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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..de493aa --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #54094 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/54094) diff --git a/old/54094-0.txt b/old/54094-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index aaf90fb..0000000 --- a/old/54094-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,5651 +0,0 @@ -Project Gutenberg's A Valiant Ignorance; vol. 2 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. 2 of 3 - A Novel in Three Volumes - -Author: Mary Angela Dickens - -Release Date: February 2, 2017 [EBook #54094] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VALIANT IGNORANCE; VOL. 2 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. II. - - London - - MACMILLAN & CO. - AND NEW YORK - 1894 - - - - - A VALIANT IGNORANCE - - - - -CHAPTER I - - -The oppressive autumn weather continued for the next week and more, but -the atmosphere in the house at Chelsea gradually cleared; at least, the -electrical disturbances which had, as a matter of fact, culminated in -Julian’s departure for the club, subsided. As the days went on, Julian -gradually recovered his spirits. His temper, which had given way so -suddenly and completely under the strain put upon it by the -unprecedented thwarting to which he had been subjected, recovered its -careless easiness. The injured expression of moodiness disappeared -wholly from his face, and his manner resumed its buoyancy. - -Nevertheless, the life of the present autumn was by no means the life of -the past spring. Partly, of course, the different framework was -responsible; life, especially at this particular moment, when winter -society was as yet hardly formed, consisted by no means wholly of a -social existence. It was, in fact, distinctly “slack” and heavy on -social lines as compared with the high pressure of the season; and the -introduction into the routine of life of a certain number of hours of -regular work on Julian’s part--the first practical acknowledgement in -the house in Queen Anne Street, that work had anything to do with -life--could not fail to alter the tone to some extent. But there was a -subtle change in Julian himself, which was hardly to be accounted for on -such broad lines. He had recovered his normal mental temperature, -indeed, but the interval of disturbance seemed to have had some -indefinable effect upon him. He had recovered himself--but it was -himself with a difference. It was almost impossible to narrow the -difference into words. To say that he was colder to his mother, or that -he stood deliberately aloof from her, would not have been true. But -there was a touch of independence about his whole personality which was -new to it; a certain suggestion of a separate life and separate -interests, such as must inevitably come to a man sooner or later, which -seemed to tinge his intercourse with her--superficially the same as it -remained--with something of carelessness, and even a hint of unconscious -patronage. - -If the change was felt by Mrs. Romayne, she made no sign; or, at least, -entered no protest. After the little explanation which had taken place -in the railway carriage she had utterly ignored the cloud which his -moodiness had created; and she ignored its passing away. When Julian was -at home she was always bright and pleasant; always charmed to have him -with her; always ready to let him go. Her little jokes at his expense in -his new character of a worker were full of tact. Her playful allusions -to her own solitary days were always light and gay. Nevertheless, the -characteristics which the ten weeks of their absence from town had -brought to her face grew and intensified during the ten days that -followed their return. Her eyes grew more restless, her mouth more -sensitive, as though the strained, sharpened look of anxiety which -haunted her face during the hour which preceded Julian’s return, and -during the whole evening, when, as happened several times in the course -of that ten days, he dined out, went deep enough to leave lasting tokens -of its presence. Her questions as to his work, and the new friends, the -new haunts, consequent upon it, seemed to come from her lips--far less -self-confident in expression in these days--almost in spite of herself. -They were always uttered with a playfulness which hardly masked a slight -nervousness underneath; a nervousness which seemed to be a reminiscence -of that first evening. - -She was sitting alone in her drawing-room one afternoon towards the end -of the second week of their return; she had a book in her hand, and a -tea-table before her. But she had neither poured herself out any tea, -nor could she be said to be reading. Every two or three minutes her -attention seemed to wander; her eyes would stray vaguely about the room, -and she would rise and move restlessly across it, to give some wholly -unnecessary touch to a drapery or a glass of flowers. Once she had -seated herself at her writing-table to begin a trivial note; but the -impulse had failed to carry her through, and she had returned to her -chair and her book. It was half-past four, and she was expecting -Julian. He had dined out on three consecutive nights, and was doing so -again to-night. And in reply to her laughing protest against “never -seeing him,” he had promised carelessly to come home and have afternoon -tea with her. - -The door-bell rang at last, and as the drawing-room door opened she -lifted a smiling face with a gaily approving comment on his punctuality. - -“Good boy!” she began. Then she broke off and laughed lightly, though -the brightness of her face suddenly ceased to be genuine. - -The figure on the threshold was that of Marston Loring. - -“Thank you,” he said; “I am glad you think so!” - -“The observation was not intended for you, I’m sorry to tell you,” -returned Mrs. Romayne, as she rose to receive him. “And I’m afraid even -if I applied it to you, you would hardly condescend to accept it. How do -you do? When did you come back? Sit down and let me give you some tea.” - -Loring sat down accordingly, with a mute witness in his manner of doing -so to a certain amount of intimacy both with the room and its mistress; -but that touch of admiring deference which had marked his demeanour -during the early stages of his acquaintance with Mrs. Romayne, was still -present with him, and was rendered only the more effective by the -familiarity with which it was now combined. - -“Thanks,” he said; “a cup of tea is a capital idea. But I don’t think -it’s quite kind of you to say that I wouldn’t condescend to the epithet, -‘Good boy.’ I should like to have it applied to me of all things. It -would be such a novelty, and so wholly undeserved!” - -He spoke in that tone of sardonic daring on which a great deal of his -social reputation rested, and Mrs. Romayne answered with a laugh. - -“No doubt it would,” she said, with that very slight and unreal -assumption of reproof with which such a woman invariably treats the -tacit confessions of a man of Loring’s reputation. “You only want the -epithet, then, because you know you don’t deserve it.” - -She handed him the tea as she spoke with a shake of her head, and added: - -“But tell me, now, when did you come back, and where have you been?” - -“I’ve been to the Engadine,” he answered; “why, I don’t know, unless -that for six weeks, at least, of my life I might fully appreciate the -charms of London! I don’t admire glaciers; snow mountains bore me; -altitudes are always more or less wearisome; and society _au naturel_ is -not to be tolerated. I reached town the day before yesterday.” - -Marston Loring was faultlessly dressed. It was impossible to associate -his attire with anything but Piccadilly and the best clubs and the best -drawing-rooms. His face, with its half-cynical, half-wearied expression, -was, in its less individual characteristics, one of the typical faces of -the society of the day. His voice and manner, well-bred, callous, and -entirely unenthusiastic, were the voice and manner of that world where -emotion is so entirely out of fashion that its existence as an -ineradicable factor of healthy human nature is hardly acknowledged. - -His presence and his cynical, cold-blooded talk seemed to do Mrs. -Romayne good. Her face and manner hardened slightly, as though her -nerves were braced, and something of the pinched, restless look of -anxiety faded. - -“It’s very nice of you to come and see us so soon!” she exclaimed with -genuine satisfaction. “Town has really been abominably empty these last -ten days. I suppose we came back rather too soon, but it seemed time -that Julian should get to work. Really, I’ve hardly seen a soul.” - -“It is a deadly time of year,” assented Loring, with a quick look at -her, “but I’m grateful to it if it makes my presence welcome to you. Of -course I called at once. I was rather afraid you might be still away.” - -“We came back ten days ago,” answered Mrs. Romayne, accepting and -putting aside his little compliment with a mocking gesture, as a form of -words entirely conventional. “Julian has been quite lost without you. -He is looking very well, I think, and is working amazingly.” - -The introduction of Julian’s name into the conversation had in neither -case come from Julian’s friend; but this time it appeared to strike -Loring as incumbent upon him to pursue the topic. - -“The approving words with which you received me were intended for him, I -suppose,” he said carelessly. “You’re expecting him?” - -There was a moment’s pause while Mrs. Romayne turned her head, as if -involuntarily, and listened intently; that haunted look coming suddenly -back into her eyes. The moment passed, and she turned to Loring again -with a quick, self-conscious glance, and an unreal laugh. - -“I’m expecting him; yes,” she said. “I’m ridiculous enough to make that -very obvious, I’m afraid! I’m so glad he won’t miss you. He doesn’t -generally come in at this hour. This is a treat--for me!” - -She laughed, and Loring said with mock solemnity of interest: - -“Indeed!” - -“I really had to be quite plaintive this morning,” she went on in the -same tone, “on the subject of not seeing him for four days except at -breakfast! He has made a good many new acquaintances already, it seems, -and has to dine out a good deal.” - -“Really!” commented Loring. His tone was quite unmoved, and Mrs. Romayne -did not see the expression in his shrewd, shallow eyes, as she spoke--an -expression of amused curiosity. “He dines at his club, I suppose?” he -enquired indifferently after a moment. - -“Yes; or at some ‘other fellow’s’ club,” laughed his mother. “Legal -institutions, I suppose!” - -There was a brief silence; one of those silences which come when one -branch of a conversation is felt to be exhausted; and then Loring -finished his tea, put down his cup, and settled himself into a -comfortable attitude. - -“I forget whether you were taken with the Ibsen craze last season, Mrs. -Romayne?” he said. “We shall all have to tie wet towels round our -heads--it won’t be becoming, I’m afraid--and give ourselves up to -solitary meditation, I hear! He is to be the thing this winter, they -tell me.” - -“Ibsen?” repeated Mrs. Romayne reflectively; obviously searching in her -memory for some ideas to attach to the name, which she was as obviously -conscious of having heard before. “Ibsen? Oh, yes,” with a sudden flash -of inspiration, “oh, yes, of course; that ‘Dolls’ House’ man, that -everybody talked of going to see just at the end of the season.” - -The first of those startling pictures of human nastiness which have -since exercised criticism to so great an extent, and which may or may -not be revelations, had taken a wonderful hold upon a certain section of -“society,” and had become, as Mrs. Romayne’s words implied, almost the -fashion in the preceding June. Society is always inclined to be literary -and intellectual, or rather, to an assumption of those qualities, in the -winter. It was with a sense of the absolute duty of priming herself -beforehand that Mrs. Romayne continued, with every appearance of the -deepest interest: - -“Ah, no! I’m sorry to say I was never able to spare an evening. -Everybody told me all about it, though. It must have been awfully clever -and interesting. But, you see, just at that time one has so much on -hand! There was that dreadful bazaar, too. By-the-bye, have the Pomeroys -come back yet, do you know, Mr. Loring?” - -Mr. Loring believed that they had not, and after a little discussion of -their probable plans, Mrs. Romayne returned to the subject of Ibsen. - -“Are they going to bring out a new play of his, did you say?” she said -carelessly. - -“So I hear,” answered Loring. “An extraordinary piece of work, with a -tremendous theory in it, of course. The idea is the influence of -heredity.” - -Mrs. Romayne started slightly. A strange flash leapt up in her eyes, and -as it died out, quenched as it seemed by iron resolution, it left a -curious expression on her face; it was an expression in which a light -scorn--the normal attitude of the shallow, fashionable woman towards -deep questions of any kind--seemed to be battling indomitably for a -place against something which was hardly to be held at bay, by no means -to be suppressed. - -“Heredity!” she said; and the ring of her voice matched the expression -of her face. - -“It’s rather an interesting subject,” continued Loring indolently. -Scientific questions in their social aspects were just becoming -fashionable. “It’s wonderful how long we have stopped short at the -inheritance of Roman noses, and violent tempers, and plain facts of that -kind without getting to anything more subtle.” - -“Yes; I suppose it is,” answered Mrs. Romayne. There was a hard -restraint in her voice, which Loring took for preoccupation and laid to -the account of her expectation of Julian. She was sitting with her back -to the light, and he could not see the expression of her face. - -“It’s awfully consoling, don’t you know,” he went on in the same tone, -“to feel that one can lay all one’s little failings to the account of -some dead and gone ancestor, with a scientific mind. I don’t notice, -by-the-bye, that even the greatest and most enthusiastic scientists show -any tendency to refer their virtues and talents back. I presume they are -always self-developed.” - -Mrs. Romayne laughed, as she was obviously intended to do; but her laugh -was rather harsh. - -“Do you know, I think scientific men are a dreadful race!” she said. -“They think that they know so much better than