, I assure -you. We are settling down in London together.”</p> - -<p>“Is it possible?” was the answer, uttered with exaggerated incredulity. -“And what are you going to do with him, may I ask?”</p> - -<p>“He is reading for the bar——” began Mrs. Romayne; and then becoming -aware that the subject of her words had by this time reached her side, -she turned slightly, and laid her hand on Julian’s arm with a pretty -gesture. “Here he is,” she said. “Let me introduce him. Julian, this is -Lord Garstin. He has been kindly asking me about you.”</p> - -<p>Julian knew all about Lord Garstin, and his tone and manner as he -responded to his mother’s words were touched with a deference which made -them, as his mother said to herself, “just what they ought to be.” The<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_148" id="page_148"></a>{148}</span> -elder man looked him over with eyes which, as far as their vision -extended, were as keen as eyes need be.</p> - -<p>“A great many of your mother’s admirers will find it difficult to -realise your existence,” he said pleasantly. “Though of course we have -all heard of you. You are going to the bar, eh?”</p> - -<p>Lord Garstin had a great following among smart young men, and the fact -was rather a weakness of his. He liked to have young men about him; to -be admired and imitated by them. His manner to Julian was characteristic -of these tastes; free from condescension as superiority can only be when -it is absolute and unassailable, and full of easy familiarity.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne, standing fanning herself between them, listened for -Julian’s reply with a certain intent suspense beneath her smile; Lord -Garstin’s approval was so important to him. The simple, unaffected -frankness of the answer satisfied her ear, and Lord Garstin’s -expression, as he listened to it, satisfied her eye; and with a laughing -comment on Julian’s words, she allowed<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_149" id="page_149"></a>{149}</span> her attention to be drawn away -for the moment by an acquaintance who claimed it in passing.</p> - -<p>There was a slight flush of elation on her face when, a few moments -later, the chat between Lord Garstin and Julian being broken off, the -former moved away with a friendly nod to the young man, and a little -gesture and smile to herself, significant of congratulation.</p> - -<p>“Come and walk round the room,” she said gaily, slipping her hand -through Julian’s arm. “There are hundreds of people you must be -introduced to.”</p> - -<p>During the half-hour that followed, Julian was introduced to a large -proportion of those people in the room who were best worth knowing. Mrs. -Romayne seemed to have wasted no time on the acquaintance of -mediocrities.</p> - -<p>His presentation to Lady Bracondale had just been accomplished, when -Mrs. Halse appeared upon the scene and greeted Mrs. Romayne with -stereotyped enthusiasm.</p> - -<p>“Such a success!” she said in a loud whisper, as Julian talked to Lady -Bracondale.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_150" id="page_150"></a>{150}</span> “Everybody is quite taken by surprise. I don’t know why, -I’m sure, but I don’t think any one was prepared for such a charming -young man. I’ve been quite in love with him ever since I saw him first, -you know, and we really must have him on the bazaar committee.” Mrs. -Halse had been out of town for Easter, and the affairs of the bazaar had -been somewhat in abeyance in consequence. “Mr. Romayne,” she continued, -seizing upon Julian, “I want to talk to you. You really must help -me——”</p> - -<p>At this juncture the man who had pressed Mrs. Romayne to dance earlier -in the evening came up to her and claimed the promise she had made him -then. She cast a glance of laughing pity at Julian, intended for his -eyes alone, and moved away.</p> - -<p>“It was too bad, mother,” he declared, laughing, as he met her a little -later coming out of the dancing-room. “Now, to make up you must have one -turn with me—just one. We haven’t danced together for ages.”</p> - -<p>He was full of eagerness, a little flushed with the excitement of the -evening, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_151" id="page_151"></a>{151}</span> her laughing protestations, her ridicule of him for -wanting to dance with his mother, went for nothing. They only let loose -on her a torrent of boyish persuasion, and finally she hesitated, -laughed undecidedly, and yielded. She, too, was a little flushed and -elated, as though with triumph.</p> - -<p>“One turn, then, you absurd boy!” she said; and she let him draw her -hand through his arm and lead her back into the dancing-room. They went -only half-a-dozen times round the room in spite of his protestations -against stopping, but Mrs. Romayne was too excellent a dancer and too -striking a figure for those turns to pass unnoticed. When she stopped -and made him take her, flushed and laughing, out of the room, she was -instantly surrounded by a group of men vehemently reproaching her for -dancing with her son to the exclusion of so many would-be partners, and -laughingly denouncing Julian.</p> - -<p>“I couldn’t help it!” she protested gaily. “Yes, I know it’s a -ridiculous sight, but we are rather ridiculous, we two, you know! Come, -Julian, take me home this<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_152" id="page_152"></a>{152}</span> moment! Let me disappear covered with -confusion.”</p> - -<p>She went swiftly downstairs as she spoke, laughing prettily, and a few -minutes later Julian, with a good deal of extraneous and wholly -unnecessary assistance, was putting her into her carriage.</p> - -<p>The whole evening had gone off admirably, Mrs. Romayne said the next -morning; repeating the dictum with which she had parted from Julian at -night, with less excitement, but with undiminished satisfaction.</p> - -<p>During the course of the next three or four weeks that satisfaction—a -certain genuine and deliberate satisfaction which seemed to underlie the -superficial gaiety and brightness of her manner—seemed to grow upon -her. The season had begun early, and very gaily, and she and Julian were -in great request. It was perhaps as well that little work was expected -of the embryo barrister before the winter, for he and his mother were -out night after night; welcomed and made much of wherever they went, as -so attractive a pair—one of whom was steeped to the finger-tips in -knowledge of her world—<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_153" id="page_153"></a>{153}</span>were sure to be. Mrs. Romayne arranged a series -of weekly dinner-parties in the little house at Chelsea, which promised -to be, in a small way, one of the features of the season. They were very -small, very select, and very cheery; no better hostess was to be found -in London, and there was a touch of sentiment about the relation between -the hostess and the pleasant young host, which was by no means without -charm for the guests.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Halse’s bazaar, too, which was affording far more entertainment to -its promoters than it seemed at all likely to afford to its supporters, -served to bring Julian into special prominence. He was not clever, but -there is a great deal to be done in connection with a bazaar on which -intellect would be thrown away, and Julian proved himself what Mrs. -Halse described effusively as “a most useful dear!” an expression by -which she probably meant to convey the fact that he was always ready to -toil for the ladies’ committee, without too close an investigation into -the end to be attained by the said toiling. He was quite an important -person at all the meetings connected<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_154" id="page_154"></a>{154}</span> with the bazaar, and the fact gave -him a standing with the innumerable “smart” people concerned which he -would otherwise hardly have attained so soon.</p> - -<p>His introduction to Lord Garstin resulted, about a fortnight after it -took place, in an invitation to a bachelor dinner. An invitation to one -of Lord Garstin’s dinners was, in its way, about as desirable a thing as -a young man “in Society” could receive; and the pleased, repressed -importance on Julian’s face as he came into the drawing-room to his -mother before he started to keep the engagement, was like a faint -reflection of the satisfaction with which Mrs. Romayne’s expression was -transfused.</p> - -<p>“You’re going?” she said brightly. “Well, I shall be at the Ponsonbys’ -by half-past eleven, and I shall expect you there some time before -twelve. Enjoy yourself, sir!”</p> - -<p>He kissed her with careless affection, and she patted him on the -shoulder for a conceited boy as he hoped, lightly, that she would not -find her solitary evening dull; she had refused to dine out without<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_155" id="page_155"></a>{155}</span> -him, saying laughingly that she should enjoy a holiday; and then he went -off, whistling gaily and arranging his buttonhole.</p> - -<p>It wanted a few minutes only to the dinner-hour when he arrived at the -club where the dinner was to be given. Three of his fellow guests were -already assembled, and to two of these—well-known young men about -town—he had already been introduced.</p> - -<p>“You know these two fellows, I think,” said Lord Garstin lightly, -“but”—turning to the third man—“Loring tells me that you and he have -not yet been introduced. I’m delighted to perform the ceremony! Mr. -Julian Romayne—Mr. Marston Loring!”</p> - -<p>Julian held out his hand with a frank exclamation of pleasure. He had -recognised in Mr. Marston Loring a young man whom he had seen about -incessantly during the past month, and who had excited a good deal of -secret and boyish admiration in him by reason of a certain assumption of -<i>blasé</i> cynicism with which an excellent society manner was just -sufficiently seasoned to give it character. It was conventional<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_156" id="page_156"></a>{156}</span> -character enough, but it was not to be expected that Julian should -understand that.</p> - -<p>“I’m awfully glad to meet you,” he said pleasantly. “I’ve known you by -sight for ages!”</p> - -<p>“And I you!” was the answer, spoken with a slight smile and a touch of -cordiality which delighted Julian. “The pleasure is distinctly mutual.”</p> - -<p>Marston Loring was not a good-looking young man; his features, indeed, -would have been insignificant but for the presence of that spurious air -of refinement which life in society usually produces; and for something -more genuine, namely, a strength and resolution about the mould of his -chin and the set of his thin lips which had won him a reputation for -being “clever-looking” among the superficial observers of the social -world. He was nine-and-twenty, but his face might have been the face of -a man twenty years older—so entirely destitute was it of any of the -gracious possibilities which should characterise early manhood. It was -pale and lined, and worn with very ugly<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_157" id="page_157"></a>{157}</span> suggestiveness; and there were -stories told about him, whispered and laughed at in many of the houses -where he was received, which accounted amply for those lines. The pose, -too, which it pleased him to adopt was that of elderly superiority to -all the illusions and credulities of youth. Marston Loring was a man of -whom it was vaguely but universally said that he had “got on so well!” -Reduced to facts, this statement meant, primarily, that with no -particular rights in that direction he had gradually worked his way into -a position in society—a position the insecurity and unreality of which -was known only to himself; and, secondarily, that by dint of influence, -hard work—hard work was also part of his pose—and a certain amount of -unscrupulousness, he was making money at the bar when most men dependent -on their profession would have starved at it.</p> - -<p>He had brown eyes, dull and curiously shallow-looking, but very keen and -calculating, and they were even keener than usual as they gave Julian -one quick look.</p> - -<p>“I think we belong to the same profession?” he said with easy -friendliness.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_158" id="page_158"></a>{158}</span> “You are reading with Allardyce, are you not? A good man, -Allardyce.”</p> - -<p>“So they tell me,” answered Julian, not a little impressed by the -critical and experienced tone of the approbation. “I can’t say I’ve done -much with him yet. One doesn’t do much at this time of year, you know.”</p> - -<p>Loring smiled rather sardonically.</p> - -<p>“That’s what it is to be a gentleman of independent fortune,” he said. -“Some people have to burn the candle at both ends.”</p> - -<p>The five minutes’ chat which ensued before the arrival of the fifth -guest—a certain Lord Hesseltine, known only by sight to Julian—and the -announcement of dinner, was just enough to create a regret in Julian’s -mind when he found that he and his new acquaintance were seated on -opposite sides of the table. Loring’s contribution to the general -conversation throughout dinner, witty, cynical, and assured, completed -his conquest, and when, on the subsequent adjournment of the party to -the smoking-room, Loring strolled up to him, cigar in hand, the prospect -of a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_159" id="page_159"></a>{159}</span> <i>tête-à-tête</i> was greatly to Julian’s satisfaction.</p> - -<p>“What an odd thing it is that we should never have been introduced -before!” he began, lighting his own cigar and scanning the other man -with youthful, admiring eyes.</p> - -<p>“It is odd,” returned Loring placidly, throwing himself into an -arm-chair as he spoke, and signing an invitation to Julian to establish -himself in another. “Especially as, like every one else, I’ve been an -immense admirer of your mother all this year. I wonder whether you -recognise what a lucky fellow you are, Romayne?”</p> - -<p>Julian’s eyes sparkled with pleasure at the easy familiarity of the -address, and he crossed his legs with careless self-importance, as he -answered, with the lightness of youth:</p> - -<p>“I ought to, oughtn’t I? I say, I know my mother would be awfully -pleased to know you. You must let me introduce you to her. Are you -coming on to the Ponsonbys’ to-night?”</p> - -<p>“I shall be only too delighted,” answered Loring, watching the smoke -from his cigar<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_160" id="page_160"></a>{160}</span> with his dull, brown eyes, and answering the first part -of Julian’s speech. “No, unfortunately I’ve got an affair in Chelsea -to-night, and another in Kensington. But we shall meet to-morrow night -at the Bracondales’, I suppose?”</p> - -<p>“Of course,” assented Julian eagerly. “That will be capital!”</p> - -<p>There was a moment’s pause, broken by Loring with a reference to a -political opinion formulated by one of the other men at dinner; and a -talk about politics ensued, eager on Julian’s part, cynical and -effectively reserved on Loring’s. A political discussion, when the -discussers hold the same political faith, has much the same effect in -promoting rapid intimacy between men, granted a predisposition towards -intimacy on either side, as a discussion of the reigning fashion in -dress has with a certain class of women. When Lord Garstin’s -dinner-party began to break up, and Loring and Julian rose to take their -departure, they parted with a hand-clasp which would have befitted an -acquaintanceship three months, rather than three hours old.</p> - -<p>“Good night,” said Julian. “Awfully<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_161" id="page_161"></a>{161}</span> pleased to have met you, Loring. -See you to-morrow night. My mother will be delighted.”</p> - -<p>“I shall be delighted,” said Loring. “All right, then. To-morrow night -we’ll arrange that look in at the House. Good night.”</p> - -<p>A few minutes’ talk with Lord Garstin, who had taken a decided fancy to -“that charming little woman’s boy,” and Julian was standing on the -pavement of St. James’s Street, with that pleasant sense of exhilaration -and warmth of heart, which is an attendant, in youth, on the -inauguration of a new friendship.</p> - -<p>It was a night in early May, and a fine, hot day had ended, as evening -drew on, in sultry closeness. The clouds had been rolling up steadily, -though not a breath of air seemed to be stirring now, and it was evident -that a storm was inevitable before long. Julian was hot and excited; he -had only a short distance to go; he looked up at the sky and -decided—the wish being father to the thought—that it would “hold up -for the present,” and that he would walk.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_162" id="page_162"></a>{162}</span></p> - -<p>He set out up St. James’s Street and along Piccadilly, taking the right -road by instinct, his busy thoughts divided between satisfaction at the -idea of belonging to the “best” club in London, introduced thereinto by -Lord Garstin; and Loring and his gifts and graces. He had just turned -into Berkeley Street when a rattling peal of thunder roused him with a -start, and the next instant the thunder was followed by a perfect deluge -of rain.</p> - -<p>It was so sudden and he was so entirely unprepared, that his only -instinct for the moment was to step back hastily into the shelter of a -portico in front of which he was just passing; and as he did so, he -noticed a young woman who must have been following him up the street, a -young woman in the shabby hat and jacket of a work-girl, take refuge, -perforce, beneath the same shelter with a shrinking movement which was -not undignified, though it seemed to imply that she was almost more -afraid of him than of the drenching, bitter rain. Then, his reasoning -powers reasserting themselves in the comparative security of the -portico, he began to consider what he should do. He was<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_163" id="page_163"></a>{163}</span> within seven -minutes’ walk of his destination, but seven minutes’ walk in such rain -as was beating down on the pavement before him would render him wholly -unfit to present himself at a party; and “of course,” as he said to -himself, there was not a cab to be seen. A blinding flash of lightning -cut across his reflections, and drove him back a step or two farther -into shelter involuntarily. And as a terrific peal of thunder followed -it instantaneously, he glanced almost unconsciously at the sharer of his -shelter.