everybody else, and that -what they know is so immensely important. As a rule, you know, it’s -about something that they really can’t know anything about, and if they -could, it would be a great deal better not to bother about it.” - -She spoke with a confident, conclusive superiority, which is only -possible, perhaps, in that section of society to which knowledge and -brain-power are among the minor and entirely unimportant factors of -life--except when the knowledge is knowledge of the world, and the -brain-power that which has adapted itself to the requirements of -society. But the superiority in her tone rang strained and false. She -seemed to be forcing the attitude on herself even more than on Loring; -and there was a faint ring of defiance in her voice--utterly -inconsistent and incompatible with the words she spoke. The combination -was curiously suggestive of that consuming fear which denies the very -existence of that by which it is created. - -Loring, however, was too fully occupied with a cynical appreciation of -the humorous aspect of the wholesale condemnation of learning by crass -ignorance to detect anything beneath the surface. An enigmatical smile -touched his lips. - -“There’s a great deal of penetration in what you say,” he said. “Of -course, there would be! But I think you’re a little sweeping, perhaps, -when you say that they don’t really know anything. Take heredity, for -instance; it’s an actual fact, capable of demonstration, that----” - -But Loring’s eloquence was broken short off. At that moment the door -opened, and Julian Romayne came into the room. - -Mrs. Romayne started to her feet at the sight of him with a strange, -hardly articulate sound, which was almost a gasp of relief, though it -passed unnoticed by either of the two men, as Julian advanced quickly to -Loring. - -“How are you, old man?” he said pleasantly. “Awfully glad to see you -back again.” - -“This is the reward of merit, you see!” said Mrs. Romayne, as Loring -replied, in the same tone. “You come home to tea with your mother, and -you find a friend! Will you have some tea, sir?” - -Her face was still a little odd, and unusual-looking, especially about -the eyes; and the touch which she laid upon Julian, as if to enforce her -words, was strangely clinging and nervous in its quick pressure. - -The talk drifted in all sorts of directions after that; all more or less -personal, either to the speakers, or to mutual acquaintances. As the -moments passed, Loring’s eyes were fixed once or twice, with momentary -intentness, on the younger man. That new touch of independence about -Julian did not belong only to his manner with his mother. It was just -perceptible towards the friend whom he had hitherto admired with boyish -enthusiasm. - -Loring rose to go at last, and as he did so he turned to Julian. - -“If it were not that I don’t like to propose your deserting Mrs. -Romayne,” he said, “I should ask you if you wouldn’t come and keep me -company over a lonely dinner at the club, Julian? I suppose you don’t -want to get rid of him, by any chance?” he continued, turning to Mrs. -Romayne. - -Mrs. Romayne and Julian laughed simultaneously; Julian with a little -touch of embarrassment. - -“I’m sure my mother has no objection to getting rid of me,” said Julian -rather hastily; “but, unfortunately, I’m engaged.” - -“Engaged!” said Loring. “Lucky fellow, to have engagements at this time -of year!” - -His tone was a little satirical, and Julian, who was following him out -of the room, flushed slightly. His colour was still considerably deeper -than usual when he dashed upstairs after seeing Loring out, and put his -head in at the drawing-room door. - -“I’m afraid I must be off directly, dear,” he said carelessly. “I was -awfully sorry to get in so late, but Allardyce wanted me.” - -An hour later, Julian was dining at a restaurant, dining simply, and -dining alone. Having finished his dinner, and smoked a cigarette, -glancing once or twice at his watch as he did so, he took his hat and -coat and strolled out. It was nearly a quarter past eight, and the only -light was, of course, the light of the street-lamps and the gas in the -shop windows. - -He passed along Piccadilly, not quickly, but with the deliberate -intention of a man who has a definite destination, until he came to a -certain side-street. Then he turned out of Piccadilly, and slackening -his steps, sauntered slowly up on the right-hand pavement. He had walked -up to the end of the street, casting sundry glances back over his -shoulder as he did so, and was turning once more, as though to saunter -down the street again, when the figure of a woman entered at the -Piccadilly end. As soon as he saw her, Julian threw away his cigar, and -quickening his steps, went to meet her. - -The face she raised to his was the face of the girl on whose behalf he -had interfered in Piccadilly ten days before, and her first words were -uttered in the soft, musical voice that had thanked him then. - -“Have you been waiting?” she said; “I’m sorry.” - -The tone of the few words with which he answered, together with the -expression with which he looked at her, showed as clearly as volumes of -explanation could have done where and how the new Julian was being -developed. - -“Only a minute or two,” he said. “A lonely fellow like me doesn’t mind -waiting a few minutes for the chance of a talk, as I’ve told you -before.” - -She looked up at him with simple, pitying eyes, and a certain -wistfulness of expression, too. - -“It seems so sad!” she said softly. “But you’ll make friends in London -soon, I’m sure. Have you been working very hard to-day?” - -“Have you been working very hard, is the more important question?” he -said, turning his eyes away from those candid brown ones, with, to do -him justice, a certain passing shame in his own. “I’m afraid there’s no -need to ask that! You look awfully tired, Clemence!” - -She shook her head with a pretty, brisk movement of reassurance. - -“Oh, no!” she said, “it’s not been at all a hard day. It never seems -hard, you know, when we don’t have to stay late, unless something goes -wrong in the work-room; and I don’t think that happens very often.” - -There was a simple, genuine content in the tone and manner in which the -words were spoken, which, taken in conjunction with the colourlessness -of the face, the tired look about the eyes, and the poor, worn dress, -told a wonderful little story of patience and serenity of spirit. - -All that Julian Romayne knew of Clemence Brymer--the brief and very -simple outline of her life as she had told it to him--was comprised in a -few by no means uncommon facts. She was a “hand” in one of the big -millinery establishments, and had worked at the same place for the last -two years. Before that time she had lived from her childhood first with -a married brother, and then, when he died, with his widow and children. -From a certain touch of reserve in her manner of speaking of those -particular years, Julian had gathered that they had been hard ones. The -marriage of the brother’s widow, and her departure to Australia, had -left Clemence alone in London. Her parents, she told Julian, had come -from Cambridgeshire; and one of her faint recollections of her father, -who had died when she was only five years old, was of sitting on his -knee in their little attic room in London, and being told by him about -his country home. Her mother had died when she was a baby; and all her -scanty recollections seemed to centre round the father, who, as she said -simply, had been “a very good man.” - -The simple trust and confidence in her face as she raised it to Julian -now was a curious contrast to the nervous, half-frightened uncertainty -of her glance at him on that night in the spring when they had shared -for those two or three minutes the shelter of the same portico. But -paradoxical as it seems at first, both expressions were the outcome, on -different lines, of the same moral characteristic. Clemence, though -there was that about her--as her face testified--which kept her, in all -unconsciousness and innocence, strangely aloof and apart from her world, -had not spent her life in London without learning to know its dangers. -But the very purity which made the glances which she was forced to -encounter in the streets at night a distress to her; which made the very -proximity of an unknown “gentleman” an uneasiness to her; which made -theoretical evil, in short, a terror to her; rendered her singularly -incapable of recognising its existence on any but the baldest lines. Her -confidence was quickly won because, though she was conscious of a world -of evil about her, it was as a something large, and black, and obvious -that she regarded it. Brought into contact with herself, anything -fair-seeming was touched by the whiteness of her own temperament; and, -with such unconscious extraneous aid, the thinnest veil was enough to -hide from her anything behind. Her confidence once won, might be -destroyed, but could hardly be shaken. Something in Julian’s face and -manner had won it for him, and the outline of his circumstances which he -had given her had won him something else--her pity. - -Exactly by what motive he had been actuated in his statements to her, -Julian would have found it rather hard to say; as a matter of fact he -never asked himself the question. Before the end of their first walk -together he had presented himself to her as a medical student living -entirely alone in London, having no female friends, or even -acquaintances, and wearying often of the rough masculine companionship -of his fellows. On these grounds he had asked her when they parted at -the end of a little poverty-stricken street near the farther end of the -Hammersmith Road, whether he might meet her now and again and walk home -with her. She had hesitated for an instant, and then had assented, very -simply. - -“You haven’t had to work late for four nights now,” she said, as they -turned their backs upon Piccadilly and began to walk steadily in the -opposite direction. “Shall you have to to-morrow night, do you think?” - -She lifted her eyes to his face as she spoke, and as he looked down and -met them it would have been clear to an onlooker what was the charm that -those long evening walks possessed for Julian. In the girl’s clear eyes -there was admiration and absolute reliance. In the look with which he -answered them there was conscious superiority and protection. - -Just at the moment when he was sore and smarting with a sense of -humiliation and futility; when in his newly-aroused angry discontent all -intercourse with women of his own class had become a farce and an -inanity to him; accident had thrown it into his power to create for -himself, as it were, a world in which all that had suddenly revealed -itself as lacking in his actual life should be lavished upon him. For -his acquaintance of Piccadilly he had absolutely no surroundings, except -such as he chose to give himself. The Julian Romayne of society, the -nonentity, the “figure-head,” as he had muttered angrily to himself, had -no existence for her. It was Julian’s own private Julian, a personality -developed side by side with the sudden and violent re-adjustment of his -conception of his relations with the world, who was looked up to, -listened to, respected, and deferred to during the hour’s walk which lay -between that side-street out of Piccadilly and a certain little street -out of the Hammersmith Road. A vague, undefined craving for pre-eminence -and admiration had risen in him with his realisation of his dependence, -and the reflected nature of the light with which he shone in society. To -a weak nature in which that craving has once stirred it matters little -by what means it is met, so that it is to some extent satisfied. - -The walk of to-night was a repetition of the walks that had preceded it; -the talk a little more intimate and a little more personal in tone than -any of its predecessors, as that of each of the latter in its turn had -been. - -In the course of the day something had occurred to remind Clemence of -her father and her father’s old home, and in intervals of Julian’s talk -about himself, she told him a good deal about her thoughts of that -little country place; of how there had been Brymers here for generations -and generations. - -“You must have been Puritans once,” said Julian, laughing, as he often -laughed, at some little grave turn of her speech as he looked into the -sweet, serious face. Work-girl as she was, she seemed to have acquired -neither the talk nor the voice of her kind. The simple form of her -words, her accent, and her gentle voice, seemed to belong to a past, -quiet and full of a modest dignity of which the London of the nineteenth -century hardly knows. “You would have made an awfully jolly little -Puritan, Clemence!” - -“I don’t know,” she said simply; “I was so little when father died. But -he felt it dreadfully, I’ve heard, when he came to London; it nearly -broke his heart.” - -“Why did he do it, then?” said Julian lightly. - -“He thought he ought,” returned the girl. “You see, there was nothing -to do at Feldbourne--nothing but ploughing, and country things, you -know. And father thought a man ought to do something--that everything -was meant to go on and get better, you know--and that every man ought to -help, ought to work. So, of course, he was obliged to come, you see.” - -They had come to the end of the road now, where they always said good -night, and as she spoke she was standing still, looking simply into his -face. He looked at her for a moment with something in his eyes which -seemed to be struggling vaguely into life side by side with the careless -mockery of his “set.” - -“He was obliged to come, because he thought he ought,” he said. “Do you -always do what you think you ought, Clemence?” - -“I try,” she said simply. “Every one tries, I suppose.” - -He laughed--the laugh that was so like his mother’s--but not quite so -freely as usual, and held out his hand. - -“I don’t know about that,” he said. “Good night, Clemence.” - -“Good night,” she said. - -He hesitated a moment. He never went to meet her without a firm and -definite intention of sealing their parting with a kiss. But he had -never done so yet, and he did not do it now. - -“Good night,” he said again, rather lamely; and then they parted, she -going quickly and quietly down the street, he passing out of it into the -noise and bustle of the Hammersmith Road. - -Once there, he paused as though undecided. - -“It’s too early to go home,” he said to himself. “I’ll go