</p> - -<p>“By Jove!” he said to himself.</p> - -<p>The girl had retreated, as he himself had done, and was standing close -up against the door of the house to which the portico belonged, in the -extreme corner from that which he himself occupied. But except for that -tacit acknowledgement of his presence, she seemed no longer conscious of -it. She was looking straight out at the storm, her head a little lifted -as though to catch a glimpse of the sky; and her face, outlined by her -dark clothes and the dark paint of the door behind her, stood out in -great distinctness. It was rather thin and pale, and very -tired-looking;<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_164" id="page_164"></a>{164}</span> the large brown eyes were heavy and haggard. It was not -worthy of a second glance at that moment, according to any canon of the -world in which Julian lived, and yet it drew from him that exclamation -of startled admiration. He had never seen anything like it, he told -himself vaguely.</p> - -<p>Apparently the intent gaze, of which he himself was hardly conscious, -affected its object. She moved uneasily, and turning as if -involuntarily, met his eyes.</p> - -<p>The next instant she was moving hastily from under the portico, when the -driver of a hansom cab became aware of Julian’s existence, and pulled up -suddenly.</p> - -<p>“Hansom, sir?” he shouted.</p> - -<p>“Yes!” answered Julian quickly, dashing across the drenched pavement. “A -hundred and three, Berkeley Square!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_165" id="page_165"></a>{165}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">All</span> the rooms in the house in Chelsea were bright and pretty, and by no -means the least attractive was the dining-room. The late breakfast-hour -fixed by Mrs. Romayne, “just for the season,” as she said, gave plenty -of time for the sun to find its way in at the windows; and on the -morning following Julian’s dinner with Lord Garstin the sunshine was -dancing on the walls, and the soft, warm air floating in at the open -windows, as though the thunderstorm of the previous evening had cleared -the air to some purpose.</p> - -<p>The two occupants of the room, as they faced one another across the -dainty little breakfast-table, had been laughing and talking after their -usual fashion ever since they sat down; talking of the party of the -night before and of engagements in the future;<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_166" id="page_166"></a>{166}</span> and finally reverting to -Lord Garstin’s dinner and Marston Loring, of whom Julian had already had -a great deal to say.</p> - -<p>“I have a kind of feeling that he and I are going to be chums, mother!” -he said as he carried his coffee-cup round the table to her to be -refilled. “I think he took to me rather, do you know!”</p> - -<p>“That’s a very surprising thing, isn’t it?” returned his mother, -laughing. “And you took to him? Well, if you must pick up a chum, you -couldn’t do it under better auspices than Lord Garstin’s.”</p> - -<p>“I took to him no end!” answered Julian eagerly. “I do hope you’ll like -him.”</p> - -<p>“I think I am pretty sure to like him,” said Mrs. Romayne graciously. “I -remember hearing about him some time ago—that he was quite one of the -rising young men of the day. He was to have been introduced to me then. -I forget why it didn’t come off. There’s your coffee!”</p> - -<p>Julian took his cup with a word of thanks and turned back to his chair; -and his mother began again.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_167" id="page_167"></a>{167}</span></p> - -<p>“Mr. Loring is a member of the Prince’s, I suppose?” she said. The -“Prince’s” was the name of the club at which Lord Garstin’s dinner had -been given. “I suppose you will want to be setting up a club in no time, -sir?”</p> - -<p>Julian laughed, and then replied somewhat eagerly and confidentially, as -though in unconscious response to a certain invitation in his mother’s -tone.</p> - -<p>“Well, of course a fellow does want a club, mother,” he said. “One feels -it more and more, don’t you know! Of course I should awfully like to -belong to the Prince’s.”</p> - -<p>“And why not?” responded his mother brightly, watching him rather -narrowly as she spoke. “Lord Garstin would put you up, I’ve no doubt, if -I asked him.”</p> - -<p>Julian’s eyes sparkled.</p> - -<p>“It would be first-rate!” he exclaimed. “Mother, it’s awfully jolly of -you!” He paused a moment and then continued tentatively: “It would be -rather expensive, you know. That’s the only thing!”</p> - -<p>“So I suppose!” answered his mother,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_168" id="page_168"></a>{168}</span> laughing. “Oh, you’re a very -expensive luxury altogether! However, I imagine another hundred a year -would do?” Then as he broke into vehement demonstrations of delight and -gratitude, she added with another laugh which did not seem to ring quite -true: “I don’t think you need ever run short of money!”</p> - -<p>There was a moment’s pause as Julian, the picture of glowing -satisfaction, finished his breakfast, and then Mrs. Romayne rose.</p> - -<p>“What are you going to do this morning?” she said. “Read?”</p> - -<p>Julian glanced out of the window.</p> - -<p>“Well,” he said, “it’s an awfully jolly morning, isn’t it? I promised to -see after some live-stock for Miss Pomeroy’s stall—puppies, and -kittens, and canary birds. Rum idea, isn’t it? What are you doing this -morning, dear?”</p> - -<p>It turned out that Mrs. Romayne had nothing particular on her hands -beyond a visit to a jeweller in Bond Street, and accepting very easily -his substitution of Miss Pomeroy’s commission for the legal studies to -which he was supposed to devote himself<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_169" id="page_169"></a>{169}</span> in the mornings, she took up -his reference to the weather, and suggested that they should drive -together to execute first his business and then her own.</p> - -<p>“It will be rather nice driving this morning,” she said. “And we can -take a turn in the Park.”</p> - -<p>Certainly there was a certain amount of excuse for those people who had -already begun to say that Mrs. Romayne was never happy without her son -by her side.</p> - -<p>She spared no pains, however, to make him happy with her; and as they -drove along there was probably no brighter or brisker talk than theirs -in progress in all London. They drove through the West End streets and -penetrated, in search of Miss Pomeroy’s requirements, into regions into -which Mrs. Romayne had hardly ever penetrated before; regions which -rather amused her to-day in their squalor. When Julian had done his -commission in plenty of time to undo it and do it again before the -bazaar came off, as he remarked with a laugh, they turned back again and -went to Bond Street.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_170" id="page_170"></a>{170}</span></p> - -<p>“I have a little private matter to attend to here,” said Julian, as he -followed his mother into the jeweller’s shop. “You just have the -kindness to stop at your end of the shop, will you, please, and leave me -to mine?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne laughed and shook her head at him. It was within a few days -of her birthday, which was always demonstratively honoured by her son.</p> - -<p>“Now, you are not to be extravagant,” she said, holding up a slender, -threatening finger with mock severity. “Mind, I will not have it. I -shall descend upon you unawares, and keep you in order.”</p> - -<p>She let him leave her with another laugh, and he disappeared to the -other end of the shop, while she followed a shopman to a counter near -the door. Just turning away from it, she met Mrs. Pomeroy and her -daughter.</p> - -<p>“Now, this is really most delightful!” exclaimed Mrs. Pomeroy, if any -speech so comfortable and so entirely unexcited may be described as an -exclamation. “It is always charming to see you, dear Mrs.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_171" id="page_171"></a>{171}</span> Romayne, of -course; but it really is particularly charming this morning, isn’t it, -Maud?”</p> - -<p>“That’s very nice,” said Mrs. Romayne brightly, turning to Maud Pomeroy -with a smile, and pressing the girl’s hand with an affectionate -familiarity developed in her with regard to Miss Pomeroy by the last few -weeks. A hardly perceptible touch of additional satisfaction had come to -her face as she saw the mother and daughter. “Please tell me why?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, of course,” said Mrs. Pomeroy placidly; she sat down as she spoke -with that instinct for personal ease under all circumstances, which was -her ruling characteristic. “That is just what I want to do. My dear Mrs. -Romayne, it is the bazaar, of course. It really is a most awkward thing, -isn’t it, Maud? It seems that we have asked twenty-one ladies—all most -important—to become stall-holders, and we can’t possibly make room for -more than eighteen stalls! Now, what would you—— Ah, Mr. Romayne, how -do you do?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Pomeroy had broken off her tale<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_172" id="page_172"></a>{172}</span> of woe as placidly as she had -begun it, and had greeted Julian with comfortable cordiality. He had -come up hastily, not becoming aware of his mother’s companions until he -was close to them.</p> - -<p>“This is awfully lucky for me!” he exclaimed. “I want a lady desperately -for half a minute, and my mother won’t do. Miss Pomeroy,” turning -eagerly to the demure, correct-looking figure standing by Mrs. Pomeroy’s -side, “will you come to the other end of the shop with me for half a -minute? It would be awfully good of you.”</p> - -<p>The words were spoken in a tone of fashionable good-fellowship—the -pseudo good-fellowship which passes for the real thing in -society—which, as addressed by Julian Romayne to Miss Pomeroy and her -mother, was one of the results of his work in connection with the -bazaar; and before Miss Pomeroy could answer, Mrs. Romayne interposed. -Somebody very frequently did interpose when Miss Pomeroy was addressed. -No one ever seemed to expect opinions or decisions from her; perhaps -because she was<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_173" id="page_173"></a>{173}</span> her mother’s daughter; perhaps because of her curiously -characterless exterior; while the fact that she had never been known to -controvert a statement—in words—doubtless accentuated the tendency of -her acquaintance to make statements for her.</p> - -<p>“It will be awfully good of you,” Mrs. Romayne said to her now, -laughing, “if you are kind enough to help this silly fellow, to insist -on his remembering that his mother will be very angry indeed if he is -extravagant. I shall have to give up having a birthday, I think.”</p> - -<p>Then as Julian, with a gay gesture of repression to his mother, waited -for Miss Pomeroy’s answer with another pleading, “It would be ever so -good of you,” the girl, with a glance at her mother, said, with a -conventional smile, “With pleasure,” and walked away by his side.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Pomeroy looked after Julian with an approving smile. He was a -favourite of hers.</p> - -<p>“Such a nice fellow,” she murmured amiably; and Mrs. Romayne laughed her -pretty, self-conscious laugh.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_174" id="page_174"></a>{174}</span></p> - -<p>“So glad you find him so,” she said. “Oh, by-the-bye, dear Mrs. Pomeroy, -can you tell me anything about a Mr. Marston Loring? He goes everywhere, -doesn’t he? I think I have seen him at your house.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, yes,” returned Mrs. Pomeroy, as placidly as ever, but with a -decision which indicated that she was giving expression to a popular -verdict, not merely to an opinion of her own. “He is quite a young man -to know. Very clever, and rising. I don’t know what his people were; he -has been so successful that it really doesn’t signify, you know. He -lives in chambers—I don’t remember where, but it is a very good -address.”</p> - -<p>“Has he money?” asked Mrs. Romayne.</p> - -<p>“I really don’t know,” said Mrs. Pomeroy. “He is doing extremely well at -the bar. By the way, they say,” and herewith Mrs. Pomeroy lowered her -voice and confided to her interlocutor two or three details in -connection with Marston Loring’s private life—the life which in the -world no one is supposed to recognise—which might have been considered -by no means to his credit. They<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_175" id="page_175"></a>{175}</span> were not details which affected his -society character in any way, however, and Mrs. Romayne only laughed -with such slight affectation of reprobation as a woman of the world -should show.</p> - -<p>“Men are all alike, I suppose,” she said, with that fashionable -indulgence which has probably done as much as anything else towards -making men “all alike.” “By-the-bye, he was Lord Dunstan’s best man, -wasn’t he?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Pomeroy was just confirming to Mr. Marston Loring what was -evidently a certificate of social merit, when Julian and Miss Pomeroy -reappeared, and Mrs. Romayne, with an exclamation at herself as a -“frightful gossip,” turned to the shopman, who had been waiting her -pleasure at a discreet distance, and transacted her business.</p> - -<p>“We haven’t settled anything about this trying business of the -twenty-one stall-holders,” said Mrs. Pomeroy plaintively, as she -finished. “Now, I wonder—we were thinking of taking a turn in the Park, -weren’t we, Maud?” Mrs. Pomeroy had a curious little habit of constantly -referring<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_176" id="page_176"></a>{176}</span> to her daughter. “It would be so kind of you, dear Mrs. -Romayne, if you would send your carriage home and take a turn with us, -you and Mr. Romayne, and I would take you home, of course. I really am -anxious to know what you advise, for there seems to be an idea that I am -in some way responsible for the awkwardness. So absurd, you know. I am -quite sure I have only done as I was told.”</p> - -<p>Apparently it had not occurred to Mrs. Pomeroy that to do as you are -told by four or five different people with totally different ends in -view is apt to lead to confusion.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne fell in with the plan proposed, after an instant’s demur, -with smiling alacrity, and the “turn in the Park” that followed was a -very gay one. Miss Pomeroy and Julian laughed and talked together—that -is to say, Julian laughed and talked in the best of good spirits, and -Miss Pomeroy put in just the correct words and pretty smiles which were -wanted to keep his conversation in full swing. Mrs. Romayne and Mrs. -Pomeroy, facing them, disposed of the difficulty<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_177" id="page_177"></a>{177}</span> in connection with the -bazaar, after a good deal of irrelevant discussion, by saying very -often, and in a great many words, that three more stalls must be got in -somewhere; a decision which seemed to Mrs. Pomeroy to make everything -perfectly right, although she had had it elaborately demonstrated to her -that such a course was absolutely impossible.</p> - -<p>It was half-past one when Mrs. Romayne and Julian were put down at their -own door, and the barouche drove off amid a chorus of light laughter and -last words. The sunshine, the fresh air, the movement, or something less -simple and less physical, seemed to have had a most exhilarating effect -on Mrs. Romayne. Her face was almost as radiant in its curiously -different fashion as Julian’s was radiant with the unreasoning good -spirits of youth.</p> - -<p>“Such nice people!” she said lightly. “I wonder whether lunch is ready? -I’m quite starving! Oh, letters!” taking up three or four which lay on -the hall-table. “Let us trust they are interesting!” She turned into the -dining-room as she spoke, sorting<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_178" id="page_178"></a>{178}</span> the envelopes in her hand. “One for -you—your friend Von Mühler, isn’t it?” she said, tossing it to Julian -carelessly. “One for me—an invitation obviously. One from Mrs. -Ponsonby, about her stall, I suppose. And one from——”</p> - -<p>She stopped suddenly. The last letter of the pile was contained in a -small square envelope, and addressed in what was obviously a man’s -handwriting—a good handwriting, clear and strong, but somewhat cramped -and precise. “Mrs. William Romayne, 22, Queen Anne Street, Chelsea.” A -curious stillness seemed to come over the little alert figure as the -pale blue eyes caught sight of the writing, and then Mrs. Romayne moved -and walked slowly away to the window, still with her eyes fixed on the -envelope. She paused a moment, and then she opened it and drew out a -sheet of note-paper bearing a few lines only in the same small, clear -hand.</p> - -<p>“Well, mother, and what have your correspondents got to say? I have had -no end of a screed from Von Mühler.”</p> - -<p>Nearly ten minutes had passed, and Mrs.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_179" id="page_179"></a>{179}</span> Romayne started violently. She -thrust the letter—still open in her hand, though she was looking -fixedly out of the window—back into its envelope and turned. Her face -had altered curiously and completely. All its colour, all the genuine -animation which had pervaded it as she came into the room, had -disappeared; it was pale and hard-looking, and the lines about the mouth -and eyes were very visible.</p> - -<p>“A dinner invitation from Lady Ashton,” she said, “and a long rigmarole -from Mrs. Ponsonby to tell me that she is resigning her stall, and why -she is doing it. Poor Mrs. Pomeroy should be grateful to her!”</p> - -<p>Her tone was an exaggeration of her bright carelessness of ten minutes -before, forced and unnatural; her back was towards the window, or even -Julian’s boyish eyes might have noticed the stiff unreality of the smile -with which she spoke.</p> - -<p>They sat down to lunch together, but the strange change which had come -to her did not pass away. Julian did most of the talking, though the -readiness of her comments and her smiles—which left her lips always<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_180" id="page_180"></a>{180}</span> -hard and set, and never seemed to touch her eyes—prevented his being in -the least aware of the fact. Their afternoon was spent apart; but when -they met again there was that about her face which made Julian say with -some surprise:</p> - -<p>“Are you tired, mother?”</p> - -<p>They were going to a large dinner-party before the very smart “at home” -to which Julian and Mr. Loring had referred on the previous evening as -an opportunity for meeting, and Mrs. Romayne was magnificently dressed. -There were diamonds round her throat and in her hair, and as they -flashed and sparkled, seeming to lend glow and animation to her face as -she laughed at him for a ridiculous boy, Julian thought carelessly that -he must have imagined the drawn look which had struck him—though he had -only recognised it as “tired-looking”—on his mother’s face. As though -his words had startled or even annoyed her, she gave neither Julian nor -any one else any further excuse for taxing her with fatigue. Throughout -the long and rather dull dinner she was vivacity itself; her face always -smiling, her laugh<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_181" id="page_181"></a>{181}</span> always ready. As the evening went on a flush made -its appearance on her cheeks, as though the mental stimulus under which -that gaiety was produced involved a veritable quickening of the pulses; -and her son, when he met her in the hall after she had uncloaked for -their second party, thought that he had never seen his mother look -“jollier,” as he expressed it.</p> - -<p>“We must look out for Loring,” he said eagerly. “Oh, there he is, -mother, just inside the doorway! That clever-looking fellow, do you see, -with a yellow buttonhole?”</p> - -<p>It was easier to recognise an acquaintance than to approach within -speaking distance of him; and some time elapsed, during which Mrs. -Romayne and Julian exchanged greetings on all sides, and were received -by Lady Bracondale, before they found themselves also just inside the -doorway. Mrs. Romayne had given one quick, keen glance in the direction -indicated by Julian, and then had become apparently oblivious of Mr. -Marston Loring’s existence until Julian finally exclaimed:</p> - -<p>“Well met, Loring! Awfully pleased to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_182" id="page_182"></a>{182}</span> see you! Mother, may I introduce -Mr. Marston Loring?”</p> - -<p>She turned her head then, and bent it very graciously, holding out her -hand with her most charming smile.</p> - -<p>“I have known you by sight for a long time, Mr. Loring!” she said. “I am -delighted to make your acquaintance!”</p> - -<p>“The delight is mine!” was the response, spoken with just that touch of -well-bred deference which is never so attractive to a woman as when it -is exhibited in conjunction with such a personality as Loring’s. “It is -one for which I have wished for a long time!”</p> - -<p>“Seen the papers to-night?” interposed Julian eagerly. “We’ve lost -Nottingham, you see!”</p> - -<p>He was alluding to a bye-election which had led to the political -discussion of the evening before, and Loring nodded.</p> - -<p>“I see,” said Loring. “Romayne has told you, no doubt,” he went on, -turning to Mrs. Romayne, “that we foregathered to a considerable extent -last night over politics—and other things.” The last words were spoken<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_183" id="page_183"></a>{183}</span> -with a glance at the younger man which seemed to ascribe to their -acquaintance an altogether more personal and friendly footing than -political discussion alone could have afforded it, and Mrs. Romayne -laughed very graciously.</p> - -<p>“Yes; he has told me!” she said. “I am rather thinking of getting a -little jealous of you, Mr. Loring.”</p> - -<p>A few minutes’ more talk followed—talk in which Loring bore himself -with his usual cynical manner, just tempered into even unusual -effectiveness—and then Mrs. Romayne prepared to move on.</p> - -<p>“You must come and see us,” she said to Loring. “Julian will give you -the address. I am at home on Fridays; and I hope you will dine with us -before long!”</p> - -<p>She gave him a pretty nod and an “<i>au revoir</i>,” and turned away.</p> - -<p>“He’s awfully jolly, isn’t he, mother?” exclaimed Julian, as soon as -they were out of earshot.</p> - -<p>“Very good style,” returned Mrs. Romayne approvingly. “He is just the -kind of man to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_184" id="page_184"></a>{184}</span> get on. You have a good deal of discrimination, sir,” -she added.</p> - -<p>The mother and son were separated after that, and about half an hour -later Mrs. Romayne caught sight of Julian disappearing with a very -pretty girl, whose face she did not know, in the direction of the -supper-room, just as she herself was greeted by Lord Garstin and pressed -to repair thither.</p> - -<p>“Thanks, no,” she said lightly. “There is such a crowd, and I really -don’t want anything.”</p> - -<p>She paused. That accentuated vivacity was still about her, as she looked -up at Lord Garstin with a little smile and a gesture which he thought -unusually charming.</p> - -<p>“I want a little chat with you, though, very much,” she said with pretty -confidence. “I’m going to ask you to give me some advice, do you know. -Will it bore you frightfully?”</p> - -<p>“On the contrary, it will delight me,” was the ready and by no means -insincere response.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_185" id="page_185"></a>{185}</span></p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne made a gracious and grateful movement of her head.</p> - -<p>“I would rather take your opinion than that of any other man I know,” -she said confidentially. She stopped and laughed slightly. “It’s about -my boy, of course!” she said. “I want to know what you think of a club -for a young man in his position? Do you think, now, that it is a good -thing?”</p> - -<p>“Emphatically, yes,” returned Lord Garstin. “I consider a good club of -the first importance to a young man. Your young man ought to be a member -of the Prince’s.” He paused a moment, looking at her as she nodded her -head softly, waiting as though for further words of wisdom from him, and -thought what a delightful little woman she was. “Suppose I talk to him -about it?” he said pleasantly. “I will see to it with pleasure if you -would like it.”</p> - -<p>Nothing, certainly, could have been more delightful than Mrs. Romayne’s -manner, as she spoke just the right words of graceful acknowledgement -and acceptance. Then she made a gaily disparaging comment on club life, -and Lord Garstin’s advocacy of it, and a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_186" id="page_186"></a>{186}</span> few minutes’ bantering, -laughing repartee followed—that society repartee of which Mrs. Romayne -was a mistress. From thence she drifted into talk about the party, and a -complaint of the heat of the room.</p> - -<p>“It is time we were going, I think!” she remarked, with a gay little -laugh. “But a mother is a miserable slave, you see! I am ‘left until -called for,’ I suppose!”</p> - -<p>“If I were not absolutely obliged to go myself,” returned Lord Garstin, -“I shouldn’t encourage such a suggestion on your part. But as that is -the case, unfortunately, shall I find your boy first and send him to -you?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne shook her head with another laugh.</p> - -<p>“I saw him retire to the supper-room a little while ago with a very -pretty girl,” she said. “I make it a point never to hurry him under such -circumstances! But if you should meet him you might tell him that I am -quite ready when he is. Good night!”</p> - -<p>The room was not by any means crowded now; it was getting late and a -great many<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_187" id="page_187"></a>{187}</span> people were in the supper-room. The corner of the room in -which Mrs. Romayne was standing happened to be nearly deserted; there -was no one near her, and after Lord Garstin left her, she stood still, -fanning herself and looking straight before her with her bright smile -and animated expression rather stereotyped on her face. Suddenly, as if -involuntarily, she turned her head; she looked across to the other side -of the room and met the eyes of a man standing against the wall, who had -been looking fixedly at her ever since Lord Garstin joined her. For an -instant not the slightest perceptible change of expression touched her -face; only the very absoluteness of its immobility suggested that that -immobility was the result of a sudden and tremendous effort of -self-control; then the colour faded slowly from her cheeks and from her -lips; the smile did not disappear but it gradually assumed a ghastly -appearance of being carved in marble; her eyes widened slightly and -became strangely fixed. The man was Dennis Falconer, and he and she were -looking at one another across the gulf of eighteen years.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_188" id="page_188"></a>{188}</span></p> - -<p>It was only for a moment. Then Mrs. Romayne, still quite colourless, -lifted her eyebrows prettily and made a gesture of amazed recognition, -and Falconer moved and came slowly towards her.</p> - -<p>“What a surprising thing!” she exclaimed, holding out her hand. “I had -no idea you were here to-night! How do you do? Welcome home!”</p> - -<p>Her tone was perfectly easy and gracious; so ultra-easy, indeed, that it -deprived her words of any personal or emotional significance whatever, -and relegated their meeting-place with subtle skill to the most -conventional of society grounds. The rather distinguished-looking man -with the good reserved manner who stood before her accepted the position -with grave readiness.</p> - -<p>“Thank you,” he said. He spoke with distant courtesy, about which there -was not even the suggestion of that matter-of-course friendliness, as of -distant kinship, which had made her reception of him nearly perfect as a -work of art. “It is a great pleasure to me to be in England again.”</p> - -<p>“You have been away—let me see—<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_189" id="page_189"></a>{189}</span>two years?” said Mrs. Romayne, with -the vivacious assumption of intelligent interest which the social -situation demanded. “Five, is it? Really? And you have done wonderful -things, I hear. Funnily enough, I have been hearing about you only -to-night. I must congratulate you.”</p> - -<p>He bent his head with a courteous gesture of thanks.</p> - -<p>“You have had my note, I hope?” he said. “You are settled in London now, -Thomson tells me.”</p> - -<p>Thomson was the family lawyer, and he and Dennis Falconer himself were -Mrs. Romayne’s trustees under old Mr. Falconer’s will.</p> - -<p>“Oh, yes!” she answered suavely. “I had it to-day, just before lunch. So -nice of you to write to me. Yes, we are settled——”</p> - -<p>She had been fanning herself carelessly throughout the short colloquy, -glancing at Falconer or about the room with every appearance of perfect -ease; but now, as her eyes wandered to the other end of the room -something seemed to catch her attention.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_190" id="page_190"></a>{190}</span> She hesitated, appeared to -forget what she had intended to say, tried to recover herself, and -failed.</p> - -<p>Julian had come into the room, and was just parting gaily from some one -in the doorway. Dennis Falconer did not take up her unfinished sentence; -he followed the direction of her eyes across the room until his own -rested upon Julian, and then he started slightly and glanced down at the -woman by his side.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne laughed a rather high, unnatural laugh. She faced him with -her eyes very hard and bright, and her lips smiling; and through all the -artificiality of her face and manner there was something lurking in -those hard, bright eyes as she did it, something not to be caught or -defined, which made the movement almost heroic.</p> - -<p>“You recognise him?” she said lightly. “Ridiculously like me, isn’t he?”</p> - -<p>At that moment Julian started across the room, evidently to come to his -mother. He came on, stopping incessantly to exchange good-nights, -laughing, bowing, and smiling; and, as though there were a fascination -for<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_191" id="page_191"></a>{191}</span> them about his gay young figure, the man and woman standing -together at the other end of the room watched him draw nearer and -nearer. Words continued to come from Mrs. Romayne, a pretty, -inconsequent flow of society chatter, but it no more tempered the -strange gaze with which her eyes followed her son than did the unheeding -silence with which Falconer received them as his grave eyes rested also -on the young man. The whole thing was so incongruous; the expression of -those two pair of eyes was so utterly out of harmony with their -surroundings, and with the laughing, unconscious boy on whom they were -fixed; that they seemed to draw him out from the brightly dressed, -smiling groups through which he passed, and isolate him strangely in a -weird atmosphere of his own.</p> - -<p>“Here you are, sir!” cried his mother gaily, looking no longer at Julian -as he stood close to her at last, but beyond him.</p> - -<p>“Lord Garstin told me you were ready to go, dear,” said Julian -pleasantly. “I hope I haven’t kept you?”</p> - -<p>“There was no hurry,” she answered,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_192" id="page_192"></a>{192}</span> smiling; her voice was a little -thin and strained. “We will go now, I think, but I want to introduce you -first to some one whose name you know. This is your cousin, Dennis -Falconer.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_193" id="page_193"></a>{193}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">It</span> was a rather close afternoon in the third week of May. Fine weather -had lasted without a break for more than a fortnight; for the last two -or three days there had been little or no breeze; and the inevitable -effect had been produced upon London. The streets were a combination of -dust, which defied the water-carts; and glare, which seemed to radiate -alike from the heavy, smoky-blue sky, the houses, and the pavements. It -was only half-past three, and Piccadilly was as yet far from being -crowded. The pavement was mainly occupied by the working population, -which hurries to and fro along the London streets from morning to night -regardless of fashionable hours; and the few representatives of the -non-working class—smartly-dressed women and carefully got-up and -sauntering<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_194" id="page_194"></a>{194}</span> men—stood out with peculiar distinctness. But the figure of -Dennis Falconer, as he walked westward along the north side of -Piccadilly, was conspicuous not only on these rather unenviable terms.</p> - -<p>At the first glance it would have seemed that the past eighteen years -had altered him considerably, and altered him always for the better; -analysed carefully, the alteration resolved itself into a very -noticeable increase of maturity and of a certain kind of strength; and -the improvement into the fact that his weak points were of a kind to be -far less perceptible as such on a mature than on an immature face. His -face was thin and very brown; there were worn lines about it which told -of physical endurance; and in the sharper chiselling of the whole the -thinness of the nose and the narrowness of the forehead were no longer -striking. The somewhat self-conscious superiority of his younger days -had disappeared under the hand of time, and a certain sternness which -had replaced it seemed to give dignity to his expression. The keen -steadiness of his eyes had strengthened, and, indeed, it was their<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_195" id="page_195"></a>{195}</span> -expression which helped in a very great degree to make his face so -noticeable. He no longer wore a beard, and the firm, square outline of -his chin and jaw were visible, while his mouth was hidden by a -moustache; iron-grey like his hair. He was very well dressed, but there -was that about the simple conventionality of his attire which suggested -that its correctness was rather a concession to exterior demands than -the expression of personal weakness.</p> - -<p>More than one of the people who turned their heads to look at him as he -walked down Piccadilly were familiar with that grave, stern face; it had -been reproduced lately in the pages of all the illustrated papers, and -people glanced at it with the interest created by the appearance in the -flesh of something of a celebrity. Falconer had done a great deal of -good work for the Geographical Society in the course of the past -eighteen years; work characterised by no brilliancy or originality of -intellectual resource, but eminently persevering, conscientious, and -patient. During the last year, however, a chapter of accidents had -conspired to invest the expedition of which he was the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_196" id="page_196"></a>{196}</span> leader with a -touch of romance and excitement with which his personality would never -have endued it. The achievement in which the expedition had resulted had -been hailed in England as a national triumph, and Dennis Falconer found -himself one of the lions of the moment.</p> - -<p>But the position, especially for a man who believed himself to attach no -value whatever to it, had been somewhat dearly bought. Falconer, as he -walked the London streets on that May afternoon, was trying to realise -himself as at home in them, settled among them, perhaps, for an -indefinite period; and the effort brought an added shade of gravity to -his face. The terrible physical strain of the last six months; a strain -the severity of which he had hardly realised at the time, as he endured -from day to day with the simple, unimaginative perseverance of a man for -whom nerves have no existence; had told even upon his iron constitution; -and a couple of great London doctors had condemned him to a year’s -inactivity at least, under penalties too grave to be provoked.</p> - -<p>He turned down Sloane Street, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_197" id="page_197"></a>{197}</span> another quarter of an hour brought -him to number twenty-two, Queen Anne Street. He rang, was admitted, and -ushered upstairs into the drawing-room.</p> - -<p>The room was empty, and Falconer walked across it, glancing about him -with those keen, habitually observant eyes of his, and on his face there -was something of the stiffness and reserve which had characterised his -voice a minute earlier as he asked for Mrs. Romayne.