down to the -club for a bit.” - -There were a good many men in the club-room when he entered it half an -hour later--and Julian--quite another young man to the Julian who had -walked to the Hammersmith Road--was discussing the latest society topic -with much animation over a whisky and seltzer, when Loring, to whom he -had nodded at the other end of the room, strolled up to him, cigar in -hand. - -“Dinner been a failure?” he enquired. - -There was nothing particular about the words; and the tone in which they -were uttered was singularly, almost significantly, devoid of expression. -But there was a keen, satirical expression in his eyes as he fixed them -on Julian. - -Julian started slightly at the words, and a curious flash of expression -passed across his face. - -“More or less,” he said, with a careless frankness that seemed just a -trifle excessive. - -“Who was the man?” - -“I don’t think you know him,” said Julian, his carelessness bordering on -defiance. - -Loring smiled. His smile was never particularly pleasant, and at this -moment it was unusually cynical. - -“I know a good many men, too,” he observed. - - - - -CHAPTER II - - -The slight alteration in Julian of which Marston Loring was conscious, -and a subtly evinced consequence of that alteration--namely, that -intimacy with the son no longer involved of necessity even an -introduction, far less intimacy, at the mother’s house--had no effect -whatever upon Loring’s relation with Mrs. Romayne, unless, indeed, it -might be said to emphasize his position as friend of the house. During -the three weeks which followed immediately upon his first call after his -return to town, he saw at least as much of Mrs. Romayne as he had done -in the course of any previous three weeks since Julian’s first -introduction of him; though the young man was no longer an obvious and -tangible link between them. He dined in Queen Anne Street a few days -after his return, but except on that occasion it chanced that he hardly -ever met Mrs. Romayne and Julian together. He met the latter often -enough at one or other of the clubs, or about town. On the former he -called, as in duty bound, after the dinner, and again and yet again at -short intervals. She had consulted him about a purchase of old oak, with -which she wished to surprise Julian, and the purchase seemed to -necessitate in his eyes frequent consultation. He also happened to meet -her once or twice when she herself was paying calls. - -She was always, apparently, pleased to see him. More pronounced, -perhaps, when she met him among other people than when she received him -alone, but still always more or less present, there was a certain eager, -unconscious assertion of something like intimacy with him about her -manner. Marston Loring was quick to observe the new note, and he prided -himself likewise on the caution with which he refused to allow it even -the value he believed it to possess. He caught her quick recognition of -his presence; her tendency to draw him always into the conversation in -which she happened to be engaged; the tacit assumption of mutual -interests and understanding lurking in her voice; and he sifted and -dismissed these things, cynically, as probably meaningless. But astute -as he was, he never thought of them in connection with the constant -references to Julian; the questions as to Julian’s doings; with which -her conversations with him were full. Of these latter he took hardly any -account--except for an occasional sardonic smile. Clever as he thought -himself, there were vast tracts of human nature to which he had no clue, -in the very existence of which he disbelieved; consequently, it was not -surprising that he should now and then mistake cause for effect. - -At about noon on a bright, cold October day he got out of a hansom at -twenty-two, Queen Anne Street, with a certain cynical expectancy on his -face. The weeks which had passed since Mrs. Romayne and Julian returned -to town on that close September day had brought on winter, and had -settled winter society fairly into its grooves; and on the previous -evening Marston Loring and Mrs. Romayne had met at a dinner-party. Mrs. -Romayne had been alone. To enquiries made for her son, and regrets at -his absence, she had replied, with a gaiety which became absolutely -feverish as the evening wore on, that he was unfortunately engaged. -Throughout the evening, as though some kind of strain were acting upon -her self-control, all the characteristics of her demeanour towards -Loring had been slightly exaggerated. Loring had detected, before he had -exchanged two sentences with her, that she was not herself; that she was -unstrung and nervous; and arguing on totally false premises he had come -to a totally false conclusion. She had pressed him restlessly about the -commission he was doing for her, and he had twisted it this morning into -an excuse for coming to see her when he knew she would be at home. - -“It is an unheard-of hour, I know,” he said, as she rose to receive him -with an exclamation of surprise. “But I want a little more detail, and -one or two measurements, before I can execute your orders -satisfactorily.” - -He had seen before she spoke that the weakness of the night before, from -whatever cause it had arisen, had passed away; the lines about her face -were set into a determined, uncompromising cheerfulness, and her voice -as she spoke conveyed the same impression. - -“It is more than kind of you, and I am very glad to see you,” she said. -“I’m always glad to see Julian’s friend, you know.” The last words with -a laugh. “You don’t happen to have met him this morning, I suppose?” - -Loring signified, without a hint of sarcasm, that it was more common not -to meet the man one would wish to meet in the Temple than to meet him, -and Mrs. Romayne laughed again. - -“I know,” she said. “But one gets an absurd impression that men doing -the same thing in the same place must be always coming across one -another. It’s very ridiculous, of course. You and he have always had a -knack of finding one another out, though. I suppose you are quite one -another’s greatest chums, aren’t you? Is ‘chum’ still the word, -by-the-bye?” - -“I believe so,” returned Loring carelessly. “Yes,” he continued in a -different tone, “I don’t know when I’ve taken to any one as I took to -Julian.” - -There was a little gesture, half-mocking, half involuntary, which -accepted the words as a personal compliment, and Mrs. Romayne said with -a smile: - -“You are a curious pair of friends, too, are you not? Julian”--her voice -in uttering the name seemed to have acquired a new tenderness in the -past month, and lingered over it now, evidently unconsciously and -involuntarily--“Julian is such a boy, and you are--a great deal older -than you ought to be.” - -She shook her head at him with a reproving laugh, and he answered in his -most _blasé_ manner: - -“I’m a man of the world, you see. I knew it all through and through -before Julian had left school. I hope you wouldn’t have preferred -another boy for his ‘chum’!” - -There was a daring and a challenge in his tone which made the question -personal rather to himself than to Julian; but Mrs. Romayne took it from -the other point of view. - -“Quite the contrary!” she said quickly. “Another boy would not have been -at all the thing for him. I am delighted to think that his mentor is a -wise one. I rely on you, Mr. Loring, do you know!” - -She stopped abruptly. The last words, uttered suddenly and -involuntarily, had seemed curiously charged with a meaning which could -not get itself expressed. She paused an instant and then, half as though -she wished to laugh some impression away, half as though she wished the -words to have significance, she added: - -“You’ll remember that, won’t you? Shall we go down and see about the -fittings?” - -She rose as she spoke and led the way down to Julian’s room. The room -was already as perfect as might be. Only a great restlessness, an -irrepressible and incessant impulse to give pleasure to its occupant, -could have dictated further improvements; and as Mrs. Romayne talked and -explained, the same restless instinct of service expressed itself in -sundry little involuntary touches to trifles about the room--about -Julian’s chair and his writing-table. - -The door-bell rang at length, and her face, over which that new and -weaker expression had stolen, hardened suddenly. - -“I’m afraid I must send you away now!” she said, turning to Loring. -“I’ve made an appointment for this morning to get through some bothering -business. You understand now just what I want, though, don’t you?” - -“I think so!” answered Loring reflectively. It would have been strange -indeed if he had not understood by this time. “But I’m sorry I must go!” - -“I’m sorry too!” said Mrs. Romayne lightly. “I hate business, and it -loses none of its solemnity, I can assure you, when it is transacted by -my connexion, Dennis Falconer. He is my trustee, you know!” - -Loring smiled. He did not detect anything behind her words, and it -struck him always as perfectly natural that Mrs. Romayne and her -“connexion” should be somewhat antagonistic. “I should imagine he would -be a rather ponderous man of business!” he said. - -The parlour-maid entered at this moment to announce that Mr. Dennis -Falconer was in the drawing-room, and as they left the room Mrs. -Romayne turned again to Loring. - -“To tell you the truth I find him rather ponderous at all times!” she -said with a laugh. “Didn’t you say once that altitudes were oppressive? -Well, I must go and be oppressed!” - -She held out her hand as she spoke, and then paused. - -“Oh, by-the-bye,” she said, “Julian wants you to come and dine one day -next week--only he’s so much engaged. Which day will suit you?” - -“Thanks!” answered Loring. “I shall be charmed!” His face was quite -impassive as he spoke, but he was wondering nevertheless whether Julian -had as yet heard of the invitation. From what he had observed lately, he -fancied that Julian had reasons of his own for avoiding home -engagements. “I am engaged on Tuesday and Thursday,” he continued, “but -on any other day I shall be delighted. Did Julian have a successful -evening yesterday?” - -Mrs. Romayne had explained to him on the previous night with forced -merriment that her son was “dining with a fellow, he says!” - -“Yes, I think so!” she answered lightly. “I don’t know which ‘fellow’ it -was, you know. Well, then, I will send you a note.” - -They had moved out into the hall as they talked, and now as she paused -at the foot of the stairs he shook hands again, and went out of the -house as she turned and went up to the drawing-room. Dennis Falconer was -standing waiting by the fire. - -“Most punctual of men!” she said airily as they shook hands. “How do you -do?” - -Dennis Falconer had by this time had five months of inaction and -ill-health, and the fact that he was heartily weary of both by no means -served to soften the natural tendency of his manner towards reserve and -severity. In settling down to London life for the winter, too, the fact -that he was no longer a new lion gave an added tinge of monotony to -existence for him, honestly unconscious as he was of this truth. The -days went very heavily with him; he was conscious of having come to a -dreary bit of his life’s journey, and he endured it conscientiously--if -with rather self-conscious self-respect. An added gravity and silence -seemed to him under the circumstances by no means to be deprecated. - -Under these circumstances the contrast between him and Mrs. Romayne as -they exchanged the trivialities of the situation was inexpressible, and -it was not surprising that they touched almost instantly upon the -business which was the cause of their interview. It was not a long -affair; it turned upon Mrs. Romayne’s desire to have rather more ready -money at her command; and Dennis Falconer, having explained the -situation to her; having stated his views, evidently conscientiously -compelled thereto; and having entered a formal protest against her -instructions; returned to his pocket the notebook to which he had been -referring as if to emphasize the close of the matter. Then he paused. - -Mrs. Romayne had drawn a quick, slight breath of relief at his action, -but the breath seemed to suspend itself for an instant on this pause, -and the eyes with which she watched his were very bright and intent. - -“As your only near relative,” he began with formal gravity, “and as your -son’s only near relative, I feel myself bound to take this opportunity -of approaching a subject which has been in my thoughts for some time. -Any man of ordinary knowledge and experience of the world, having regard -only to the most ordinary circumstances, would tell you that so large an -allowance as you make your son is not an advisable thing for any young -man.” - -Mrs. Romayne had listened with her expression veiled and repressed into -an intent vigilance, and as he finished a dull flush--which was none the -less hot and significant because it had not the vivid intensity of the -angry flush of youth--crept into her face, and her eyes glittered. Her -tone as she spoke witnessed to a strong self-control, and an intense -determination not to abandon her position or to lessen by one jot the -distance she had set between them. - -“I am sorry you think so!” she said carelessly. - -“I think so, emphatically,” he returned. “I should think so for any -young man. For William Romayne’s son----” - -Mrs. Romayne had been gathering up some papers from the table with -light, careless movements; she rose now rather suddenly but still -carelessly. What seemed to him almost shameful callousness quickened -Falconer into what he thought a righteous disregard for all -conventionality. - -He too rose, but his movement was no response to hers; rather it seemed -to crush and dominate its suggestion of easy dismissal with the -implacable austerity of a reality not to be put aside. He stood looking -at her, forcing her, by the suddenly asserted superiority of his man’s -determination and mental weight, to meet his grave, condemning eyes. - -“Does your son know what his father was?” he said in a low, stern voice. - -He had forced down the barrier, he had annihilated the distance, and she -faced him with glittering eyes, that dull flush all over her face, its -mask gone. - -“No!” she said, and from her hard, defiant voice, also, all -artificiality had dropped away. - -“He knows nothing of his danger; he has no safeguards, and he has money -at his command which would be temptation to any young man. Think