</p> - -<p>Until the night, now nearly a fortnight ago, when they had met in Lady -Bracondale’s drawing-room, Dennis Falconer had seen Mrs. Romayne only -once since their journey from Nice had ended in old Mr. Falconer’s -house. That one occasion had been his visit to his uncle—so called—in -his Swiss home in the second year of Mrs. Romayne’s widowhood.</p> - -<p>He had been in Europe several times since then and had always made a -point of visiting old Mr. Falconer, but on every subsequent occasion it -had happened—rather strangely, as he had thought to himself once or -twice—that Mrs. Romayne was away from<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_198" id="page_198"></a>{198}</span> home. After old Mr. Falconer’s -death communication between them occurred only at the rarest intervals. -Dennis Falconer was Mrs. Romayne’s only remaining relation, and in this -capacity had been left by her uncle one of her trustees; but any -necessary business was transacted by his fellow trustee—old Mr. -Falconer’s lawyer. But the clan instinct was very strong in Falconer; it -brought in its wake a whole set of duties and obligations which for most -men are non-existent; and the sense of duty which had been -characteristic of him in early manhood had only been more deeply—and -narrowly—engraved by every succeeding year.</p> - -<p>Arrived in London, and knowing Mrs. Romayne to be settled there, he had -considered it incumbent on him to call on her, and had written the note -which she had received nearly a fortnight ago. He had written it with -much the same expression on his face—only a little less pronounced, -perhaps—as rested on it now that he was waiting for Mrs. Romayne in her -own drawing-room. Through all the changes brought about by the passing -of eighteen years, the mental attitude produced in him<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_199" id="page_199"></a>{199}</span> towards Mrs. -Romayne during those weeks of dual solitude at Nice had remained almost -untouched, except inasmuch as its disapproval had been accentuated by -everything he had heard of her since. It had been vivified and rendered, -as it were, tangible and definite by the short interview at Lady -Bracondale’s party, which had made her a reality instead of a -remembrance to him.</p> - -<p>He was standing before a large and very admirable photograph of -Julian—Julian at his very best and most attractive—contemplating it -with a heavy frown, when the door behind him opened under a light, quick -touch, and Mrs. Romayne came into the room.</p> - -<p>“It is too shocking to have kept you waiting!” she said. “So glad to see -you! I gave myself too much shopping to do, and I have had quite a -fearful rush!”</p> - -<p>Her voice and manner were very easy, very conventionally cordial; and, -as it seemed to Falconer, there was not a natural tone or movement about -her. It was her “at home” afternoon, and she was charmingly dressed in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_200" id="page_200"></a>{200}</span> -something soft and pale-coloured; her eyes were very bright, and the -play of expression on her face was even more vivacious and effective -than usual—exaggeratedly so, even.</p> - -<p>She shook hands and pointed him to a seat, sinking into a chair herself -with an affectation of hard-won victory over the “fearful rush”; the -subtle assumption of the most superficial society relation as alone -existing between them was as insidious and as indefinable as it had been -on their previous meeting, and seemed to set the key-note of the -situation even before she spoke again.</p> - -<p>“It is a frightful season!” she said. “Really horribly busy! They say it -is to be a short one—I am sure I trust it is true, if we are any of us -to be left alive at the end—and everything seems to be crammed into a -few weeks. Don’t you think so? You are very lucky to have arrived -half-way through.”</p> - -<p>“London just now does not seem to be a particularly desirable place, -certainly,” answered Falconer; his manner was very<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_201" id="page_201"></a>{201}</span> formal and reserved, -a great contrast to her apparent ease.</p> - -<p>“No!” she said, lifting her eyebrows with a smile. “Now, that sounds -rather ungrateful in you, do you know, for London finds you a very -desirable visitor. One hears of you everywhere.”</p> - -<p>“I am afraid I must confess that I take very little pleasure in going -‘everywhere,’<span class="lftspc">”</span> returned Falconer stiffly. “Social life in London seems -to me to have altered for the worse in every direction, since I last -took part in it.”</p> - -<p>“And yet you go out a great deal!” with a laugh. “That sounds a trifle -inconsistent!”</p> - -<p>“I am not sufficiently egotistical to imagine that my individual refusal -to countenance it would have any effect upon society,” answered -Falconer, still more stiffly. “To tolerate is by no means to approve.”</p> - -<p>Falconer’s reasons for the toleration in question—the real reasons, of -which he himself was wholly unconscious—would have astonished him not a -little, if he could have brought himself to realise them, in their<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_202" id="page_202"></a>{202}</span> -narrow conventionality. Fortunately it did not occur to Mrs. Romayne to -ask for them. With the ready tact of a woman of the world she turned the -conversation with a gracefully worded question as to his recent -expedition. He answered it with the courteous generality—only rather -more gravely spoken—with which he had answered a great many similar -questions put to him during the past week by ladies to whom he had been -introduced in his capacity of momentary celebrity; and she passed on -from one point to another with the superficial interest evoked by one of -the topics of the hour. Her exaggerated comments and questions, more or -less wide of the mark, were exhausted at length, and a moment’s pause -followed; a fact that indicated, though Falconer did not know it, that -the preceding conversation had involved some kind of strain on the -bright little woman who had kept it up so vivaciously. The pause was -broken by Falconer.</p> - -<p>“You have heard,” he said, “of poor Thomson’s illness?”</p> - -<p>It would hardly be true to say that Mrs. Romayne started—even -slightly—but a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_203" id="page_203"></a>{203}</span> curious kind of flush seemed to pass across her face. -As she answered, both her voice and her manner seemed instinctively to -increase and emphasize that distance which she had tacitly set between -them; it was as though the introduction into the conversation of a name -their mutual familiarity with which represented mutual interests and -connections had created the instinct in her.</p> - -<p>“Yes, poor man!” she said carelessly. “There has been a good deal of -illness about this season, somehow.”</p> - -<p>“I am afraid it is a bad business,” went on Falconer, with no -comprehension of the turn she had given to the conversation, and with -his mental condemnation of what seemed to him simple heartlessness on -her part not wholly absent from his voice. “There was to be a -consultation to-day; and I shall call this evening to hear the result. -But I am afraid there is very slender hope.”</p> - -<p>“How very sad!” said Mrs. Romayne with polite interest.</p> - -<p>Falconer bent his head in grave assent, and then with a view to arousing -in her shallow nature—as it seemed to him—some<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_204" id="page_204"></a>{204}</span> remembrance at least -of the usefulness to her of the man whose probable death she -contemplated so carelessly, he said with formal courtesy:</p> - -<p>“Thomson has done all the work connected with our joint trusteeship so -admirably hitherto that there has been no need for my services. But if, -while he is ill, you should find yourself in want of his aid in that -capacity, I need not say that I am entirely at your command.”</p> - -<p>Again that curious flush passed across Mrs. Romayne’s face, leaving it -rather pale this time.</p> - -<p>“Thanks, so much!” she said quickly. “I really could not think of -troubling you. I’ve no doubt I shall be able to hold on until Mr. -Thomson is well again. Thanks immensely! You will not be within reach -for very long, I suppose?”</p> - -<p>“I shall be in London for a year, certainly,” answered Falconer, -acknowledging her tacit refusal to recognise any claim on him in the -formal directness of his reply. Then, as she uttered a sharp little -exclamation of surprise, he added briefly; “I am in the doctors’<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_205" id="page_205"></a>{205}</span> hands, -unfortunately. There is something wrong with me, they say.”</p> - -<p>“I am very sorry——” she began prettily, though her eyes were rather -hard and preoccupied. But at that moment the door opened to admit an -influx of visitors, and Falconer rose to go.</p> - -<p>“So glad to have seen you!” she said as she turned to him after -welcoming the new-comers. “You won’t have a cup of tea? It is always -rather crushing when a man refuses one’s tea, isn’t it, Mrs. Anson?” -turning as she spoke to a lady sitting close by. Then as she gave him -her hand, speaking in a tone which still included the other lady in the -conversation, she alluded for the first time to Julian. The whole call -had gone by without one of those references to “my boy” with which all -Mrs. Romayne’s acquaintances were so familiar, that such an omission -under the circumstances would have been hardly credible to any one of -them.</p> - -<p>“I’m so sorry you have missed my boy!” she said now with her apologetic -laugh. “I’m afraid I am absurdly proud of him—<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_206" id="page_206"></a>{206}</span>isn’t that so, dear Mrs. -Anson?—but he really is a dear fellow.”</p> - -<p>“He is going to the bar, I believe?” said Falconer; his face and voice -alike were uncompromisingly stern and unbending.</p> - -<p>“Yes!” answered Julian’s mother. “He is not clever, dear boy, but I hope -he may do fairly well. Good-bye! Shall you be at the Gordons’ to-night? -We are going first to see the American actor they rave about so. A funny -little domestic party—I and my son and my son’s new and particular -‘chum.’ Good-bye!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne’s face did not regain its normal colour as she turned her -attention to her other callers, nor did those faint lines about her -mouth and eyes disappear. She was particularly charming that afternoon, -but always, as she welcomed one set of visitors or parted from another, -laughing, talking or listening so gaily, there was a faint, hardly -definable air of preoccupation about her. She had a great many visitors, -and the afternoon grew hotter as it wore on. When she dressed for dinner -that night, finding herself strangely nervous, irritable with her maid, -and “on<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_207" id="page_207"></a>{207}</span> edge altogether,” as she expressed it, she was very definite -and distinct in her self-assurances that such an unusual state of things -was owing solely to the heat and “those tiresome people”; rather -unnecessarily distinct and explicit it would have seemed, since there -was apparently no chance of contradiction.</p> - -<p>The acquaintanceship between Julian and Marston Loring had developed -during the past fortnight with surprising rapidity. They had dined -together at the club, they had smoked together in Loring’s chambers, and -they had met incessantly at dances, “at homes,” or dinners, on all of -which occasions Mrs. Romayne had been uniformly gracious to her son’s -friend.</p> - -<p>At a garden-party a few miles out of London, admittedly the greatest -failure of the season, when Loring and the Romaynes had walked about -together all the afternoon with that carelessness of social obligations -which a dull party is apt to engender, the scheme for the present -evening had been arranged; Loring adding a preliminary dinner at a -restaurant, with himself in the capacity of host to Mrs. Romayne and her -son, to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_208" id="page_208"></a>{208}</span> the original suggestion that they should go together to the -theatre.</p> - -<p>Julian was in high spirits as they drove off to keep their engagement, -but his mother’s responses to his chatter were neither so ready nor so -bright as usual. He glanced at her once or twice and then said boyishly:</p> - -<p>“You look awfully done up, mother!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne turned to him quickly, her eyes sparkling angrily, her -whole face looking irritable and annoyed.</p> - -<p>“My dear Julian,” she said sharply, “it’s a very bad habit to be -constantly commenting on people’s appearance; especially when your -remarks are uncomplimentary. You told me I looked tired the other day. -Please don’t do it again!”</p> - -<p>Such an ebullition of temper was an almost unheard-of thing with Mrs. -Romayne, and Julian could only stare at her in helpless -astonishment—not hurt, but simply surprised, and inclined to be -resentful. He could not realise as a woman might have done the jarred, -quivering state of nerves implied in such an outbreak; and he simply -thought his mother was rather odd, when a moment<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_209" id="page_209"></a>{209}</span> later she stretched -out her hand hastily, and laid it on his with a quick, tight squeeze.</p> - -<p>“That was abominably cross, dear!” she said in a voice which shook. -“Don’t mind! I am all right now.”</p> - -<p>But she was not all right, and though she made a valiant effort to -collect her forces and appear so, her gaiety throughout dinner was -strained and forced. Loring’s quick perception realised instantly that -something was wrong with her, and his demeanour under the circumstances -was significant at once of the work of the past fortnight, and of his -individual capacity for turning everything to his own ends. With a tacit -assumption of a certain right to consider her, he evinced just such a -delicate appreciation of her mood as gave her a sense of rest and -soothing, without letting her feel for a moment that he found anything -wanting in her. His pose was always that of a man to whom youth or even -early manhood, with its follies and inexperiences, is a thing of the dim -past, and he used that pose now to the utmost advantage; combining a -mental equality with<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_210" id="page_210"></a>{210}</span> the mother with an actual equality with the son as -his contemporary in a manner which made him seem in a very subtle way -equally the friend of each. He talked, of course, almost exclusively to -Mrs. Romayne, never, however, failing to include Julian in the -conversation; and he so managed the conversation as to take all its -trouble on his own shoulders, and give Mrs. Romayne little to do but -listen and be entertained.</p> - -<p>He succeeded so well that the dinner-hour, by the time it was over, had -done the work of many days in advancing his dawning intimacy with Mrs. -Romayne.</p> - -<p>She felt better, she told herself as they entered the theatre—told -herself with rather excessive eagerness and satisfaction, perhaps -because of something within, of which the quick, nervous movement of her -hands as she unfastened her cloak was the outward and visible sign.</p> - -<p>The curtain was just going up as they seated themselves, and during the -first quarter of an hour the two seats to their left remained empty. -Then Mrs. Romayne, whose attention was by no means chained to the stage, -became<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_211" id="page_211"></a>{211}</span> aware of the slow and difficult approach of a flow of -loudly-whispered and apologetic conversation, combined with the large -person of a lady; and a moment or two later she was being fallen over by -Mrs. Halse, who was followed by a girl, and who continued to explain the -situation fluently and audibly, until a distinct expression of the -opinion of the pit caused her to subside temporarily.</p> - -<p>She began to talk again before the applause on the fall of the curtain -had died away, and her voice reached Mrs. Romayne, to whom her remarks -were addressed, across the girl who was with her, and Julian, who was -sitting on his mother’s left hand, with gradually increasing -distinctness.</p> - -<p>“So curious that our seats should be together!” were the first words -Mrs. Romayne heard. “I have just been meeting a connection of yours. The -explorer, you know—Dennis Falconer. So fascinating! Oh, by-the-bye—my -cousin. I don’t think she has had the pleasure of being introduced to -you, though she has met your son. Miss Hilda Newton—Mrs. Romayne.”</p> - -<p>Miss Hilda Newton was a very pretty, dark girl of a somewhat pronounced -type.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_212" id="page_212"></a>{212}</span> She had large, perceptive, black eyes, singularly unabashed; a -charming little turned-up nose; and a rather large mouth with a good -deal of shrewd character about it. She was understood to be a country -cousin of Mrs. Halse’s, with whom she had been staying for the last -three weeks; but only a very critical and rather unkind eye could have -traced the country cousin in her dress, which had a great deal of style -and dash about it. She acknowledged Mrs. Halse’s introduction of her -with rather excessive self-possession, and after a casual word or two to -Mrs. Romayne, addressed herself to Julian; it was she with whom he had -disappeared to supper at Lady Bracondale’s “at home,” and they had -evidently seen a good deal of one another in the interval.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne had noticed them together more than once, and she had taken -a dislike to Miss Newton’s pretty, independent face and manners. In her -present mood it was an absolute relief to her to find in the girl a -legitimate excuse for irritation, and a reason for the fact that Mrs. -Halse’s speech had somehow undone all the work of the early<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_213" id="page_213"></a>{213}</span> part of the -evening, and set her nerves on edge afresh.</p> - -<p>“Detestably bad style!” she said to herself angrily, giving an unheeding -ear to Mrs. Halse as she watched Miss Newton reply with a little twirl -of her fan to an eager question of Julian’s. “Just what one would expect -in a cousin of that woman.” Then she became aware that “that woman” was -vociferously insisting on changing places with Julian, and that Julian -was acceding to the proposition with considerable alacrity; and before -she had well realised exactly what the change involved, Mrs. Halse, with -much paraphernalia of smelling-bottle, fan, opera-glasses, and -programme, was established at her side, and Julian and Miss Newton were -seated together at the end of the row, practically isolated by the -stream of Mrs. Halse’s conversation.</p> - -<p>“So horrid to talk across people, isn’t it?” said that lady airily, -though no crowd ever collected would have interfered with her flow of -language. “This is much more comfortable. My dear Mrs. Romayne, I am -simply dying to rave to somebody about<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_214" id="page_214"></a>{214}</span> your cousin—he is your cousin, -isn’t he?—Mr. Falconer, you know. What a splendid man! Of course all -the accounts of his work have been most fascinating, but the man himself -makes it all seem so much more real, don’t you know. Now, do tell me, is -he your first cousin, and do you remember him when he was quite a little -boy, and all that sort of thing?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne took up her fan and unfurled it. She was looking past Mrs. -Halse at Julian and Miss Newton, who were looking over the same -programme with their heads rather close together. Her eyebrows were -slightly contracted, and her eyes very bright, and the restless -movements of the slender hand that held the fan seemed to be an -expression of intense inward irritation.</p> - -<p>“Oh dear, no; Dennis Falconer is not my first cousin, by any means!” she -said carelessly, though her voice was a trifle sharp. “Third or fourth, -or something of that kind.”</p> - -<p>“He is quite a hero, isn’t he?” said Mrs. Halse, gushingly addressing -Loring. “Have you met him?”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_215" id="page_215"></a>{215}</span></p> - -<p>Loring, though his glance had every appearance of perfect carelessness, -was watching Mrs. Romayne intently. He had noticed her access of nervous -irritability, and he was curious as to the cause. Was it her son’s -flirtation with Miss Newton? Was it dislike to Mrs. Halse? Or had it any -connection with Dennis Falconer? He had his reasons for a study of Mrs. -Romayne’s idiosyncrasies.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” he said. “I met him the other night. A good sort of fellow he -seemed.”</p> - -<p>“He’s magnificent!” said Mrs. Halse enthusiastically. “We must have him -at the bazaar, my dear Mrs. Romayne; that I am quite determined. If he -would sell African trophies for us, you know—a native’s tooth, or -poppy-heads—oh, arrow-heads, is it?—well anything of that sort—it -would be a fortune to us! Have you seen a great deal of him? Cousins are -so often just like brothers and sisters, are they not?”</p> - -<p>A low laugh and a toss of her head from Miss Newton at this moment -closed the perusal of the programme, and Julian turned his attention to -perusing the pretty black eyes instead. Mrs. Romayne’s lips seemed<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_216" id="page_216"></a>{216}</span> to -tighten and whiten, and the fingers which held the fan were tightly -clenched as she answered in a voice which rang hard in spite of her -efforts:</p> - -<p>“Sometimes they are, of course. But it depends so much on circumstances. -Dennis Falconer and I had not met for years until the other day.”</p> - -<p>At that moment the curtain went up, leaving Mrs. Halse literally with -her mouth open, and the instant it fell Mrs. Romayne leant across to -Miss Newton with a comment on the performance, spoken in a rather thin, -tense voice, and with eyes that glittered as though the nervous strain -under which the speaker was labouring was becoming almost insupportable. -Apparently something in her face repelled the girl, for her answer was -of the briefest, and Julian throwing himself into the breach, he and -Miss Newton were instantly absorbed in an animated discussion. It was a -long wait, and Loring, noting every one of the restless movements of the -woman by his side as she talked and laughed so sharply, understood that -to Mrs. Romayne<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_217" id="page_217"></a>{217}</span> every moment meant nervous torture. The instant the -green curtain fell on the third act she rose, and Loring followed her -example, and wrapped her quickly and deftly in her cloak.</p> - -<p>“I can’t say I think much of your American prodigy,” she said to him -with a forced laugh. “I must confess that he has bored me to such an -extent that I really can’t stand any more boredom, and shall go straight -home. Julian!”</p> - -<p>She glanced round for him as she spoke, but he was escorting Mrs. Halse -and her cousin, and she was waiting for him in her brougham before he -joined her.</p> - -<p>“Suppose you come to the club with me?” suggested Loring carelessly, as -Julian received his mother’s announcement of her intentions rather -blankly. “What do you say to a game of billiards?”</p> - -<p>“All right,” responded Julian. “Thanks, old fellow. It was only that I -told Miss Newton we were coming on. Isn’t she a jolly girl, mother?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne smiled.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_218" id="page_218"></a>{218}</span></p> - -<p>“Very pretty indeed,” she said lightly. “It’s a sad pity you’re such an -ineligible fellow, isn’t it?”</p> - -<p>And Loring, as the carriage drove off, said to himself admiringly: “What -a wonderfully clever woman!”</p> - -<p>Reaction from a heavy strain—even, apparently, if it is only the strain -of combating exhaustion engendered by heat—is a terrible thing. When -Mrs. Romayne got out of her carriage after her long drive, her face was -haggard and drawn. She passed into the house, gathered up mechanically, -and without a glance, two letters waiting for her on the hall-table; -told the maid who was waiting for her that she might go to bed, and went -up into the drawing-room.</p> - -<p>There was a low chair by a little table covered with dainty, useless -paraphernalia, which she particularly affected. She sat down in it now, -almost unconsciously as it seemed, without even loosening her cloak, and -with a long, low sigh; the moments passed, and still she sat there, a -curious grey pallor about her face, her eyes gazing straight before her -as though they were looking into the future or<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_219" id="page_219"></a>{219}</span> the past. At last, as if -by a sudden fierce effort of will, she roused herself and began to tear -open the letters still in her hand as if with a desperate instinct -towards occupying her thoughts.</p> - -<p>Her eyes fell on the letter by this time open in her hand, and she read -it almost unconsciously, taking in the sense gradually as she read:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p class="nind"> -“<span class="smcap">Dear Cousin Hermia</span>,<br /> -</p> - -<p>“I have just heard to my great sorrow of the death of our old -friend Thomson, and I think it right to let you know of it. I -believe I need not remind you that on any future occasion on which -the help of your now, unfortunately, sole trustee may be necessary, -you will find me entirely at your service.</p> - -<p class="r"> -<span style="margin-right: 5em;">“Faithfully yours,</span><br /> -“<span class="smcap">Dennis Falconer</span>.”<br /> -</p></div> - -<p>With a sudden fierce gesture, of which her small white fingers looked -hardly capable, Mrs. Romayne crushed the letter in her hand and lifted -her head.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_220" id="page_220"></a>{220}</span></p> - -<p>“To be thrown upon him!” she said in a curious, breathless tone. “To -have to come into contact—close contact, personal contact—with him!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_221" id="page_221"></a>{221}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">The</span> season, as Mrs. Romayne had told Dennis Falconer, was to be a short -one, and its proceedings were apparently to be regulated on the old -principle of a short life and a merry one. Gaieties overtook one another -in too rapid succession, and an unusually sunny and breezy May and June, -with the inevitable action of such weather on human beings, even under -the most artificial conditions, rendered these gaieties a shade more -really gay than usual.</p> - -<p>The atmosphere was not, again, so close as it had been on the afternoon -when Dennis Falconer called on Mrs. Romayne, and it is presumable that -the weather must have been responsible for her general unusualness of -mood on the evening of that day; for if she was not quite herself on the -following morning,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_222" id="page_222"></a>{222}</span> the touch of self-compulsion in her brightness was -so slight as to be hardly perceptible, and a day or two later it had -entirely disappeared.</p> - -<p>Certainly if constant stir and movement are conducive to good spirits, -there was nothing wonderful in Mrs. Romayne’s satisfaction with life. -For she had not, as she complained laughingly, a single moment to -herself.</p> - -<p>“It’s a regular treadmill!” she exclaimed gaily one day to Lord Garstin. -“I had really forgotten what a terrible thing a London season was!”</p> - -<p>“It seems to agree with you,” was the answer. “There is one lady of my -acquaintance, and only one, who seems to grow younger every day!”</p> - -<p>“You can’t mean me,” she laughed. “I assure you, I am growing grey with -incessantly running after that boy of mine! He is as difficult to catch -as any lion of the season. I never see him except at parties!”</p> - -<p>Julian’s intimacy with Marston Loring had grown apace, and it had led to -sundry social consequences which were, his mother said, “so good for -him.” Little dinners at<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_223" id="page_223"></a>{223}</span> the club, to which he had been duly elected; -dinners at which he was now guest, now host; jovial little bachelor -suppers made up among the very best “sets.” Loring himself was very -careful—though he knew better than to make his care perceptible, except -in its results—never to allow himself to be placed in the position of a -rival to Mrs. Romayne for her son’s time and company. He lost no -opportunity of making himself useful and agreeable to Mrs. Romayne; now -using pleasantly arrogated rights as Julian’s friend; now his superior -brain-power and knowledge of the world; until he gradually assumed the -position of friend of the house. But club life necessarily created in -Julian interests apart from his mother—interests which she was -apparently well content that he should have, so long as his ever-ready -chatter to her on the subject revealed that they were all connected with -good “sets.”</p> - -<p>It was furthermore a season of very pretty <i>débutantes</i>, a large -majority of whom elected to look upon Mr. Romayne as “such a nice boy,” -and to exact—or permit—any amount of slavery from him in the matters -of fetching<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_224" id="page_224"></a>{224}</span> and carrying and general attendance. “You’re known to be so -profoundly ineligible, you see!” his mother would say to him, laughing. -“Nobody is in the least afraid of you, poor boy!” And she looked on with -perfect calmness as he danced, and rode, and did church parade; looked -on with a calmness which might have been mistaken for indifference, but -for the significant fact that she always knew which of his “jolly girls” -was in the ascendant for the moment.</p> - -<p>Miss Newton had gone home on the day following the meeting at the -theatre.</p> - -<p>Falconer was to be seen about throughout the season, making his grave -concession to the weaknesses of society. Mrs. Romayne and Julian met him -constantly, and he was asked to, and attended, the most formal of the -dinners given at Queen Anne Street. But the intercourse between him and -his “connection,” as Mrs. Romayne called herself, was of the most -distant and non-progressive type. Julian did not take to him at all. “He -is such a solemn fellow, mother!” he said. “He seems to think that I’m -doing something wrong all the time.” An observation to which Mrs.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_225" id="page_225"></a>{225}</span> -Romayne replied by laughing a rather forced laugh and changing the -conversation.</p> - -<p>The last event of the season, as it became evident as the weeks ran on, -would be the bazaar in aid of Mrs. Halse’s discovery among charities. It -was, perhaps, as well that the institution in question was by no means -in such urgent need of patronage as might have been argued from Mrs. -Halse’s demeanour towards it earlier in the proceedings; for that lady’s -enthusiasm on the subject had suffered severely in the contest with the -numerous other enthusiasms which had succeeded it, and the affairs of -the bazaar had been pursued by all its supporters with energy which is -most charitably to be described as intermittent. Three separate dates -had been fixed for the opening day; and, after a great deal of money had -been spent in printing and advertising, each of these in succession had -had to be abandoned owing to the singular incompleteness of every -fundamental arrangement—though, as Mrs. Halse observed impatiently, -after the third postponement, there were “heaps and heaps of Chinese -lanterns.” Finally it was announced for the fifth and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_226" id="page_226"></a>{226}</span> sixth of July; -and owing to herculean efforts on the part of half-a-dozen unfortunate -men enlisted in the cause; who apparently braced themselves to the task -with a desperate sense that if the affair was not somehow or another -carried through now, by fair means or foul, they were doomed to struggle -in a tumultuous sea of fashionable feminine futility for the remainder -of their miserable lives; on the fifth the bazaar was actually opened.</p> - -<p>It was late in the evening of that eventful day, and in various -fashionable drawing-rooms exhausted ladies stretched on sofas were -recruiting their forces after their severe labours. It had been the -fashion for the last week or more among the prospective stall-holders to -allude to the fatigue before them with resigned and heroic sighs of -awful import; consequently they were now convinced to a woman that they -were in the last stages of exhaustion. As a matter of fact it is -doubtful whether out of the sensations of all the “smart” helpers -concerned—with the exception of the devoted half-dozen before -mentioned, who had retired to various clubs in a state of collapse—a -decent state of fatigue<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_227" id="page_227"></a>{227}</span> could have been constructed; and the reason for -this was threefold. In the first place, so much money had been spent in -announcing the dates when the bazaar did not take place, that there was -exceedingly little forthcoming to announce the date when it did take -place; consequently its attractive existence remained almost unknown to -the general public, and the services of the sellers were in very slight -demand. In the second place, the greater part of the work which could -not be done by proxy was left undone. And in the third place, each lady -had been throughout the day so deeply convinced of the “frightfully -tiring” nature of her occupation, that she thought it only her duty to -“save herself” whenever that course was open to her—which was almost -always.</p> - -<p>In the drawing-room at Chelsea, very cool and pretty with its open -windows and its plentiful supply of flowers and ferns, Mrs. Romayne was -lying on the sofa, as the exigencies of the moment, socially speaking, -demanded of her, in an attitude of graceful weariness; an attitude which -was rather belied by the alert expression of her contented face.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_228" id="page_228"></a>{228}</span> She -had dined at home—“just a quiet little dinner, you know—cold, because -goodness knows when we shall get it!”—with Julian and Loring at -half-past seven. The bazaar did not close until nine, but all the -principal stall-holders had thought it their duty to the following day -not to wear themselves quite out, and had left the last two hours to the -care of one or other of the hangers-on, of whom “smart” women may -usually have a supply if they choose; and Mrs. Romayne’s quiet little -dinner was only one of a score of similar functions, very dainty and -luxurious in view of the tremendous exertions which had preceded them, -which were being held in various fashionable parts of London. At ten -o’clock Loring had taken his leave, declaring sympathetically that Mrs. -Romayne must long for perfect quiet after her exertions. It was then -that Mrs. Romayne had betaken herself to her sofa and her papers.</p> - -<p>“What an immense time it is since we have had such a domesticated hour!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne had laid down her literature some moments before, and had -been lying looking at Julian with that curious<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_229" id="page_229"></a>{229}</span> expression in her eyes -which would creep into them now and again when they rested on the -good-looking young figure, and which harmonised so ill with the shallow, -vivacious prettiness of the rest of her face. She spoke, however, with -her usual light laugh at herself, and Julian laughed too as he threw -down his magazine and turned towards her.</p> - -<p>“It is an age, isn’t it?” he said.</p> - -<p>During the final agony of preparation for the bazaar, Julian had been in -immense request. Not that he was one of the devoted half-dozen, or that -he did much definite work; but he was always ready to discuss any lady’s -private fad with her for any length of time, and to rush all over London -about nothing. His exertions, and the exhaustion engendered thereby, had -rendered necessary a great deal of recreation at the club. He had -repaired thither very frequently of late, instead of escorting his -mother home on the conclusion of their tale of parties for the night.</p> - -<p>“It is a comfort to think that it is so nearly over!” observed Mrs. -Romayne carelessly. It is never worth while, in the world in which Mrs. -Romayne moved, to express<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_230" id="page_230"></a>{230}</span> more than half your meaning in words, and -Julian quite understood that she alluded, not to the domestic hour, but -to the season. Her words were not prompted by any actual weariness of -the round of life she characterised as “it,” but the sentiment was in -the air—the fashionable air, that is to say. She and Julian, in common -with the greater part of their world, were leaving London at the end of -the week.