what -you are doing!” - -For a couple of seconds they confronted one another, separated by no -conventionalities, man and woman, with the common memory of a common -horror between them, holding them together in spite of every obstacle -which temperament and habit, mental and moral, could interpose. - -Then with a tremendous effort the woman’s strength reasserted itself, -and by sheer force of her will she thrust away the horrible reality -which he had forced upon her. She laughed. - -“I really don’t know what we are talking about!” she said. “I am sure -you mean most kindly as to my spoilt boy’s allowance, but we won’t -trouble to discuss it! So good of you to take the trouble to think of -it--and so unnecessary!” - -For a moment Falconer gazed at her almost petrified with amazement and -disgust. His perceptive and imaginative faculties had not developed with -the passing of years; his mental processes were slow; and for all their -ghastly exaggeration he accepted the careless, shallow artificiality of -her tone and manner, and the smiling unfeelingness of the rebuff she had -given him, exactly as they appeared upon the surface. It was some -seconds, even, before he thoroughly realised how ruthlessly and -completely she had imputed to him all the attributes of a meddler; and -as he did so an added distance touched the uncompromising sternness -which had gradually settled down upon his face. - -“I beg your pardon!” he said, and the formal, unmeaning words seemed, in -their enforced condescension to her level, to carry with them a lofty -condemnation which was even contempt. “Good day!” he added stiffly; and -then, not seeing, apparently, the hand she extended to him with a hard, -smiling “Good-bye,” he left the room. - -Mrs. Romayne’s face remained curiously blanched-looking all the -afternoon, as though she had received some kind of shock. She spent the -afternoon in paying calls, and whenever she returned alone to her -carriage there crept back into her eyes--bright and eager as she talked -and laughed--a certain haunting questioning, not to be driven quite -away by any simulation of gaiety. - -As her afternoon’s work drew to a close, her eyes were no longer quite -free from it, even as she made her attractive conversation, and when she -rose to bring her last visit to an end she was looking very tired. She -was just shaking hands with her hostess when Mrs. Halse was announced. - -To spare herself one iota of what she considered her social duty--even -when that duty took the form of civility to a woman she disliked--was -not Mrs. Romayne’s way. With exactly the exclamation of pleasure and -surprise which the situation demanded she waited, pleasantly desirous of -exchanging greetings with the new-comer, while Mrs. Halse bore down -vociferously upon the mistress of the house. Mrs. Halse had only very -recently returned to town, and there was all the excitement of novelty -about her appearance. She was a good deal louder even than usual, partly -as the result of this excitement, and partly as the result of absence -from town; and she had also grown considerably stouter. Announcements -of this fact, lamentations, and explanations mingled with her greetings -of her hostess, and were still upon her lips when she turned to Mrs. -Romayne. - -“Abominable, isn’t it?” she said, pouring out her words as fast as they -would come, and without waiting for any answers. “Such a trial! I -suppose I shall have to go in for Turkish baths or something horrible of -that sort. And how is everybody? How is that wicked young man of yours, -Mrs. Romayne? I heard of his goings on at the Ponsonbys’! By-the-bye, do -tell him that Hilda Newton is engaged to be married. So good for him! No -doubt he thinks she is pining away. A very good match, too--young -Compton; rich and good-looking; rather a fool, but don’t tell Master -Julian that.” - -Master Julian’s mother was smiling so charmingly that it was with some -difficulty that Mrs. Halse, who, with the assistance of Miss Newton, had -guessed the substance of the conversation which had actually taken place -between the mother and son in the railway carriage during their journey -from Norfolk, had some slight difficulty in restraining the -ejaculation, “Cat!” - -“Really!” was the suave answer. “Miss Newton is really engaged, and so -well. So glad! Such a charming girl! Yes, I’ll tell Julian, certainly. -His heart will be broken--temporarily. Fortunately his fancies are as -ephemeral as they are numerous. Good-bye! So glad to have seen you.” - -She pressed Mrs. Halse’s hand cordially as she spoke, and pursued her -graceful way to the door. - -Julian was dining out again that night, and her lonely evening -apparently affected his mother’s nerves. At any rate, Julian received a -message the next morning--a Sunday--to the effect that she had slept -badly and was resting, but would see him at lunch, and at lunch-time -accordingly she appeared. - -She laughed at his half-careless, half-affectionate enquiries, calling -herself quite rested and quite well. And after his first enquiries as to -her health, Julian relapsed into rather moody silence--silence with -which his mother had apparently nothing to do. That tone of independence -which had come to him, and which was sometimes hardly perceptible, -could hardly have been more strongly evidenced than by his one or two -spasmodic efforts to pass out of his own life--where something was -evidently not to his liking--into the life they shared. - -Such a state of things is always more or less disturbing to the mental -atmosphere; more or less according to the sensitiveness of the person -upon whom it acts; and as Mrs. Romayne sat opposite Julian the furtive -glances which she cast at his moody, preoccupied face became more and -more anxious and restless. A tentative, uncertain tone in her manner of -dealing with him, which had developed during the last month, increased -moment by moment; and her voice and laugh as she chatted to -him--ignoring his indifferent reception of her little bits of -news--became moment by moment more forced and unreal. That her nerves -and her self-control were not so reliable as they had once been was -evident in the fact that she took refuge--as was not unusual with her in -these days--in painful exaggeration. - -Her bright little flow of talk stopped at last, however; and Julian -making no attempt to fill the gap, there was total silence. It was -broken again by Mrs. Romayne, and she was talking now, evidently, for -talking’s sake, as though she was no longer capable of weighing her -words; but, in her intense desire to penetrate the vague atmosphere -which she could not challenge, was making her advances blindly. - -“I met Mrs. Halse yesterday,” she began gaily. “Did I tell you? -Fortunately I only encountered her for a few moments, or I doubt whether -I should be alive to tell the tale.” - -She paused, and Julian smiled absently. They had finished lunch, and he -had risen and strolled to the fire with a cigarette, and he was thinking -vaguely, as her voice broke in upon his meditations--or perhaps rather -feeling than thinking--that his mother was rather artificial. All -society women were artificial, he had thought once or twice lately; and -the word was acquiring a new significance to him. - -“She bestowed an immense amount of conversation upon me in the course of -those few minutes!” continued Mrs. Romayne in the sprightly tone which -her son was beginning to hear for the first time as something jarring. -“Amongst other things she told me a little piece of news which will -interest you.” - -“Yes?” said Julian indifferently. - -A fellow didn’t always want to be entertained, he was saying to himself -irritably; it was a nuisance. His thoughts had wandered completely, and -he was going over a fruitless hour which he had spent alone walking up -and down a certain side-street off Piccadilly, on the previous -evening--an hour which was accountable for his gloomy humour this -morning--when he became aware of his mother’s voice saying with -insistent gaiety: - -“Well, sir, aren’t you broken-hearted?” - -Julian started and made a futile effort to realise what his mother had -said. The necessity for the effort and its failure proved by no means -soothing to him, and he said rather impatiently: - -“I’m awfully sorry, mother, but I’m afraid I didn’t hear.” - -“He didn’t hear!” echoed Mrs. Romayne in mock appeal to heaven and -earth to witness the fact. She, too, had made an effort and a failure, -and the result with her was to increase her nervous recklessness. “Five -weeks ago he was ready to eat his poor little mother because she -prevented his proposing to this young woman, and now when I tell him -she’s engaged he doesn’t even hear! Perhaps you’ve forgotten Hilda -Newton’s very existence, my lord! Who is her successor?” - -Julian flushed angrily, and his good-looking face took a sullen -expression. - -“She’s not likely to have a successor, as you call it,” he said. “A -fellow doesn’t care to have that kind of thing happen twice.” - -His mother broke into a thin, nervous laugh. - -“You don’t mean to say it rankles still!” she said gaily. “Is this the -reason of your devotion to work and ‘fellows’? You silly old boy, you -ought to be thoroughly glad of your escape by this time! I think I shall -follow Dennis Falconer’s advice, and cut down your allowance to teach -you reason. Shall I?” - -The jest, dragged in as it was, had a forced ring about it; perhaps it -bore all-unconscious testimony to the oppressively insistent power of -that haunting questioning of yesterday. But Julian, knowing nothing of -this, was simply conscious of ever-increasing irritation from her voice -and manner. - -“I don’t see what business my allowance is of Dennis Falconer’s!” he -said gruffly. And then side by side with his growing sense of his -mother’s artificiality, there grew in him an overmastering desire for -another woman’s presence--a simple presence, to which social subtleties -and affectation were unknown. Why hadn’t Clemence met him yesterday -evening? How could he tell when he would see her again? To-morrow he -could not meet her. Then his reflections paused, as it were, absorbed in -a vague sense of discomfort and discontent, until a fresh thought stole -across them; a thought which presented itself by no means for the first -time that day. - -Why should he not go and see her this afternoon? After all, why should -he not? He never had done such a thing, but--did it mean so much as it -seemed to mean? And if it did? Why not? - -“I don’t see either,” his mother said; and Julian smiled grimly as he -thought how little she knew the question she was answering. “It’s our -business, isn’t it? And it’s my private business to find you a nice -wife--not yours at all, you understand.” These last words with a laugh. -“She must be pretty, I suppose--good style at any rate--and she must be -rich, and she must have the makings of a good hostess in her. Really, I -think I must begin to look her out. Don’t you think----” - -Julian interrupted her. He was hardly conscious that he was doing so; he -had hardly heard her words; but the atmosphere of the perfectly -appointed room, with its artificial mistress, had suddenly become -absolutely intolerable to him, and he had answered his own question -suddenly and recklessly. - -“I’m going out, mother,” he said. “I’ve got some calls to make, and it’s -getting late. You won’t go out this afternoon, I know. Good-bye.” - -He was gone almost before she had realised that he was going. - -To Mrs. Romayne it was a repetition of their first evening at home -together in the autumn. The nervous excitement under which she had been -acting died suddenly away, and she realised what had happened; realised -it, and sat for a moment staring at it, as it were, her hands clenched -on the tablecloth, her face haggard and drawn. - -To Julian it was no repetition. It was a new departure, sudden and -unpremeditated, and as he walked away from his mother’s house his face -was alight and eager with excitement and determination. - - - - -CHAPTER III - - -On finding himself condemned to twelve months in London, Dennis Falconer -had debated the question of where he should live at some length; and had -finally decided on returning to some rooms in the neighbourhood of the -Strand, in which he had been wont to establish himself during his -temporary residences in London for the past fifteen years. It was not a -fashionable part of London. Falconer was a richer man now than he had -been fifteen years before, and there were sundry luxuries to be had in -those quarters of London where wealthy bachelors congregate, which were -not recognised so far south of Piccadilly. It was also natural to him to -think twice before he abandoned the idea of living where it was “the -proper thing”--of the hour--to live. But he was known and respected in -his old rooms; he would be received there with deferential delight; he -would be of the first importance in his landlady’s estimation; and these -things, little as he knew it, had a distinct influence on his decision. - -The two rooms which he occupied, on the first floor, bore a strong -likeness to the majority of first-floor rooms in the same street, -occupied by single gentlemen. These gentlemen were not, as a rule, of -the class who think it worth while to impress their artistic character -upon the room in which they live; as a whole, indeed, they might have -been said to lack artistic character. Here and there was a more -inveterate smoker, newspaper-reader, or novel-reader, as the case might -be, the sign manual of whose tastes was not to be obliterated. But as a -rule it was the landlady’s taste that reigned supreme and monotonous. - -Dennis Falconer’s rooms were no exception to the rule. The furniture was -very comfortable, very solid, and very ugly, in the style of thirty -years ago; an artistic temperament would have modified the whole -appearance of the room, insensibly and necessarily, in the course of a -week. But Falconer was not even conscious that anything was wrong. He -was as nearly devoid of æsthetic sense, even on its broadest lines, as -it is possible for a civilised man to be; and the state of mind which -takes pleasure in the tone of curtains and carpets, and the form of -tables, chairs, or china, was to him incomprehensible, and consequently -a little contemptible. - -On a November morning, with an incipient yellow fog hanging about, the -appearance of the room in which breakfast was waiting for him was -calculated to cast a gloom over a temperament never so little open to -such