</p> - -<p>“It has been awfully jolly!” said Julian, leaning back in his chair and -resting his head against his loosely locked hands. “I had no idea that -life was such a first-rate business!”</p> - -<p>His mother smiled, and there was a strange touch of triumph in her -smile.</p> - -<p>“It is a first-rate business,” she assented, “if one lives it among the -right people and in the right position. I imagine you see by this time -that it isn’t much use otherwise!”</p> - -<p>He laughed as though his appreciation of her words rendered them almost -a truism to him, and there was a moment’s silence. It was broken by -Julian.</p> - -<p>“It costs a lot of money,” he said, in a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_231" id="page_231"></a>{231}</span> casual, indefinite way, but -with a quick glance at his mother.</p> - -<p>“Well, it isn’t cheap, certainly,” was the laughing answer: “but I think -we shall manage.” Then noticing something a little deprecating about his -pose and expression, Mrs. Romayne added, with mock reprehension, “You’re -not going to ask me to raise your allowance, you extravagant boy?”</p> - -<p>Julian moved, and leaning forward, clasped his hands round one knee as -if the uncomfortable and transitory pose assisted explanation. He -laughed back at her, but he was looking nevertheless somewhat ashamed of -himself.</p> - -<p>“No, it’s not that—exactly,” he began rather lamely. “It’s a splendid -allowance, mother dear, and I’m no end grateful; but the fact is, there -has been a good deal of card-playing lately at the club. I don’t care -for cards, you know, but one must play a bit, and I have been rather a -fool. Look here, dear, I suppose—I suppose you couldn’t let me have two -hundred, could you—before we go away, you know?”</p> - -<p>“Two hundred, Julian! My dear boy!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_232" id="page_232"></a>{232}</span></p> - -<p>There was a strong tone of surprise and remonstrance in Mrs. Romayne’s -voice, and there was also a very distinct note of annoyance; but all -these sentiments seemed rather to apply to the demand, which was -apparently unseasonable, than to the desirability of the transaction. -She was neither startled nor distressed.</p> - -<p>“It is young Fordyce, mother,” continued her son deprecatingly. “It was -awfully foolish to play with him, he’s so beastly lucky. And you see I -must settle it before I go away.”</p> - -<p>“And have you none of your own?” demanded his mother, with some asperity -in her tone. Julian’s creditor was a young man who had the reputation of -being a “very good sort of fellow,” who would never “do” in society.</p> - -<p>“I’m awfully sorry to say I haven’t!” returned Julian meekly.</p> - -<p>There was a moment’s pause, and Mrs. Romayne tapped impatiently on the -papers lying by her.</p> - -<p>“It is such an inconvenient moment,” she said at last. “I have just made -all my<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_233" id="page_233"></a>{233}</span> arrangements for the quarter—I don’t mean that you can’t have -it, of course you can, dear—but it is difficult to lay my hand on it at -this moment.”</p> - -<p>“Falconer could arrange it for you,” suggested Julian, alluding to -Falconer in his capacity of trustee for the first time, as it happened.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne started violently, and a sharp exclamation of dissent rose -to her lips. She stopped it half uttered, and paused a moment, -controlling herself with difficulty.</p> - -<p>“No,” she said at last, in rather a hard tone. “I would rather not do -that. I will think it over and see what can be done. We must raise your -allowance, sir. I can’t have mines sprung on me like this!”</p> - -<p>She had risen as she spoke, and as he followed her example she lifted -her face towards him for the good-night kiss which always passed between -them.</p> - -<p>“I will sleep upon it,” she said. “Good night, extravagant boy.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_234" id="page_234"></a>{234}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">The</span> stall-holders presented a singularly fresh and unworn appearance, -considering how much they had undergone, as they gradually put in an -appearance at their stall on the following day, and gathered together in -little knots to compare notes as to their sufferings, and here and there -to allude incidentally to their takings—which certainly seemed -disproportionate to the exertions of which they were the result. The -fancy dress idea on which Mrs. Halse’s whole soul had been set in March -had been abandoned when Mrs. Halse found a fresh hobby in April; and -each lady wore that variety of the fashion of the day which seemed most -desirable in her eyes. All the dresses were very “smart,” and as their -wearers moved about, visiting one another’s stalls, exchanging -greetings, and inspecting<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_235" id="page_235"></a>{235}</span> one another’s wares with critical eyes, they -showed to conspicuous advantage. For, during the first hour at least, -the stall-holders and their satellites, male and female—a mere handful -of people in the great hall—had the entire place with all its -decorations to themselves.</p> - -<p>It was the cheap day, however, and as the afternoon wore on the hall -gradually filled with that curious class of person which is always -craving for any link, however “sham,” with the fashionable world, and -makes it a point of self-respect to attend all public functions in which -“society” chances to be engaged. These far-off votaries of fashion -walked about, looking not at the stalls, but at the ladies in attendance -on them, turning away as a rule in stolid silence when invited in -mellifluous tones to buy; or perhaps investing a shilling when long -search had resulted in the discovery of a twopenny article to be had for -that sum, for the sake of making a purchase from one of the leaders of -fashion; some of them, with a vague notion that it was fashionable to -“know every one,” kept up a great show of talk and laughter, and were<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_236" id="page_236"></a>{236}</span> -constantly seeing acquaintances on the other side of the hall—with whom -they never by any chance came in contact. But no one spent more than -five shillings, and the stall-holders began to find the position pall.</p> - -<p>“I call this deadly!” said Mrs. Halse, subsiding into a chair, and -looking up pathetically at Julian Romayne, who stood by. Julian should -have been in attendance at the stall next but one, where Mrs. Pomeroy -and his mother reigned, but Mrs. Halse, in view of the exertions before -her, had summoned to her aid, about a week before, Miss Hilda Newton; -and Miss Hilda Newton was looking irresistibly bewitching to-day in a -big yellow hat. Her spirits, also, bore the strain of the proceedings -better than did those of the other young ladies.</p> - -<p>“Suppose we pick out some things—cheap things”—with a little -grimace—“and go about among the people and try and sell them,” she said -now adventurously, looking up into Julian’s face, with her pretty black -eyes dancing. “I’ve done it heaps of times at bazaars, and it always -goes well. Let us try, Mr. Romayne.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_237" id="page_237"></a>{237}</span></p> - -<p>Mr. Romayne was by no means loath, and a few minutes later his mother, -whose eyes had been covering Mrs. Halse’s stall all the time she tried -to persuade into a purchase a sharp-faced girl, whose sole object was a -sufficiently prolonged inspection of Mrs. Romayne’s dress to enable her -to find out how “that body was made,” saw them sally forth together -laughing and talking in low, confidential tones. Her lips tightened -slightly; the reappearance of Miss Newton had found Mrs. Romayne’s -dislike to the pretty, opinionated, self-reliant girl as active and -apparently unreasoning as it had been on her previous visit.</p> - -<p>“What a very good idea!” she said now suavely, turning to Mrs. Pomeroy -who sat by, a picture of placid content, and indicating the adventurous -pair as they disappeared among the people. “We must try something of the -sort, I think. Maud, dear”—Miss Pomeroy had recently become Maud to -Mrs. Romayne—“do you see? I really think something might be done in -that way.”</p> - -<p>Miss Pomeroy, who was standing in front<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_238" id="page_238"></a>{238}</span> of the stall, a charming and -apparently quite inanimate figure in white, assented demurely, and Mrs. -Romayne, looking round for a man, caught the eye of Loring. He came to -her instantly.</p> - -<p>“You’ll do capitally,” she said brightly, and Miss Pomeroy, making no -objection to the proceeding, was started forth with Loring, the latter -carrying a small stock-in-trade, to emulate Miss Newton and Julian. That -stock-in-trade was quite untouched, however, when about a quarter of an -hour later they returned to the stall a little hot and discomfited.</p> - -<p>“We haven’t made a success,” said Loring with a rather sardonic smile; -“Miss Pomeroy says I’m no good! Now, there’s that fellow Julian doing a -roaring trade!”</p> - -<p>Julian and Miss Newton, in point of fact, were at that moment visible -returning to Mrs. Halse’s stall, evidently in high feather, all their -stock sold out. Mrs. Romayne watched Julian counting his gains into Mrs. -Halse’s hand, saying laughingly to Loring as she did so:</p> - -<p>“You are not boy enough for this kind of thing, I’m afraid!” And then -Julian,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_239" id="page_239"></a>{239}</span> with a final laughing nod, turned away from Mrs. Halse, and -came hastily towards his mother’s stall.</p> - -<p>“That’s right!” said Mrs. Romayne gaily, ignoring the fact that he had -evidently not come to stay. “I was just wanting you, sir, to go round -with Miss Pomeroy, if she will kindly go with you, and get rid of some -of our odds and ends!”</p> - -<p>Julian stopped short and flushed a little.</p> - -<p>“I’m awfully sorry!” he said. “I’ll come back and do it with pleasure! -But I have just promised to go round again with Miss Newton. I came to -see if you could give us some change.”</p> - -<p>His mother supplied his wants smilingly, and he was gone. She had turned -away with rather compressed lips when a voice behind her said half -hesitatingly, half gushingly, and with a strong German accent:</p> - -<p>“We are surely unmistaken! It is—yes, it must be, the much-honoured -Mrs. Romayne!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne turned quickly and gazed at the speaker obviously -unrecognisingly. Nor<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_240" id="page_240"></a>{240}</span> did the two figures with whom she was confronted -look in the least like acquaintances of hers. They were young women of -the plainest and most angular German type, shabbily dressed according to -the canons of middle-class German taste.</p> - -<p>“She remembers us not, Gretchen!” began the younger of the two. And then -a sudden light of recollection broke over Mrs. Romayne. They were two -girls who had been training for a musical career at Leipsic, whom it had -been the fashion to patronise; they had not developed as had been -expected, however, and she had entirely forgotten their existence.</p> - -<p>“Fräulein Schmitz!” she said now with distant brightness. “Ah, of -course! How stupid of me! How do you do?”</p> - -<p>They were very loquacious. Mrs. Romayne had heard all about their -careers; all the reasons that had led to their spending a fortnight in -London; and was beginning to think that the moment had come for getting -rid of them, when, having exhausted themselves in compliments on her -appearance, they enquired after Julian.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_241" id="page_241"></a>{241}</span></p> - -<p>“Though we have seen Mr. Romayne,” said the elder, “since, ah, but much -since we had the pleasure to see his mother. It was in Alexandria in the -winter past—we hoped that some concerts there might be possible, but -there is so much jealousy and favouritism—it was in Alexandria that we -met him. He was travelling in Egypt, he told to us.”</p> - -<p>“Yes!” said Mrs. Romayne, smothering a yawn. “He was in Egypt——” she -stopped suddenly, and her eyes seemed to contract strangely. “Where did -you say you saw him?” she said.</p> - -<p>“It was in Alexandria! He was there for the day only, and he was to us -most kind. He arrived in the morning early by the same train, and he -showed us much until at night he left.”</p> - -<p>“At Alexandria?”</p> - -<p>“Surely! At Alexandria!”</p> - -<p>“You must have made a mistake. It was some other place.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne’s tone was curiously unlike that in which she had conducted -the early part of the conversation. It was sharp and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_242" id="page_242"></a>{242}</span> direct. Fräulein -Schmitz seemed to notice and resent the change.</p> - -<p>“But we have not made a mistake, I must assure you!” she said stiffly. -“It was at Alexandria. We saw him go away in the train.”</p> - -<p>There was a moment’s pause. Mrs. Romayne was looking straight before her -with those strangely contracted eyes; her lips a thin, pale line. The -sisters waited a moment, evidently affronted. Then, finding that Mrs. -Romayne took no notice whatever of them, they exchanged resentful -glances, and the elder spoke.</p> - -<p>“We will say good-bye!” she said formally. “It is time that we were -going!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne seemed to remember their presence—gradually only. Then she -said quickly, and in a voice that sounded as though her throat were dry:</p> - -<p>“You are going at once? Right out of the hall at once?”</p> - -<p>“At once we are going, yes!” was the reply, and with a stiff inclination -of their heads they moved away.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne followed the two angular<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_243" id="page_243"></a>{243}</span> forms with her eyes until they -reached the entrance and disappeared. Then she swept a quick glance -round the hall. Julian was at the further end deeply absorbed in his -proceedings with Miss Newton. The Fräulein Schmitz had evidently been -unseen by him.</p> - -<p>His mother looked at him for a moment with a strange, fixed gaze, and -then she turned her eyes away mechanically, and moved her mouth with a -little twitch as though she felt the muscles stiffening and knew that -they must not take the lines they would; there was a deadly pallor about -her mouth. At that instant Loring came up to her with a witty satirical -comment on the scene at which she was apparently gazing, and for the -next few minutes she stood there exchanging gay little observations with -him, the pallor never altering, her eyes never moving. Then quite -suddenly she turned towards him.</p> - -<p>“I want some tea!” she said. “Take me to the refreshment place, Mr. -Loring!”</p> - -<p>Julian was threading his way to where she stood, and though she turned -instantly<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_244" id="page_244"></a>{244}</span> in the direction of the refreshment stall, followed perforce -by Loring, she passed close to him. He stopped and said something, but -she only nodded to him and went rapidly on.</p> - -<p>A great many other stall-holders were recruiting themselves with tea and -ices, and they were all more or less in spirits, real or affected, at -the approaching prospect of the end of their labours. Mrs. Romayne was -instantly hailed as one of a very smart group, and took her place with -eager, high-pitched gaiety. She did not go back to her stall, tea being -over, but moved about the bazaar, always with a little party in -attendance, laughing and talking. She and Julian were dining with a -large party of stall-holders at Mrs. Pomeroy’s; they were all to repair -thither direct from the bazaar, and Mrs. Romayne took a detachment in -her carriage. Only one instant of solitude came to her before the -luxurious, hilarious meal; only one instant, when the stream of -descending ladies left her behind on an upper landing. In that instant, -as if involuntarily and unconsciously to herself, the gaiety fell from<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_245" id="page_245"></a>{245}</span> -her face like a mask, leaving it haggard and ghastly. She put her -hand—it was icy cold—up to her head.</p> - -<p>“He told me a lie!” she said to herself. “A lie! Oh, my boy!”</p> - -<p>She was very bright and witty as she and Julian drove home together, and -the greyish whiteness which was stealing over her face was unnoticed by -her son’s careless eyes even when they stood in the well-lighted hall.</p> - -<p>“Are you going straight up, mother?” he said. “If so, I’ll say good -night. I want a cigar.”</p> - -<p>She paused a moment and looked at him with that indescribable tenderness -which haunted her eyes at times as they rested on him, intensified a -thousandfold.</p> - -<p>“I’ll come and sit with you for a little while if you will have me,” she -said.</p> - -<p>She tried evidently for her usual manner, and succeeded inasmuch as -Julian noticed nothing beyond. But beneath the surface there was -something not wholly to be suppressed—something which looked out of her -eyes, trembled in her voice, lingered in her<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_246" id="page_246"></a>{246}</span> touch as she laid her hand -on his arm; something which, taken in conjunction with the shreds of -affectation with which she strove to cover it, and with the boy’s -profound unconsciousness, was as pathetic as it was beautiful and -strange.</p> - -<p>She drew him into his own little room, and then with a forced laugh at -herself she pushed him gently into a chair, and insisted on waiting upon -him—bringing him cigar, matches, ash-tray—anything she could think of -to add to his comfort, laughing all the time at him and at herself, and -hugging those shreds of affectation close. But there was that about her, -if there had been any one to see and understand, which made her one with -all the many mothers since the world began who, with their hearts aching -and bleeding with impotent pity and love, have tried to find some outlet -for their yearning in the strange instinct for service which goes always -hand in hand with mother love as with no other love on earth.</p> - -<p>She lit his match at last, and then knelt down beside his chair.</p> - -<p>“My dearest,” she said, “my dearest,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_247" id="page_247"></a>{247}</span> you shall have that two -hundred—to-morrow if you like! You did not think me vexed about it, did -you? You know I only want you to be happy, Julian, don’t you?”</p> - -<p>Julian laid down his cigar with a merry laugh. “I should be a fool if I -didn’t!” he answered, patting her hand with boyish affection. “It’s -awfully good of you, dear, and I’m frightfully grateful. I won’t make -such a fool of myself again.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne put up her hand quickly. “Don’t promise, Julian!” she said -in a strange breathless way, “you might—you might forget, you know, and -then perhaps you wouldn’t like to tell me! And I want to know! I always -want to know!” She stopped abruptly, an almost agonised appeal in her -eyes.</p> - -<p>She was still kneeling at his side, with her eyes fixed on his face; and -suddenly, abruptly, almost as though the words forced themselves from -her against her will, she said, with a slight catch in her voice:</p> - -<p>“Julian, I met Fräulein Schmitz to-day!”</p> - -<p>He met her eyes for a moment, his own questioning and uncomprehending; -then<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_248" id="page_248"></a>{248}</span> gradually there stole over his face recollection, vague at first, -which became as it grew definite rather shamefaced, rather annoyed, and -rather amused.</p> - -<p>“Oh!” he said; his tone was light and daring enough, though a touch of -genuine shame and embarrassment lurked in it. “Oh, I call that hard -lines!”</p> - -<p>He was smiling daringly into her face with an acceptance of the -situation that was perfectly frank. His mother’s hands, as they rested -on the arm of his chair, were tightly wrung together, and her eyes never -stirred from his face.</p> - -<p>“Why?” she said rather hoarsely, “why did you?”</p> - -<p>He laughed, shrugging his shoulders and throwing out his hands with a -graceful foreign movement.</p> - -<p>“I was rather a culprit, you see,” he said. “I only spent those few -hours in Alexandria, and I never gave a thought to your commission. And -I felt such a brute about it that I wasn’t up to confessing!”</p> - -<p>It was the truth and the whole truth, and it conveyed itself as such. -Mrs. Romayne<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_249" id="page_249"></a>{249}</span> knelt there for a moment more, looking into his eyes, her -own wide and strained; and then she rose heavily and slowly to her feet. -There was a pause.</p> - -<p>The silence was broken by Julian, evidently with a view to changing a -subject on which he could hardly be said to show to conspicuous -advantage.</p> - -<p>“You’re going to write to Falconer, I suppose? You wouldn’t like to do -it to-night, dear, would you? He would get the letter in better time if -it was posted the first thing. You could do it at my table there!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne did not speak. Julian could not see her face.</p> - -<p>“Yes!” she said at last, and her voice sounded rather hollow and far -away, “I will do it to-night if you like.” She bent down and kissed him. -“Good night!” she said.</p> - -<p>“Won’t you write here?” said Julian in some surprise.</p> - -<p>“No, I’ll go upstairs!” she answered, and went out of the room.</p> - -<p>She went upstairs, moving slowly and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_250" id="page_250"></a>{250}</span> heavily, straight to her dainty -little writing-table, and sat down, drawing out a sheet of paper. She -wrote the conventional words of address to Dennis Falconer, and then she -stopped suddenly and lifted her face. It was ghastly. The eyes, sunken -and dim, seemed to be confronting the very irony of fate.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_251" id="page_251"></a>{251}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV</h2> - -<p class="nind">“<span class="smcap">The</span> jolliest week I’ve ever had in my life!”</p> - -<p>“I wonder how often you’ve said that before?”</p> - -<p>August had come and gone, the greater part of September had followed in -its wake, and a ruddy September sun was making the end of the summer -glorious. In the large garden of a large country house in Norfolk, -everything seen in its wonderful radiance seemed to be even overcharged -with colour, if such a thing is possible with nature; it was as though -all the beauty of the summer had been intensified and arrested in its -maturity into one final glow. The rich green of the smooth lawns, the -colours of the autumnal flowers, the tints of the foliage, the very -atmosphere, seemed all alike to be pausing<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_252" id="page_252"></a>{252}</span> for the moment at the most -perfect point of radiance. But nature never pauses; and that this was -indeed the final glow, the end of her summer beauty, was revealed here -and there by little significant touches, or written across earth and sky -in broader letters. The birds were gone or going. Even as Julian Romayne -spoke a flight of swallows overhead was wheeling and darting hither and -thither in preparation for an imminent departure; the very glory of the -trees meant decay, and in spite of all the efforts of indefatigable -gardeners, dead leaves strewed the trim lawns and gravel paths.</p> - -<p>All these signs and tokens of the approach of the inevitable end were -particularly conspicuous about the narrow grass path shut in by high yew -hedges, up and down which Julian Romayne and Hilda Newton were -sauntering together. Fallen leaves were thick upon it, and in the -flower-beds, by which it was bordered, the summer flowers, whose day was -long since done, had not been replaced by their autumn successors. -Apparently, the walk was a secluded and little frequented one, on which -it was not worth while to spend<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_253" id="page_253"></a>{253}</span> much pains. Judging from the coquettish -toss of the head, tempered by a certain softness of tone, with which -Miss Newton replied to the insinuated regret of Julian’s words, it -seemed not improbable that those characteristics had something to do -with their selection of that particular spot for their stroll. They had -been staying in this pleasant country house together for the last week, -the hostess having taken a fancy to Mrs. Halse’s cousin in town; and now -in another hour Julian and his mother would be on their way home.</p> - -<p>As the half-mocking, half-inviting words fell from his companion’s lips, -Julian turned impetuously towards the pretty, piquant face; it was -shaded by a bewitching garden hat.</p> - -<p>“I never meant it so much before, on my honour,” he said impulsively; -adding with a boyish suggestion of tender reproach in his voice: “I -should have thought you might have known that. It’s awfully hard lines -to think it’s over.”</p> - -<p>Miss Newton had a large crimson dahlia in her hand, and she was plucking -the petals<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_254" id="page_254"></a>{254}</span> slowly away and scattering them at her feet.</p> - -<p>“Is it?” she said.</p> - -<p>“You know it is,” he returned ardently, trying to catch a glimpse of the -dark face bent over the crimson flower. “Won’t you tell me that you’re a -little sorry, too? Miss Newton—Hilda——”</p> - -<p>His vigorous young hand was just closing over the pretty little fingers -that held the dahlia; the dainty little figure was yielding to him -nothing loath, it seemed, when from the further end of the grass walk a -third voice broke in upon their <i>tête-à-tête</i>, and as they started -instinctively apart Mrs. Romayne, accompanied by their hostess, came -sauntering towards them.</p> - -<p>“Taking a farewell look at the quaint old walk, Julian?” she said with -suave carelessness as she drew near them. “The garden is looking too -beautiful this morning, isn’t it, Miss Newton? What a lovely dahlia that -is you were showing Julian!”</p> - -<p>She looked smilingly at Miss Newton as she spoke, apparently quite -unconscious that the girl’s face was white—not with embarrassment,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_255" id="page_255"></a>{255}</span> -disappointment, or emotion, but with sheer angry resentment—and she -moved on as she spoke, tacitly compelling Miss Newton to move on at her -side, while Julian and the other lady followed, perforce together.</p> - -<p>“We have only about ten minutes more, I’m afraid,” she said. “I was just -taking a last stroll round the place with Mrs. Ponsonby. I’m afraid we -shall find London rather unbearable to-night. The call of duty is always -so very inconvenient!”</p> - -<p>She was leading the way toward the house, and her little high-pitched -laugh eliciting only a monosyllabic response from the girl at her side, -she resumed what was practically a monologue, carried on with a suavity -and ease which was perhaps over-elaborated by just a touch. Her -farewells, which followed almost immediately on their arrival at the -house, when a little bustle of departure ensued—in which Miss Newton -took no part, that young lady having promptly disappeared—were -characterised by the same manner, about which there was also a little -touch of suppressed excitement. It was not until she and Julian were -alone together in a first-class<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_256" id="page_256"></a>{256}</span> carriage of the London express that her -gay words and laughs ceased, and she let herself sink back in her -corner, unfolding a newspaper with a short, hardly audible sigh of -relief.</p> - -<p>A very slight and indefinable change had come to Mrs. Romayne’s face in -the course of the last two months. It had been perceptible in her -animation, and was still more perceptible in her repose. The lines about -her face which had needed special influences to bring them into -prominence during the winter were always plainly perceptible now; and -they gave her face a very slightly careworn look, which was emphasized -by the expression of her eyes and mouth.</p> - -<p>The eyes had always a slightly restless look in them in these days; even -now, as she read her paper, or appeared to read it, there was no -concentration in them; and every now and then they were lifted hastily, -almost furtively, over the paper’s edge. The mouth was at once weaker -and more determined; weaker, inasmuch as it had grown more sensitive, -more nervously responsive to the movements of her restless eyes; and -more<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_257" id="page_257"></a>{257}</span> determined, as though with the expression of a constant mental -attitude.</p> - -<p>There was a good deal of indecision in her face, and its expression -varied slightly, but incessantly, as she fixed her eyes anew on the -printed words before her after each fleeting glance at the boyish face -outlined by the cushions opposite. She laid down her paper at last, with -a little deliberate rustle, apparently intended to attract attention, -and as she did so her face assumed its ordinary superficial vivacity; an -expression which harmonised less well with the rather sharpened features -than it had done three months before.</p> - -<p>“A good novel, Julian?” she said airily, smothering a yawn as she spoke, -and indicating with a little gesture of her head the book in Julian’s -hand.</p> - -<p>Julian had been holding the book in his hand, ever since they left the -little Norfolk station from which they had started, but he had scarcely -turned a page. His features were composed into an expression of boyish -resentment, about which there was that distinct suggestion of sullenness -which is the usual outward expression of the hauteur of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_258" id="page_258"></a>{258}</span> youth. As his -mother spoke he flushed hotly with angry self-consciousness.</p> - -<p>“Not particularly,” he said, without lifting his eyes.</p> - -<p>There was a moment’s pause, during which Mrs. Romayne’s eyes were fixed -upon him with concentration enough in them now; and then she broke into -a light laugh, and leaning suddenly forward laid one of her hands on -his.</p> - -<p>“Poor old boy!” she said, in a tone half mocking, half sympathising. “It -was very hard on you, wasn’t it? It’s a cruel fate that makes young men -so ineligible, and girls so pretty, and throws the two perversely -together! If you’ve any thought to spare from yourself, sir, though, I -think you should bestow a little gratitude upon me for my very timely -arrival!”</p> - -<p>She laughed again, and in her laugh, as in her voice, there was the -faintest possible touch of reality, and that reality was anxiety. Then, -as Julian twisted his hand from under hers with a gruff and almost -inaudible: “I don’t see that!” she leant back in her seat again with a -smile.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_259" id="page_259"></a>{259}</span></p> - -<p>“My dear boy,” she said gaily; “it’s a very sad position for you, I -admit; but for the present you’re dependent on your mother—not such a -very stingy mother, eh, sir? I think you’ll find it will be all right -for you, when the right young woman turns up, as no doubt she will some -day. Perhaps you’ll find that your mother won’t abdicate so very -ungracefully. But, you see, it must be the right young woman!”</p> - -<p>In spite of the laugh in it, there was a ring in the tone in which the -words were spoken which was full of significance, and the significance -and the laughter seemed to be doing battle together as Mrs. Romayne went -on, ignoring Julian’s interjection:</p> - -<p>“I don’t think you would have found it a very pleasant situation, to be -engaged to Miss Newton with the prospect before you of keeping her -waiting until you had made your fortune at the bar; and I’m sorry to say -I don’t share your conviction of the moment, that she is the right young -woman. She is very pretty, I allow, and a very nice girl, no doubt.” -Mrs. Romayne’s voice grew a little hard as she said the last words. -“But<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_260" id="page_260"></a>{260}</span> she’s not at all the sort of girl that I should like you to marry. -She has no money, in the first place.”</p> - -<p>“I have enough for both,” said Julian impetuously, and then stopped -short and coloured crimson.</p> - -<p>His mother broke into a merry laugh.</p> - -<p>“No, poor boy!” she said. “I have enough for both! That’s just what I -want you to remember in your intercourse with pretty girls. After all, -you know, the position has its advantages! You may flirt as much as you -like while you’re known to be dependent on your mother, and no one will -take you too seriously.”</p> - -<p>Julian did not echo her laugh, nor did he make any comment on her words. -He sat with his face turned away from her, and a rather strange -expression in his eyes—an expression which was at once unformed and -mutinous. His mother could not see it, but the outline of his profile -apparently disturbed her. The anxiety in her face deepened again, mixed -this time with an expression of doubt and self-distrust. As though to -emphasize the lightness of her preceding tone, she turned<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_261" id="page_261"></a>{261}</span> the -conversation into a comment on the landscape, and took up her paper -again.</p> - -<p>The remainder of the journey passed in total silence; and the drive home -from the station was silent, too. An arrival in London at the end of -September is not a very pleasant proceeding, unless it is approached -with considerable industry, determination, and a large stock of energy. -The butterflies of society, and, indeed, a large proportion of the bees, -have not yet returned. Those who have returned have done so under stern -compulsion to begin the winter’s work; and there is a general, -all-pervading sentiment as of the end of holidays and the beginning of -term time.</p> - -<p>The day that had been so radiantly lovely in Norfolk had evidently been -oppressively hot and airless in town, and the general air of exhaustion -and squalor, which such circumstances are apt to produce in London, did -not help to render its appearance more attractive.</p> - -<p>Number twenty-two, Queen Anne Street, Chelsea, itself seemed to be -touched by the general depression. The summer flowers in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_262" id="page_262"></a>{262}</span> the -window-boxes had been taken away, and their successors were apparently -waiting for orders from the mistress of the house; and as Mrs. Romayne -and Julian entered the hall, there was that indefinable atmosphere about -the house which two months’ abandonment to even the best of servants is -apt to produce—an atmosphere which is the reverse of cheerful. There -were letters lying on the hall-table, one of which Mrs. Romayne handed -to Julian with the comment: “From Mr. Allardyce, isn’t it, Julian? Will -he be ready for you to-morrow?”</p> - -<p>Julian’s legal studies were, in fact, to begin in earnest on the -following day; and when, the next morning, he said good-bye to his -mother and set out for the Temple, she followed him to the door with a -laughing “Good speed.” That, at least, was her ostensible motive, but -there was something in her face as she laid her hand on his arm as he -turned away on the doorstep which suggested that the last words she said -to him were those that she had really followed him to say.</p> - -<p>“What time shall you be back, Julian?”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_263" id="page_263"></a>{263}</span></p> - -<p>And as he answered carelessly:</p> - -<p>“I can’t tell; not till dinner-time, I expect,” there came into her eyes -a curious shadow of yearning anxiety.</p> - -<p>“Take care of yourself, sir!” she said lightly, and went back into the -house.</p> - -<p>That shadow lived in her eyes all day as she went about giving orders -and “putting things to rights,” as she said; striving in fact, with a -concealed earnestness which seemed somewhat disproportionate to its -object, to give the house that peculiar air of brightness which had been -so characteristic of it, and which somehow did not seem so easily to be -obtained as formerly.