influences; and Dennis Falconer as he opened his bedroom door and -came slowly out, looked as though his mental atmosphere was already -sufficiently heavy. He always breakfasted punctually at nine o’clock, -and he never went to bed before one; it simply never occurred to him to -make any concession to the emptiness of his present life by spending -more than seven hours out of the twenty-four in sleep, even if he had -been physically able to do so. And there were days when the intervening -seventeen hours hung on his hands with an almost unendurable weight. He -had never been a man who readily made friends, and his tendency in this -direction had steadily decreased as he grew older, so that the few men -with whom he was intimate were friends of his early manhood; and, as it -happened, none of these intimates were in England at the moment. He was -absolutely incapable of forming those cheery, unmeaning -acquaintanceships which make the savour of life to so many unoccupied -men. He was one of those men with whom no one thinks of becoming -familiar; who is vaguely supposed either to have a private and select -circle of friends, or to be sufficient for himself; whose demeanour, -correct, self-contained, and a trifle formal, seems to hold the world at -a distance. Consequently his intercourse with his fellow-creatures was -limited by his present life to slight conversation on the topics of the -day at his club, or in various drawing-rooms where he paid grave, stiff -calls, or attended stately functions. Cut off from his own particular -work he had no interests and no pursuits. - -It was a dreary life in truth, and it was little wonder that Falconer’s -expression grew rather more austere with every week. The sentiments of -a man of his temperament towards a world in which there seemed so little -place for him, and from which he could derive so little satisfaction, -would inevitably tend towards stern disapproval. - -On this particular morning the sense of dreariness was very heavy upon -him. On the previous day he had had an interview with the great doctor -to whose fiat he owed his detention in London. The great doctor had been -indefinite and unsatisfactory; had looked grave and talked vaguely about -troublesome complications and a possible necessity of complete repose. -Falconer had made no sign of discomposure, had taken his leave with his -usual courteous gravity, and had left the consulting-room with a cold -chill at his heart. The cold chill was about it still this morning as he -walked to his window before going to the breakfast-table, and stood -there looking blankly out. What he was really looking at was the -prospect before him if, as the doctor had hinted, he should have to lie -up for a time. A lodging and a nurse, or a hospital; solitude and -confinement in either case. - -He sighed heavily, and turning as though with the instinct to turn away -from his troubles, he sat down to the table, poured out his coffee, and -took up the letters lying by his plate. There were only two--one in a -common-looking envelope directed in an illiterate hand, the other in a -clear, characteristic man’s hand, at the sight of which his face -brightened perceptibly. - -“Aston,” he said to himself, and opened it quickly. - -His friendship for the little doctor, which time had only served to -strengthen, was, perhaps, the most genial sentiment of Dennis Falconer’s -life, and Dr. Aston’s absence in India at this particular period had -been a bitter disappointment to him. He had hoped for some time that the -doctor’s plans--always of a somewhat erratic nature--might bring him -back to London shortly; and as his eyes fell on the first sentence of -the letter a slight sound of intense relief escaped him; an eloquent -testimony to his present loneliness. Dr. Aston began by telling him that -he would be in England before Christmas. - -The letter was long and interesting; it abounded in bits of vivid -description and shrewd observation, and its comments on Falconer’s -proceedings were keen and kindly. Its recipient allowed himself to -become absorbed in it to the total neglect of his breakfast, and his -expression was lighter than it had been for weeks when he came upon -these sentences towards the close of the letter: - -“By-the-bye, in the ‘latest intelligence’ of London society--all is fish -in the shape of human nature that comes to my net, as you know, and I -study that curious institution carefully whenever I get the chance--I -constantly, nowadays, come across the name of a Mrs. Romayne. ‘The -charming Mrs. Romayne and her good-looking son’ is the usual formula. It -is not by any chance the little woman with whom I got myself and you -into such a terrible fix years and years ago at Nice--William Romayne’s -widow? Is it any relation? I should like to know what became of that -little woman, if you can tell me; she had stuff in her. And whether the -boy has dreed his weird yet?” - -Falconer laid down the letter abruptly, and turned to his breakfast, his -face stern and uncompromising. His interview with Mrs. Romayne, now a -fortnight old, had accentuated markedly his grim disapprobation of her; -and the strong feeling of reprobation that stirred him then had so -little subsided that the least touch was enough to re-endow it with -vigorous life. - -“Stuff in her!” he muttered, with a world of contempt in the curt -ejaculation. “Stuff in her! If Aston only knew!” - -He glanced at the letter again, and a certain disapproval, personal to -the writer, expressed itself in the grave set of his lips as he re-read -the words about Julian; his whole mental and moral attitude was -antagonistic to, and inclined to condemn, what he characterised, now, as -“Aston’s dangerous theories.” He passed with what seemed to him -practical sense from “Aston’s extravagance” to a stern consideration of -the heinousness of such a life and education as Julian’s for a young man -in Julian’s position. Julian’s position, rightly considered, involved in -his eyes a reaping in obscurity, humility, and sombreness of life of the -harvest of shame and disgrace which his father had sown; and that there -was anything inconsistent between this view of the case and his -condemnation of Dr. Aston’s theories he was utterly unaware. - -He applied himself to his breakfast, still meditating on Mrs. Romayne -and the probable consequences of her callousness; and then he took up -the other letter and opened it. - -At the opening of his last expedition, one of the men attached to it had -met with a disabling accident, and had been sent home. The man had been -with Falconer on a previous expedition, and when the latter returned to -England he had made enquiries about him, and had finally, and with no -little difficulty, traced him out to find him crippled for life, and in -a state of abject poverty. Falconer, according to his narrow and -orthodox lights, as strictly conventional in their way as were Mrs. -Romayne’s in hers, was a good man. The letter he was reading now, from -the wife of this man, was written by a woman by whom he was regarded as -a kind of Providence; to be reverenced indeed, not loved, but to be -reverenced with all her heart. She and her husband had been rescued by -him from despair; all that medical skill could do for the man had been -done at his expense. The pair had been settled by him in a small house -in Camden Town, where Mrs. Dixon, a brisk, capable woman, was to let -lodgings. To this house Falconer had been once or twice to see the -crippled man; and he was not now surprised to receive from the wife the -information--conveyed in a style in which natural loquacity struggled -with awe of her correspondent--that the husband had had one of the bad -attacks of suffering to which he was liable, and that if Mr. Falconer -could spare half an hour, Dixon would “take it very kind with his duty.” - -Falconer smiled grimly at the words “if Mr. Falconer could spare half an -hour.” His whole day was practically at Dixon’s disposal. He would go up -to Camden Town that afternoon, he decided; he almost wished he had -thought of going before, and as the thought crossed his mind, the -remembrance of what might possibly be lying in wait for himself in the -not very distant future made him rise abruptly and thrust his letters -into his pocket. - -It was about twelve o’clock when he left his rooms and walked slowly -away in the direction of club-land. He usually got through an hour or so -at his club before lunch, reading the papers and so forth. The -threatening fog of three hours earlier had rolled away, and there were -gleams of wintry sunshine about which made walking pleasant. Dr. Aston’s -letter had cheered Falconer considerably; the feeling, too, that he had -a definite occupation for his afternoon, and an occupation which was not -invented, was invigorating; and altogether he was in better spirits than -he had been for many a day. He was walking up Waterloo Place, when his -eyes, which could not forego, even in a London street, their trained -habits of keen, accurate observation, lighted on Marston Loring, who was -coming down Waterloo Place on the opposite side of the road. Loring was -a man Dennis Falconer particularly disliked, and after one disapproving -glance he was looking away, when he saw the other suddenly stop with a -movement--and evidently an exclamation--of surprise and welcome. In the -same instant he became aware that Julian Romayne had turned out of a -side-street, and was greeting his friend apparently with effusion. -Falconer’s brow clouded involuntarily. The instinct of kin was so strong -in him that there was a certain touch of personal feeling, little as he -wished it, in his connection with the Romaynes, which made the thought -of them particularly disagreeable to him; and here, for the second time -to-day, the young man and his mother were forced upon his notice. He -pursued his way up the street, watching Julian grimly, and as he passed, -still on the opposite pavement, the corner where the two young men were -standing, Julian happened to look across, saw him, and made a ready, -courteous gesture of salutation. Falconer returned it stiffly enough, -and walked on. - -Julian turned to Loring with a laugh. - -“Old bear!” he said; “I wish he’d take himself off to Africa or -somewhere. He’s a regular wet blanket to have about! Well, old fellow, -and what’s the news?” - -Julian was looking very fresh, vigorous, and full of life. There was a -curious suggestion about him of alertness which was not without a -certain excitement; and his tone and manner as he spoke were almost -superabundantly frank and loquacious. - -Ten days before, Loring had received a note from Mrs. Romayne telling -him that Julian was going for a week’s holiday to Brighton, and that the -alteration in his room must be completed if possible in his absence. “It -is a sudden idea with him, apparently,” she had written; “but do let us -take advantage of it.” - -If Loring had had his own private notion on the subject of this sudden -idea on Julian’s part he had made no sign to Julian’s mother; he had -paid, in silence, his cynical tribute to the maternal wisdom which had -presumably recognised the fact that if freedom is not granted it will be -snatched. - -Three days had now passed since Julian’s return, but it had happened--he -himself could perhaps have told how--that until this Saturday afternoon -he and Loring had not met. There was nothing in his face and manner at -this moment, however, but the most lively, even demonstrative -satisfaction; and without giving Loring time to answer his question he -went on, with an ease and gaiety which were very like, and yet unlike, -his mother. - -“Where were you off to? The club? Come and have some lunch with me, do! -I want to tell you how first-rate I think my room. I hear you’ve taken -no end of trouble over it. It was awfully jolly of you, old man!” - -“Glad you like it,” returned Loring nonchalantly. “Yes, I think it’s -nice. But it was Mrs. Romayne who took the trouble.” - -He was studying Julian keenly, though quite imperceptibly, as he spoke. -The young man’s manner was assumed--of that Loring was quite aware. But -what, exactly, did it hide? What exactly was the secret? - -He debated this question calmly with himself throughout the lunch which -they took together a little later on; interposing question and remarks -the while into Julian’s flow of fluent talk and laughter. About -Brighton, in particular, Julian was full of chatter; and as he wound up -a vivacious description of his doings there, Loring commented mentally: - -“He hasn’t been to Brighton at all!” - -Aloud he said, as genially as nature ever allowed him to speak: - -“Well, it’s very jolly to see you back again, my boy. Do you know we’ve -seen next to nothing of one another lately, and I vote we turn over a -new leaf, eh? What are you going to do this afternoon, now?” - -He was leaning back in his chair lighting a cigarette as he spoke, and -apparently his attention was wholly claimed by the process; as a matter -of fact, however, he was studying Julian’s face intently, and his sense -of annoyance was not untinged with admiration when not a muscle of that -good-looking face moved. Julian leant back and crossed his legs airily. - -“I promised to go to the Eastons’, I’m sorry to say!” he said. “It’s an -awful bore! We might have done a theatre together!” - -Now, the Eastons were mutual acquaintances of the two men, but it so -happened that they had taken irremediable offence against Loring over -some detail connected with the bazaar, and it was no longer possible for -him to call upon them. Julian was of course aware of the fact, and -Loring smiled cynically at what he recognised as a very clever move. - -“A pity!” he said composedly. “Better luck another time. Well, you’re -not in any hurry, anyway.” - -“Not a bit!” assented Julian, cheerfully disposing of himself in a most -comfortable and stationary attitude. But a moment later he sprang to his -feet. “By Jove!” he exclaimed, “I nearly forgot! I’ve got a commission -to do for my mother in Bond Street--shop closes at two. Can I do it?” - -A hurried reference to his watch assured him that he would just do it, -and with a hasty farewell he dashed out of the room. Loring did not -propose to accompany him. It was not worth while, he told himself; and -he smiled sardonically as Julian departed. - -“I shall find out,” he said to himself. “Of course I shall find out! The -question is, is it worth while to wait, or shall I play my game with -what I know? The attached friend of the boy warning his mother in -time”--he smiled again very unpleasantly--“or the sympathising friend of -the mother having made a terrible discovery! Which is the better pose? -The latter, I think. Yes, the latter! I’ll wait until I’ve made my -discovery.” - -He dropped the end of his cigarette into an ash-tray, sat for a moment -more in deep thought, and then rose and strolled slowly away. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - - -Julian, meanwhile, hailed a passing hansom, sprang into it, and told the -man to drive, not to Bond Street but to the Athenæum, Camden Town. There -was an air about him as of one who plumes himself on having done a -clever thing, and as he settled himself for his long drive there was a -curious excitement and radiance in his face. When the cab reached its -destination at last he jumped out and walked rapidly and eagerly away. - -It was not a neighbourhood likely to be familiar to a young man about -town, but Julian pursued his way with the certainty of a man who had -followed it several times before. In about ten minutes he turned into a -neat and respectable little street, consisting of two short rows of -small houses with diminutive bow windows to the first-floor rooms. -About half-way down he stopped at a house on the right-hand side and -knocked with a quick, decided touch. He was an object of the deepest -interest as he stood upon the little doorstep to a brisk, -curious-looking woman who was standing in the ground-floor window of the -house opposite, but her opportunity for observation was brief. The door -was opened almost immediately, and with a pleasant greeting to the -woman, who stood aside, he passed her and ran upstairs--a course of -action evidently expected of him. He opened the door of the front room -on the first floor and went eagerly in. - -“Here I am!” he cried. “Did you expect me so soon?” - -Standing in the middle of the room, as though she had suddenly started -from her chair, with her hands outstretched towards him, was Clemence; -and on the third finger of that thin, left hand there shone a bright -gold ring. - -Her face was a delicate rosy red, as though with sudden joy just touched -with shyness, and all the beauty which had been latent in her tired, -work-worn face seemed to have been touched into vivid, almost startling -life, by the hand of a great magician. By contrast with the face she -turned to Julian now, the large eyes deep and glowing, the mouth -trembling a little with tenderness, the face of a month ago, pure and -sweet as it had been, would have looked like the inanimate mask of a -dormant soul. The soul was awake now, quivering with consciousness; -womanhood had come with a purity and beauty beyond any possibility of -girlhood. Looking at her face now, it was easy to see by what means -alone the latent strength of her character might be developed. - -He drew her into his arms with an eager, confident touch, and she -yielded to him completely, clinging to him with the colour deepening in -her face as he kissed it boyishly again and again. It was a fortnight -only since he had kissed her first. - -“I was watching for you,” she said softly. “I heard your step.” - -He laughed exultantly and kissed her again. - -“I thought you’d be watching!” he said. “Though I’m earlier than I told -you, do you know? Much earlier! I say, Clemence, how jolly the room -looks!” - -It was a small room, furnished and decorated in the simplest and -cheapest style; as great a contrast as could well be imagined to the -rooms to which he was accustomed. But it was very clean and very -comfortable-looking; and there was a homelike, restful atmosphere about -it which might well have radiated from the slender figure in the plain -dress, with that shining wedding-ring and lovely, flushing face. She -smiled, a very sweet, pleased little smile. - -“Do you think so really?” she said. “I am so glad. It is that beautiful -basket-chair you sent, and the flowers.” She glanced as she spoke at a -pot of chrysanthemums standing on a little table in the window. Then she -turned to him again, her eyes a little deprecating. “Do you think you -ought to spend so much money?” she said shyly. - -Julian laughed, and flung his arm round her, as he surveyed the little -room with a vivid air of proprietorship. Here he was master. Here his -word was law. Here he was in a world of his own making, and his only -fellow-creature was his subject. - -“It looks jolly!” he pronounced again as a final dictum. “Now, come and -sit down, Clemence, and tell me what you’ve been doing since yesterday!” -He settled himself into the arm-chair by the fire with a lordly air as -he spoke, adding: “Come and sit on this stool by me, like the sweetest -girl in the world.” - -Clemence hesitated, hardly perceptibly. Hers was a nature to which -trivial endearments came strangely, almost painfully. She had not yet -learned to caress in play; and there was an innate, unconscious, -personal dignity about her to which trivial self-abasement was -unnatural. But almost before she was conscious of her reluctance there -swept over her, like a great wave of hot sweetness, the remembrance that -she was his wife! It was her duty to do as he wished. She came softly -across the room, sat down on the stool he had drawn out, and laid her -cheek against his arm. - -It was a trivial action, very quietly performed, but it was instinct -with the beauty of absolute self-abnegation; and as if, as her physical -presence touched him, something of her spirit touched him too, a sudden -quiet fell upon the exultant, self-satisfied boy at whose feet she sat. -Not for the first time, by any means, there stole over Julian a vague -uneasiness; a vague realisation of something beyond his ken; something -in the light of which he shrank, unaccountably, from himself. His hand -closed round the woman’s hand lying in his with a touch very different -from the boyish passion of his previous caresses, and for a moment he -did not speak. Then he said slowly and in a low, dreamy voice: - -“Clemence, I can’t think why you should ever have loved me!” - -The hand in his thrilled slightly, and the head on his shoulder was just -shaken. Clemence could not tell him why she loved him. The bald outline -she could trace as most women can trace it. She could look back upon -her first sense of reliance, her pity, her admiration, her sense of -strange, delightful companionship; but the why and wherefore of it, the -mystery which had given to this young man and no other the key of her -soul, this was to her as a miracle; as, indeed, there is always -something miraculous in it, even when it seems most natural. To account -for love; to say that in this case it is natural, in this case it is -unnatural; is to confess ignorance of the first great attribute of -love--that it is supernatural and divine. - -There was another silence, a longer one this time, and the strange spell -sank deeper into Julian’s spirit. He said nothing. It would have been a -relief to him to speak; to reduce to words, or, indeed, to definite -consciousness, the vague trouble that oppressed him; but its outlines -were too large and too vague for him. It was in truth a sense of total -moral insolvency, but he could not understand it as such, having no -moral standpoint. Clemence neither moved nor spoke; her hand lay -motionless in his; her cheek rested against him; her beautiful eyes -looked straight before them with a dreamy, almost awestruck gaze. - -At last, with a desperate determination to thrust away so unusual an -oppression, Julian moved slightly and began to talk. He wanted to get -back his sense of superiority, and his voice accordingly took its most -boyish and masterful tone. - -“You haven’t told me what you’ve been doing, Clemence?” he said. “Have -you given notice at your bonnet shop as I told you?” - -Clemence lifted her head and sat up, clasping her hands lightly on the -arm of his chair. - -“No!” she said gently. “I thought I would ask you to think about it -again. I would so much rather go on if you didn’t mind. For one thing, -what could I do all day?” She looked up into his face as she spoke with -deprecating, pleading eyes, which were full of submission, too; and the -submission was very pleasant to Julian. - -“I do mind,” he said authoritatively. “I can’t have it, Clemence. I -can’t always see you home, don’t you see, and I won’t have you about at -night alone. Besides, I don’t choose that you should work.” - -“But I do so want to!” she said, laying her hand timidly and -beseechingly on his. “It will be so difficult for you to keep us both; -you will overwork yourself, I’m so afraid. Oh, won’t you let me help? -I’ve always worked, you know; it doesn’t hurt me. You don’t want to -forget that you’ve married a work-girl, do you?” - -She smiled at him as she spoke, one of her sweet, rare smiles, and he -kissed her impetuously. - -“Don’t talk nonsense!” he said imperiously. “I can’t allow it, and -that’s all about it. How do you suppose I could attend to my work when -I’m kept at the hospital in the evening, if I were thinking all the time -of you alone in the streets! No, you must give notice on Monday!” - -She looked at him wistfully for a moment. He was condemning her to long -days of idleness, to constant uneasiness and self-reproach on his -behalf, to a certain loss of self-respect. But self-sacrifice was -instinctive with her. - -“Very well!” she said simply. - -The little victory, the assertion of authority restored Julian’s spirits -completely, and he plunged into discursive talk; more or less -egotistical. It was all, necessarily, founded on falsehood, and it would -have been a delicate question to decide when his talk ceased to be -consciously untruthful, and became the expression of a fictitious Julian -in whom the real Julian absolutely believed. - -The afternoon wore on; the winter twilight fell, bringing with it a -slight return of the fog of the morning; two hours had passed before -Julian moved reluctantly, and said that he must go. - -“I shall come to-morrow!” he said, taking her face between his hands and -kissing it. “We’ll go out into the country if it’s fine. I wish it were -summer-time! Have you ever seen the river, Clemence?” - -“Not in the country,” she said. “It must be nice! How much you’ve seen! -Do you know I often think that you must wish sometimes I was a lady! I -don’t know anything and I haven’t seen anything, and----” she faltered, -and he rose, laughing and drawing her up into his arms. - -“Any one can know things,” he said lightly, “and any one can see things. -But no one but you can be Clemence! Do you see? Oh, what a bore it is to -have to go!” - -He was lingering, undecidedly, as though a little pressure would have -scattered his resolution to the winds, and seated him once more in the -chair he had just quitted. But, since he had said that he must go, it -never occurred to Clemence to ask him to stay. If it were not his duty -he would never leave her. If it was his duty now, how could she hold him -back! - -“To-morrow will come!” she said, looking into his face with a brave -smile. - -“I don’t believe you want me to stay!” he returned, half laughing, half -vexed. - -“Don’t I?” she said simply, and he caught her in his arms again. - -“What a shame!” he said. “There, good-bye! Are you coming to the door?” - -She shook her head. - -“I’ll stay here,” she said, “and watch you from the window. I see you -farther so. Ah, it’s rather foggy! I’m so sorry! You’ll look up? -Good-bye!” - -She lifted her face to his and kissed him tenderly and shyly, and he -left her standing by the window. - -Julian ran downstairs, let himself out, and stood for a moment on the -doorstep as he realised the disagreeable nature of the atmosphere. At -the same instant the door of the house opposite opened, and a man came -out, attended to the threshold by a woman. She caught sight of Julian -instantly, and said something to the man, as he stood in the shadow, in -a deferential whisper. Julian shook himself, confounded the fog, and -then glanced up at the window from which the light streamed on his face. -He waved his hand, turned away, and walked rapidly down the street, -pulling up his coat collar as he went. - -As he went, Dennis Falconer slowly descended the two steps of that -opposite house, and slowly--very slowly--followed him. - - - - -CHAPTER V - - -“Good-bye! So glad to have seen you! What, dear Mrs. Ponsonby, are you -going to run away too? So kind of you to come out on such an afternoon! -Good-bye!” - -It was a Friday afternoon, and Friday was Mrs. Romayne’s “day.” This -particular Friday had been about as unpleasant, atmospherically, as it -is possible for even a November day to be, short of actual dense fog; it -had been very dark, and a drizzling rain--a dirty rain too--had fallen -unceasingly. Under these circumstances it was rather surprising that any -one should have ventured out, even in the most luxurious brougham, than -that Mrs. Romayne’s visitors should have been comparatively few in -number. - -The departure of the ladies to whom her farewells had been spoken, and -with whom she had been exchanging social commonplaces for the last -quarter of an hour, left her alone; and as she returned to her chair by -the dainty tea-table and poured herself out a cup of tea, she had -apparently very little expectation of further callers, though it was -only just past five o’clock; for when the door-bell rang a few minutes -later she paused, and a look of surprise crossed her face. She put down -her cup with a little sigh, which was more a concession made to the -dictum of conventionality that callers are a bore than an expression of -real feeling; and then, as the door opened, she rose with a touch of -genuine satisfaction. - -“My dear Mrs. Pomeroy!” she exclaimed. “How sweet of you to come out on -such a shocking day! Really, you must have had an intuition of my -forlorn condition, I think! Maud, dear, how are you?” - -She had given her left hand to the girl in a familiar, caressing way as -she retained Mrs. Pomeroy’s right hand, and now she drew the elder lady -with charming insistence towards a large, inviting-looking chair, -indicating to the daughter with a pretty gesture that she was to take a -low seat near the table. - -“It is an ill wind that blows no one any good!” she continued gaily, as -Mrs. Pomeroy greeted her placidly. “It is really too delightful to get -you all to myself like this! How seldom one gets the chance of a cosy -chat! And how very seldom it comes with the people of all others with -whom one would thoroughly enjoy it! You’ll have some tea, won’t you--oh, -yes, you