</p> - -<p>Her face was gaiety itself, however, when she stood in the drawing-room -as the dinner-bell rang, very daintily dressed in a tea-gown which -Julian had admired, waiting for her son. A moment elapsed and Julian -dashed downstairs, breathless and apologetic, but rather sparing of his -words. His first day’s work hardly seemed to have dissipated the cloud -which had hung about him that morning at breakfast, and as his mother -slipped her hand playfully into his arm with a laughing<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_264" id="page_264"></a>{264}</span> word or two of -forgiveness, he turned and led her out of the room without the response -which would have been natural to him.</p> - -<p>“Have you had a pleasant day?” said Mrs. Romayne lightly, as they sat -down to dinner.</p> - -<p>“Pretty well,” returned Julian indifferently. He said no more, and Mrs. -Romayne, with one of her quick, half-furtive glances at him, began to -talk of her own day. She had paid some calls in the afternoon, and had a -great deal of news for him as to who had and who had not returned to -town; and a great deal of gossip which was both amusing in itself, and -rendered more amusing by the piquant animation with which she retailed -it. It failed to rouse much interest in Julian, apparently, however, and -after a time his mother returned to her original topic—again with a -quick, anxious glance at his face.</p> - -<p>“Did you find Mr. Allardyce easy to work with?” she enquired, -interestedly this time.</p> - -<p>“Yes: I suppose so,” was the unresponsive response.</p> - -<p>“How long did he keep you?”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_265" id="page_265"></a>{265}</span></p> - -<p>“I got away at four o’clock.”</p> - -<p>Something seemed to leap in Mrs. Romayne’s eyes—to be instantly -suppressed—as she said, with an indifference which any ear keener than -Julian’s might have detected to be forced:</p> - -<p>“Four o’clock! And what have you been doing since then, may I ask? You -did not come in till a quarter past seven.”</p> - -<p>Perhaps Julian felt the inquisition in the question, though he was -conscious of nothing unusual in his mother’s voice; for he answered, -rather briefly:</p> - -<p>“I went to the Garrick with a fellow.”</p> - -<p>“What fellow?” demanded his mother in the same tone.</p> - -<p>Julian moved impatiently.</p> - -<p>“There’s another fellow reading with Allardyce,” he answered. -“Griffiths—he took me in.”</p> - -<p>As though the suppressed impatience of his tone had not escaped her, -Mrs. Romayne found herself reminded at this point of something she had -heard that afternoon during one of her visits. And she proceeded to -place her little piece of news before Julian<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_266" id="page_266"></a>{266}</span> with every advantage that -narration could give it, though her face looked rather thin and sharp as -she talked. Dinner was over by this time, and as she finished with a -laugh, she rose from her seat, and put her hand on Julian’s arm. His -face was somewhat bored and dissatisfied, as though his mother’s effort -for his entertainment entirely failed to compensate him for the merry -house-parties of the last month.</p> - -<p>“I think I shall have to come and keep you company while you smoke your -cigar,” she said lightly; adding, with an assumption of a sudden thought -on the subject which was not wholly successful: “By-the-bye, the Garrick -Club must be a most attractive spot if you stayed there from four -o’clock till seven?”</p> - -<p>Julian took a quick step forward. The movement might have been due to -his desire to open the door for her, or it might have been an expression -of the irritation of which his face was full.</p> - -<p>“I didn’t get there at four,” he said. “I really don’t know what time it -was, but it must have been nearly five. And I<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_267" id="page_267"></a>{267}</span> walked home; so I left -somewhere about half-past six.”</p> - -<p>The irritation was in his voice as well as in his face; and his mother -patted him gaily on the shoulder, with her most artificially -self-deriding laugh.</p> - -<p>“He’s quite annoyed at being asked so many questions!” she exclaimed. -“It’s a dreadful nuisance to have such a silly old mother, isn’t it? But -you haven’t told me what Mr. Griffiths is like yet?”</p> - -<p>Julian had tried to laugh in answer to her first words; but the sound -produced had been almost as greatly wanting in reality as had been the -ease of his mother’s tone, and he answered now with undisguised -impatience.</p> - -<p>“Like? Oh, he’s like—any other fellow, mother. Nothing particular, one -way or the other.” He paused a moment, and then added hastily: “I was -rather thinking of running down to the club this evening, dear, if you -wouldn’t mind being alone. I want to hear whether Loring has come back. -There’s just a chance he might be there, you know.”</p> - -<p>He had said that morning that there was no likelihood of Loring’s -returning for another<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_268" id="page_268"></a>{268}</span> two or three days; but Mrs. Romayne forbore to -remind him of that fact. Nor did she allude to the conviction which had -turned her suddenly rather pale; namely, that his thoughts of going down -to the club had arisen within the last few minutes.</p> - -<p>“Very well, dear,” she said, smiling up at him. “Go, by all means. Oh, -no! I shall be quite happy with a book.”</p> - -<p>He did not look back at her as he left the room after another word or -two, or the expression on her face might have arrested even his -youthfully self-centred and preoccupied attention.</p> - -<p>Loring was not at the club, nor was there any information to be obtained -there as to his movements. Julian played a game of billiards and lost it -through sheer carelessness, and then determined to go home again. He -would walk part of the way, he said to himself, though he had had one -walk that day. He wanted to “think things over.”</p> - -<p>The phrase was serious, and by comparison with the process to which it -was attached, grandiloquent. Julian’s mental apparatus was at present as -undeveloped as that of a fashionable<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_269" id="page_269"></a>{269}</span> young man of four-and-twenty may -usually be taken to be. The process of “thinking things over,” as -conducted within his good-looking head, involved no stern process of -reasoning, no exhaustive system of logical deduction from cause to -effect, no carefully-balanced opinions of the past or decisions for the -future. When he proposed to himself to “think things over,” in short, he -simply meant that he should ring a strictly limited number of changes on -the fact that, as he expressed it vaguely to himself, it was “awfully -hard lines.”</p> - -<p>It had taken him some time to come to this conclusion. He had flirted -with Miss Hilda Newton very happily for the last ten days, with a great -deal of wholly unnecessary assistance from that young lady herself, -without the very faintest definite intentions towards her. He had -enjoyed it, and she had enjoyed it; and the idea which had occurred to -him once or twice, that his mother did not enjoy it, had not -particularly affected him. Circumstances alone would have been -responsible for the proposal which had so nearly been an accomplished -fact on the day before.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_270" id="page_270"></a>{270}</span> And had the speech to Miss Newton, interrupted -by Mrs. Romayne, reached its legitimate conclusion, and received its -inevitable response, it was extremely likely that he might by this time -have been the victim of a vague consciousness of having made a mistake. -But it had been interrupted; and a deeply-injured sense of having been -thwarted was consequently not unnatural in its author. That sense of -injury which might have passed away in mere sentiment, but which, on the -other hand, might, if it had been left untouched by words, have -developed into a secret breach between mother and son, had been focussed -and rendered definite and tangible, as it were, by his mother’s laughing -speeches in the train. It was as he had sat gazing blankly out of the -window during the last half-hour of their journey, that he had come to -the conclusion before mentioned that it was “awfully hard lines.”</p> - -<p>“It makes a fellow feel such a fool!” he said to himself as morosely as -the undeveloped nature of his temperament permitted, as he issued -moodily from his club and started in the direction of Piccadilly. “It -makes a<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_271" id="page_271"></a>{271}</span> fellow feel such a confounded fool!” He could not reduce this -general principle to detail, but what he really felt was something of -the sensation of the child who realises suddenly and for the first time -the “pretence” of the fairyland of shadows in which he has been -performing prodigies of valour.</p> - -<p>All the intercourse with the pretty girls of his “sets” which Julian had -hitherto accepted simply and unquestioningly, had suddenly become flat, -stale, and unprofitable to him. All illusions had gone from it, and the -reality was painfully unsatisfying, and wounding to his self-love. There -is all the difference in the world between a vague understanding and a -practical realisation. Julian had known, of course, from the very first -that he was dependent on his mother, but he had never felt it until the -previous day. He had known that marriage without her consent was -practically impossible for him; but the fact had never before been -brought home to him. The veto which had descended so impalpably and -decisively upon what he was now prepared to characterise as his hopes, -with regard to Miss Newton, shrivelling them to nothingness, had<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_272" id="page_272"></a>{272}</span> also -shrivelled away all the embellishing haze by which the conditions of his -life had been surrounded.</p> - -<p>The background to all his thoughts on the subject; the background which -had grown up almost without consciousness on his own part, with his -first humiliated realisation of the facts of the case, and which -remained a vague, brooding shadow in his mind; was resentment against -his mother; a resentment which, taken in conjunction with the careless -and effusive affection of his attitude to her hitherto, threw a curious -light on his relations with her. But against this background, and -affecting him far more keenly, was a sore sense that life had suddenly -lost its savour for him. The charm of flirtation had vanished utterly -before his mother’s words as to its harmlessness. The privilege which -she assigned to him seemed to reduce him to the level of a shadow among -substances, to put him at a hopeless disadvantage with all the women of -his world, and render his intercourse with them a farce of which both -they and he must be perfectly conscious.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_273" id="page_273"></a>{273}</span></p> - -<p>“It’s all such utter humbug!” he said to himself, that being the nearest -definition he could attain of the vague thoughts that were passing -through his mind. Then he ceased to express himself, even mentally, and -walked along, meditating moodily and discontentedly. He was walking -along Piccadilly when he found his thoughts gradually returning to his -actual surroundings as though something were drawing them, unconsciously -to himself, as extraneous objects which one is not even aware of -noticing will sometimes do.</p> - -<p>It was about eleven o’clock: not a very pleasant time in Piccadilly; and -the pavement was by no means crowded. The first detail to which he awoke -was the hilarious demeanour of a young man just in front of him, who was -walking, very unsteadily, in the same direction as himself. He was a -young man of the commonest cockney type, obviously in the maudlin stage -of intoxication.</p> - -<p>As Julian’s senses became more fully alive he noticed, a pace or two in -front of the young man, the shabbily-dressed figure of a girl. She was -walking hurriedly and nervously,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_274" id="page_274"></a>{274}</span> and as the young man quickened his -uneven steps in response to a sudden quickening of hers, Julian saw that -the intoxicated speeches which had first grown into his own meditation -were addressed to the girl, and that she was trying in vain to escape -from them. It was not a particularly uncommon sight for a London street, -and a half-indignant, half-careless glance would naturally have been all -the attention Julian would have vouchsafed it. But as the pair preceded -him up Piccadilly; the girl shrinking and afraid; afraid to attract -attention by too rapid movements; as much afraid, as her nervous, -undecided glances around her showed, of the help a protest might attract -to her as of her pursuer; the man, sodden and brutal, absolutely -destitute for the moment of reasoning faculty; Julian found his -attention fascinated by them.</p> - -<p>A spark of natural youthful chivalry, entirely undeveloped by his life, -stirred in him. He quickened his steps, involuntarily apparently, and -with no definite intention, for he was just passing them with a quick, -undecided glance at the girl, when he saw her<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_275" id="page_275"></a>{275}</span> stop suddenly and shrink -back against a neighbouring shop-front. Whether a faint shriek really -came from her, or not, he never knew, but her eyes met his and appealed -to him almost as if without the owner’s consciousness. The man had laid -a hot, drunken hand upon the worn, ungloved fingers.</p> - -<p>Julian stopped.</p> - -<p>“Let go!” he said peremptorily. His tone was so sharp, and the -interference was so sudden and unlooked-for, that the man, stupid with -drink, did as he was bidden as if involuntarily. “Be off!” continued -Julian in the same tone.</p> - -<p>The man stared at him for a minute, and broke into a maudlin laugh, a -discordant snatch of a comic song, and staggered on his way, as though -the sudden breaking of his chain of ideas had obliterated the girl from -his memory.</p> - -<p>She was standing, as Julian turned to her, leaning back against the -shop-front, shaking from head to foot, but evidently making a violent -effort to control herself.</p> - -<p>“Thank you, sir,” she murmured tremulously,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_276" id="page_276"></a>{276}</span> and was moving to go on her -way with faltering, trembling footsteps, when Julian stopped her.</p> - -<p>“This is not a nice place for you to be alone in,” he said almost -involuntarily. “Have you far to go?”</p> - -<p>He had looked at her for that moment during which she had stood -motionless, with her face outlined against the dark shutter, with a -strangely mingled feeling that her face was wonderfully unlike any with -which he was acquainted; and yet that he had actually seen it -before—seen it, and experienced the same half-startled, half-wondering -sensation. It was white now to the very lips, and the great, brown eyes, -dark and liquid, looked out from under their soft lashes and level -eyebrows, wide with terror and distress. Her features were beautifully -formed, though they were so thin and worn that it would never have -occurred to Julian to class her among the ranks of pretty girls. But the -real charm of her face lay about her mouth. It was very strong—though -the strength was latent and entirely unconscious; very simple, and very -sweet; and even the pallor of her lips<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_277" id="page_277"></a>{277}</span> and the slight trembling about -them could not detract from the beauty of the line they made. Her hair, -as Julian noticed, was of a soft black and very luxuriant. She was -rather tall, and her shabby jacket concealed and spoilt the outline of -her figure; but the set of her well-shaped head was full of instinctive -grace.</p> - -<p>She paused a moment before she answered him, looking into his face with -a simple directness which had a dignity of its own.</p> - -<p>“Yes, sir,” she said in a low voice, which shook a little in spite of -her evident efforts to steady it; “to the Hammersmith Road.”</p> - -<p>“But you’re not going to walk, are you?” said Julian.</p> - -<p>Apparently her glance at his face had satisfied her. She answered him -this time without hesitation.</p> - -<p>“Yes, sir,” she said.</p> - -<p>Her voice was very musical and refined. It harmonised better with her -face than with her worn, work-girl’s dress, and the dignified deference -of her manner.</p> - -<p>“Then you must let me see you safely<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_278" id="page_278"></a>{278}</span> part of the way, at any rate,” -said Julian impulsively.</p> - -<p>She hesitated, and looked at him again, and this time the large eyes -grew moist with tears.</p> - -<p>“It’s very silly of me,” she said tremulously. “I—I think it was his -touching me that upset me so.”</p> - -<p>She had been rubbing one hand, all this time, mechanically and -involuntarily, as it seemed, over the hand on which that drunken touch -had fallen.</p> - -<p>“I did try to get a ’bus, but they were all full. I couldn’t let you -take such trouble.”</p> - -<p>It needed only the unconscious gratitude of those words to convince -Julian that it would be no trouble whatever. And he asserted the same -with an assumption of authority and masterfulness quite new to him.</p> - -<p>It was an hour and a half later when his mother, sitting up, wakeful, in -her own room, caught the slight sound made by his latch-key in the door, -and noticed a moment’s pause before the door was opened. In that pause<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_279" id="page_279"></a>{279}</span> -there had come to Julian one of those sudden flashes of light which -sometimes illuminate a vainly-pondered question.</p> - -<p>“Of course!” he said to himself, as he shut the door with a bang. “Of -course! I knew I’d seen her before! In the thunderstorm, the night I -dined with Garstin!”</p> - -<p class="c">END OF VOL. I<br /><br /><br /><small> -F. M. EVANS <span class="ov">& CO., LIMITED, PRINTERS, CRYSTAL P</span>ALACE, S.E.</small></p> - - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Valiant Ignorance; vol. 1 of 3, by -Mary Angela Dickens - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VALIANT IGNORANCE; VOL. 1 OF 3 *** - -***** This file should be named 54093-h.htm or 54093-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/4/0/9/54093/ - -Produced by Chuck Greif, MFR and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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