really must; it is so much more friendly!” She laughed as she -spoke, and turned to the girl sitting demurely on the low seat near her -with a tacit claim on her sympathy and comprehension which was very -fascinating. Miss Pomeroy’s pretty, expressionless lips smiled sweetly, -and her mother, who was always ready to yield to pressure where a cup of -tea was concerned--that soothing beverage being forbidden her by her -medical authorities--answered contentedly: - -“Well, thanks, yes! I think I will! One really wants a cup of tea on a -day like this, doesn’t one?” Mrs. Pomeroy had rarely been known to leave -a statement unqualified by a question. “It is really very disagreeable -weather, isn’t it? Not that it seems to trouble you at all.” Mrs. -Pomeroy smiled one of her slow, amiable smiles as she spoke. “I am so -glad to see you looking so much better!” - -Mrs. Romayne laughed. - -“I am very well indeed, thanks,” she said. “But I’ve not been ill that I -know of, dear Mrs. Pomeroy.” - -Mrs. Pomeroy shook her head gently. - -“I thought, do you know, when I first came home, that you looked as -though your holiday had been a little too much for you--so many people’s -holiday is a little too much for them, don’t you think? And how is your -boy? Very hard at work, we hear.” - -Mrs. Romayne smiled. - -Mrs. Pomeroy’s opinion as to her looks had been quite correct; and it -was only within the last fortnight that they had altered for the better. -Within that fortnight her brightness and vivacity had ceased to be--as -they had been for weeks before--wholly artificial; something of the look -of nervous strain had gone out of her eyes, and her face was altogether -less sharpened. Her smile now was genuine; and her voice was strangely -tender and contented. - -“Very hard,” she said. “I have had to get used to a great deal of -absence on his part. He has gone down to Brighton to-day, until Monday; -he needs a little fresh air, of course. It is so long since he has been -shut up as he is now.” - -“You must miss him very much,” said Mrs. Pomeroy placidly. - -Mrs. Romayne did not answer directly, except with a laugh. - -“I am almost inclined to envy mothers with daughters,” she said, smiling -at Miss Pomeroy again. “I wonder, now”--a sudden idea had apparently -struck Mrs. Romayne--“I wonder whether you would lend me your daughter -now and then, and I wonder whether she would consent to be lent.” - -“I should be delighted,” said Mrs. Pomeroy, with vague amiability, and -an equally vague glance at her daughter. “And I’m sure Maud will be -delighted, too, won’t you, Maud?” - -“Delighted!” assented Maud, with pretty promptitude. - -“Well, then, we must arrange it some time or other,” declared Mrs. -Romayne gaily. “Perhaps you would come and spend a week with me, -Maud--that would be charming!” - -But she did not press the point, letting the subject drop with apparent -carelessness, and talking about other things, always keeping the girl in -the conversation; turning to her now and then with a pleasant, familiar -word, or a gesture which was lightly affectionate. The mother and -daughter had risen to take leave when she said carelessly: - -“Oh, by-the-bye, Maud, dear, have you anything to do to-morrow -afternoon? I’ve been bothered into taking two tickets for a matinée, a -charity affair, you know, but they say it will be rather good. It would -be so nice of you to come with me!” - -“It will be very nice of you to take me!” was the response. “Thank you -very much!” - -A minute or two more passed in the arrangement of the place and hour for -meeting, and then Mrs. Pomeroy drifted blandly out of the room, followed -by her daughter, and Mrs. Romayne was again alone. - -She walked to the fireplace this time, and putting one foot on the -fender, stood looking down, her face intent and satisfied. - -“Just the right sort of girl!” she said to herself. “Just the right sort -of girl!” - -She was wearing the little gold bangle which Julian had given her on her -birthday--the one which Miss Pomeroy had helped him to choose--and she -was turning it on her wrist with tender, contemplative touches. She was -so absorbed in her reflection that she did not hear the servant come -into the room, or notice for the moment that the girl was standing -beside her with a letter. She started at last, and looked up; took the -letter, and opened it carelessly, without looking at it, as the woman -took away the tea-table. - -“DEAR COUSIN HERMIA, - - “Unless I hear from you to the contrary, I propose to call on you - to-morrow (Saturday), at three o’clock, on a matter of grave - importance. - -“Faithfully yours, - -“DENNIS FALCONER.” - -Mrs. Romayne’s face had changed slightly as she began to read--changed -and hardened--and as she finished she drew the letter through her -fingers with a gesture of mere impatience, which was somehow belied by -the look in her eyes. Something of that strained look had come back into -them. She could not see him to-morrow, she was saying to herself -briefly; she was not going to put off Maud Pomeroy; Dennis Falconer must -fix another time, and she would write him a line at once. She walked -quickly across to her writing table, sat down, drew out a sheet of paper -and took up a pen. - -And then she paused. - -Ten minutes later her note was written, and on its way to the post, but -it was not directed to Dennis Falconer. It began, “My dear Maud,” and it -told Miss Pomeroy that business had “turned up” which would make it -impossible for Mrs. Romayne to go to the theatre on the following -afternoon, and that she enclosed the tickets hoping that Maud might be -able to use them. - -Exactly on the stroke of three on the following afternoon the door-bell -rang. Mrs. Romayne was alone in the drawing-room, apparently lazily and -pleasantly enough occupied with the latest number of the latest society -paper; and as the sound reached her ear her lips hardened into a thin, -straight line, and her eyes flashed for a moment with a look of -antagonism which was almost defiant. Then the servant announced: - -“Mr. Falconer!” - -Dennis Falconer was looking very pale; there was little colour even in -his lips, and his face was set and stern. He took the hand Mrs. Romayne -held out to him, and replied to her greeting in the briefest possible -phrase, with no softening of a something curiously solemn and inexorable -about his demeanour, though his eyes rested on her for an instant with a -singular expression. He disliked and despised the woman before him, and -yet at that moment he pitied her. - -“Sit down!” she said. “I am charmed to see you, though, do you know, you -have chosen an inopportune moment. I had a very pleasant engagement for -this afternoon, and I nearly put you off. So I hope the business is -really very grave.” - -Her voice was lightness itself, and that very lightness, with the almost -unusual loquacity with which she had received him, seemed to witness to -the presence in her mind of a recollection which she was determined to -ignore--the recollection of their last interview, in that very room. -There was an air about her of having entrenched herself behind a barrier -which she defied him to pass; of being resolute this time against -surprise, or against any other method of attack. - -“It is very grave!” said Falconer, and in contrast with her voice, his -rang with stern heaviness. “I must ask you to prepare yourself for bad -news!” - -“Bad news!” she echoed sharply, as her eyes, fixed on his face, grew -suddenly bright and keen. “Oh--money, I suppose?” Her voice jarred a -little, though she spoke very lightly. - -“No!” said Falconer. - -His tone was absolutely uncompromising. On his unsympathetic and -unimaginative mind the effect of her manner was to obliterate his sense -of pity beneath a consciousness of the retributive justice of the -moment before her. - -“Not money?” she said, with a little, unreal laugh. “Well, that’s a -comfort, at any rate.” Her hand had clenched itself suddenly round the -arm of her chair on his monosyllable, and now she paused a moment, -almost as though her breath had failed her, before she said, with -affected carelessness: “And if not--what?” - -Her back was towards the light, and Falconer could not see her face. - -“I will answer your question, if you will allow me, with another,” he -said. “Have you noticed anything unusual in the course of the past -month--or more--in the conduct of your son?” - -In the instant’s dead silence that followed a slight creaking sound made -itself audible and then died away. The clenched hand on the bar of Mrs. -Romayne’s chair had passed slowly round it with such intense pressure as -to produce the sound. Then she answered him, as he had previously -answered her, in a monosyllable. - -“No!” she said. There was a desperate effort in her voice at -carelessness, at nonchalance, at astonishment; but it was penetrated -through and through with all her past antagonism towards, and defiance -of, the man before her accentuated into fierce repudiation. Falconer’s -voice, as he answered her, seemed to confront that defiance with -inexorable fate. - -“That is almost unfortunate,” he said sternly. “In that case, I fear -that what I have to tell you must fall with double and treble severity, -as coming upon you unawares. Will you not think again? Has he not been -absent from home a good deal? Have his absences been satisfactorily -accounted for? Have you ever proved”--he paused, laying stress upon the -last word--“have you ever proved such accounts, as given by himself, -correct?” - -With a valiant effort, the power of which Falconer must have appreciated -had he been able to penetrate beyond the ghastly artificiality of the -result, Mrs. Romayne rallied her forces, and strove to throw his words -back upon him; to defend and entrench herself once and for all with the -only weapon she knew. She broke into a thin, tuneless laugh. - -“What an absolutely gruesome catechism!” she cried. “Really, it would -take me weeks of solitary confinement and meditation among the -tombs--isn’t there a book about that, by-the-bye?--before I could -approach it in a duly sepulchral spirit. Do you know, it would be an -absolute relief to me if you could come to the point? I am taking it for -granted, you see, that there is a point, which is no doubt a compliment -which its infinitesimal nature hardly deserves. Produce the poor little -thing, for heaven’s sake!” - -“The point is this,” said Falconer grimly and concisely. “Your son’s -life, as you know it, is a lie. He has a sordid version of what is known -as an ‘establishment.’ He is living with a work-girl in Camden Town.” - -There was a choked, strangled sound, and Mrs. Romayne’s figure seemed to -shrink together as though every muscle had contracted in one -simultaneous throb. Her face, could Falconer have seen it, was rigid and -blank, except for her eyes. For that first instant she looked as a -patient might look who, having suspected himself of a deadly disease, -having congratulated himself on the subsidence of his symptoms and known -hope, learns from his physician that that subsidence of obvious symptoms -was in itself only a more dangerous symptom still, and that he is indeed -doomed. Her eyes were the eyes of a woman who looks despair full in the -face. - -But with no human being who keeps hold of life and reason can the vivid -agony of such a vision endure for more than an instant. It dulls by -reason of its very insupportableness. Time is an empty word where mental -suffering is concerned, and the second-hand of the tall clock in the -corner had traversed its dial only once before a kind of film passed -over those agonised eyes, and Mrs. Romayne spoke in a thin, hoarse -voice. And the man so close to her was conscious of nothing but a short -pause, and was revolted accordingly. - -“How do you know?” Even in that moment the instinct of defiance of him -personally could not wholly yield, and lingered in her voice. - -“I have an old servant who lives in Camden Town. He is an invalid, and I -occasionally visit him. His wife is a garrulous woman, and thinking that -I have some claim on her gratitude, considers it necessary to inform me -as to all her own and her neighbours’ affairs. Visiting the husband last -Friday week, I found the wife greatly excited and alarmed for the -reputation of the street--in which she lets lodgings--by the appearance -in the house opposite of a couple whose relations to one another had -instantly been suspected by their landlady and her neighbours, though -they passed as newly-made man and wife!” - -With a sudden, low cry of inexpressible horror and dismay Mrs. Romayne -sprang to her feet, flinging out her hands as though to keep off -something intolerable to be borne. - -“No! no!” she cried breathlessly. “No! no! Not that! Not married? It -would be ruin! Ruin! ruin! No! no!” - -Dennis Falconer paused, freezing slowly into what seemed to him surely -justifiable abhorrence of the woman before him. What if he knew in his -heart that such a marriage would indeed mean ruin to a young man? So -bald a trampling down of the moral aspect of the position before the -practical was not decent! It was for a woman--and that woman the young -man’s mother--to be overwhelmed by the moral horror to the exclusion of -every other thought! And it was the practical alone that had drawn any -show of emotion from Mrs. Romayne! - -“I am sorry to have agitated you!” he said, and his voice was cold and -cutting as steel. “I have no doubt in my own mind that they are not -married. I had better perhaps continue to give you the facts in order. -Chance led to my seeing the young man in question as he was leaving the -house. I recognised your son. I proceeded to make enquiries. He passes -as a medical student, under the name of Roden. The girl is--or was--a -hand at one of the big millinery establishments. From her affectation of -innocence and simplicity, the woman who has most opportunity of -observing her is inclined to think the very worst of her!” - -A quick, hissing breath--an unmistakeable breath of relief--parted Mrs. -Romayne’s white lips. She had sunk down again in her chair and was -grasping it now with both hands as she leant a little forward, trembling -in every limb. - -“Then it is not likely--it is not likely that he has married her,” she -said, in a low, rapid tone to herself rather than to Falconer, as it -seemed. “Go on!” - -“There is very little more to be said,” returned Falconer icily. “They -have occupied the rooms--that is to say, the girl has occupied them, -visited every day by your son--for three weeks now. The woman has -discovered that they had been somewhere in the country together for a -week previously. You will, of course, be able to recall his absence from -home. Yesterday he took her away into the country again; they are to -return on Monday!” - -He stopped; and as though she were no longer conscious of his presence, -Mrs. Romayne’s head was bowed slowly lower, as if under some -irresistible weight, until her forehead rested on her hand, stretched -out still upon the arm of her wide chair. - -She lifted her face at last, white and haggard as twenty added years of -life should not have made it, and rose, helping herself feebly with the -arm of her chair, like a woman whose physical strength is broken. -Falconer rose also. He was utterly alienated from her; he was conscious -of only the most distant pity, but he felt that it was incumbent on him -to say something. - -“I regret very much that it should have fallen to my lot to break this -to you!” he said, stiffly and awkwardly. “I fear that coming from -me----” He hesitated and paused. - -From out the past, confusing, almost numbing him, a vague and ghastly -influence had risen suddenly upon him to strain that strange, -intangible, and awful cord of common knowledge by which he and the woman -before him were bound together, revolt against it or deny its presence -as they might. Under the touch of that influence his last words had come -from him almost involuntarily. He had not known whither they tended; he -could bring them to no conclusion. - -Mrs. Romayne looked him in the eyes, holding now to a table by which -she stood, but with no weakness in her ashen face. She seemed to be -concentrating all her force into one final repudiation of him. She -ignored his words as though he had not spoken. - -“I will ask you to leave me now!” she said. And her voice, thin and -toneless though it was, left her completely mistress of the situation. - -She made no movement to shake hands; he hesitated a moment, then bowed -and left the room. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - - -“It’s a jolly little place enough!” - -“I think it’s lovely.” - -There was a certain tone of regret, of lingering, reluctant farewell, in -both voices; though in Julian’s case it was light and patronising; in -Clemence’s, dreamy and tender. As Julian spoke he shifted his position -slightly as he leant against the iron railing by which they stood, and -let his eyes wander over the scene before them with condescending -approval. - -They were standing on the somewhat embryonic “sea-front” of what a few -years before had been a fishing village, and was now struggling, rather -inefficiently, to become a watering-place. Such season as the place -could boast was entirely confined to the summer months; to the -frequenters of winter resorts it was absolutely unknown; consequently -its intrinsic charms at the moment--in all the lassitude and monotony -left by departed glory--might have been considered conspicuous by their -absence. But it was a glorious winter’s day. A slight sprinkling of snow -had been frozen on the roofs of the somewhat depressed-looking houses -and on the unsightliness of the unfinished sea-front; and brilliant -sunshine, almost warm in spite of the keen, frosty air, was glorifying -alike the deserted little town, the country beyond, and the sparkling, -dancing sea. The frosty, invigorating brightness found a responsive -chord in Julian’s heart this morning; he was not always so susceptible -to such simple, natural influences. He was in a good humour with the -place; he had spent two wholly satisfactory days there--two days, -moreover, which had had much the same influence upon his moral tone as a -change to bracing air and simple, wholesome food would have on a -physique accustomed to dissipation. - -His survey ended finally with Clemence’s face. She was standing at his -side looking out over the sea, her eyes intent and full of feeling, her -beautiful face flushed and still, absorbed by the mysterious charm of -the ceaseless movement and trouble of the bright water stretching away -before her. - -“What are you looking at, Clemence?” he said, boyishly. - -She lifted her eyes to his quite gravely and simply. - -“Only the sea,” she said. “It is so beautiful, I feel as if I never -could leave off looking at it. It makes me feel--oh, I can’t tell you, -but it is like something great and strong to take away with one!” She -looked away again. “Oh, I wish, I wish we need not go!” she said with a -little sigh. - -“I wish we needn’t,” returned Julian; he had been dimly conscious of -something in her eyes and voice which made her previous words, simple as -they seemed, almost unintelligible to him, and he caught at her last -sentence as containing an idea to which he could respond. “It’s an awful -nuisance, isn’t it? And do you know it is time we started? Never mind. -We’ll come down again soon!” - -They stood for another moment; Clemence looking out at the sunny sea, -Julian taking another careless comprehensive view of the whole scene; -and then, as though those last looks had contained their respective -farewells, they turned with one accord and walked away in the direction -of the railway station. And as if in turning her back upon the sunlit -sea she had turned her back also upon something less definite and -tangible, a certain gravity and wistfulness crept gradually over -Clemence’s face as they went; crept over it to settle down into a -sadness most unusual to it as the train carried them quickly away -towards London. Julian, sitting opposite her, was vaguely struck by her -expression. - -“Are you awfully sorry to go back, Clemence?” he said. - -She started slightly, and looked at him with a faint smile. - -“I suppose I am!” she said. “We have been very happy, haven’t we?” There -was a wistful regret in her voice which touched him somehow, and he -answered her demonstratively, with a cheery and enthusiastic augury for -the future. Clemence smiled again; again rather faintly. “I know!” she -said. “I mean I hope so. Only--I don’t know what’s the matter with me! I -feel as if--something were finished!” - -Julian broke into a boyish laugh. Her depression was by no means -displeasing to him; it was a tribute to his importance, to her -dependence on him; and the necessity for “cheering her up” implied the -exercise of that superiority and authority in which he delighted. - -“Why, what a dear little goose you are, Clemence!” he said, leaning -forward to take her hands in his. “A ‘Friday to Monday’ can’t last for -ever, you know, but it can be repeated again and again. Why, I shall be -up every day--every single day, I promise you. I shouldn’t wonder if I -found I could spend the evening with you to-morrow! Won’t that console -you?” - -She did not answer him, but she took one of his hands in hers and -pressed it to her cheek. His consolation had hardly touched that strange -oppression which weighed upon her; and Julian, in high feather, and -quite unaware that only his voice was heard by her, his words passing -her by unheeded, had been talking at great length about all the -happiness before them, when she said, in a hesitating, far-away voice: - -“Could you--could you come home with me this afternoon?” - -Julian paused a moment. The question was hardly the response his words -had demanded. Then he said decisively: - -“Quite impossible, I am sorry to say. I would if I could, you know, -dear, but it’s quite impossible!” - -She gave his hand a little quick pressure. - -“I know, of course!” she murmured gently. She paused a moment, and then -said in a low voice, rather irrelevantly as it seemed: “Julian”--his -name still came rather hesitatingly from her lips--“do you think--do you -like Mrs. Jackson?” - -Mrs. Jackson was the name of the woman whose rooms Julian had taken for -her, and he started slightly at the question. - -“She’s not a bad sort,” he said, with rather startled consideration. “At -least, she seems all right. Isn’t she nice to you, Clemence? Don’t you -like the rooms?” - -“Oh, yes! yes!” she said quickly, almost as though she reproached -herself for saying anything that could suggest to him even a shadow of -discontent on her part. “I like them so very, very much. It is only--I -don’t know what exactly. Somehow, I don’t think Mrs. Jackson is quite a -nice woman.” She had spoken the last words hesitatingly and with -difficulty, almost as though they came from her against her will. - -Julian glanced at her quickly. - -“What makes you think that, Clemence?” he said, with judicial -masterfulness. “Have you any reason, I mean?” - -But Clemence was hardly able to define, even in her own pure mind, what -it was that jarred upon her in her landlady’s manner; and to Julian she -was utterly unable to put her feelings into words. Her hasty disclaimer -and her hesitating beginnings and falterings, however, served to remove -the misgiving which had stirred him lest some knowledge of his own real -life should have come to the woman’s knowledge. He was the readier to -let himself be reassured and to dismiss the subject in that the train -was slackening speed for the last time before reaching London, and he -intended to move into a first-class smoking carriage at the approaching -station. Julian was well aware of the risks of discovery involved in -these journeys with Clemence; and though he faced them nonchalantly -enough, he used wits with which no one who knew him only in his -capacities of man about town and budding barrister would have credited -him, to reduce them to a minimum. To be seen emerging from a third-class -carriage at Victoria Station was a wholly unnecessary risk to run, and -he avoided it accordingly. - -“You mustn’t be fanciful, Clemmie,” he said, now in a lordly and airy -fashion. “I’ve no doubt Mrs. Jackson is a very jolly woman, as a matter -of fact. Look here, dear, would you mind if I went and had a smoke now? -It isn’t much further, you know, and one mustn’t smoke in hospital, you -see!” - -Clemence was very pale when he joined her on the platform at -Victoria--joined her after a quick glance round to see whether he must -prepare himself for an encounter with an acquaintance; and she did not -speak, only looked up at him with a grave, steady smile which made her -face sadder than before. His announcement of his intention of putting -her into a hansom drew from her an absolutely horrified protest. She -would go in an omnibus, she told him hurriedly, or in the Underground! -She had never been in a cab! It would cost so much! But when he -overruled her, a little impatiently--it was not yet dark, and he did not -wish to remain longer than was necessary with her in Victoria -Station--she submitted timidly, with a sudden slight flushing of her -cheeks. - -“A four-wheeler, Julian!” she murmured pleadingly, as they emerged into -the station yard. With a lofty smile at what he supposed to be -nervousness on her part, he signified assent with a little condescending -gesture, and stopped before a waiting cab. - -“Here you are,” he said. “Jump in!” - -She got in obediently, and as he shut the door she turned to him through -the open window. - -“Good-bye, Julian!” she said, in a low, sweet voice. - -“Good-bye!” he said cheerily, smiling at her. Her face in its dingy -frame looked whiter, sweeter, and more steadfast than ever, and it made -a curiously sudden and distinct impression on Julian’s mental retina. -Then the cab turned lumberingly round, and he moved smartly away. He did -not see that as the cab turned, that sweet, white face appeared at the -other window and followed him with wide, wistful eyes until the moving -life of London parted them. - -Julian was on his way to the club. He had a vague disinclination to the -thought of going home; the house in Chelsea was always more or less -distasteful to him now, and he had no intention of going thither before -it was necessary. It was nearly dark by the time his destination was -reached, and as his hansom drew up a few yards from the club entrance he -could only see that the way was stopped by a carriage from which two -ladies and a gentleman had just emerged. It was the younger of the two -ladies who glanced in his direction, and said, in a pretty, uninterested -voice: - -“Isn’t that Mr. Romayne?” - -Marston Loring was the man addressed, and he shot a keen, considering -glance at the speaker--Miss Pomeroy. The fact that her eyes had noticed -Julian when his quick ones had not, trivial as it was, was not without -its significance to the man whose stock-in-trade, so to speak, was -founded on clever estimate and appreciation of trifles. Was Miss Pomeroy -not so entirely unobservant a nonentity as she was supposed to be, he -asked himself, not for the first time; or was there another reason for -her quickness in this instance? - -“So it is!” he said. “Hullo, old fellow!” - -Julian came eagerly up to the group as it paused for him on the club -steps, and shook hands in his pleasantest manner with Mrs. Pomeroy. - -“I do believe it’s a ladies’ afternoon!” he exclaimed gaily. “What luck -for me! How do you do?” shaking hands with Miss Pomeroy. “I’d actually -forgotten all about it, and I’ve only just come up from Brighton! -Loring, you must ask me to join your party, old man! Tell him so, Miss -Pomeroy, please!” - -Whether strict veracity is to be imputed to a young man who professes -unbounded satisfaction at finding fashionable “ladies’ teas” in full -swing at his club when he has just come off a journey is perhaps -doubtful; but Julian threw himself into the spirit of the moment with a -frank gaiety and enthusiasm which was not to be surpassed. The greater -number of the ladies who were sipping club tea as if it were a hitherto -untasted nectar, and gazing at club furniture as though it were -provision for the comfort of some strange animal, were acquaintances of -his; and as he moved about among them his passage seemed to be marked by -merrier laughs, a quicker fire of the jokes of the moment, and brighter -faces than prevailed elsewhere. He was enjoying himself so thoroughly, -apparently, that he was unable to tear himself away, and when he left -the club at last, he sprang into a hansom, and told the driver to “put -the horse along.” He and his mother were dining out together, and he had -left himself barely sufficient time to dress. - -He ran up the steps, flinging the driver his fare, let himself in with -his latchkey, and proceeded to his room up two steps at a time. When he -emerged thence, twenty minutes later, in evening dress, he was -congratulating himself on having “done the trick capitally, and well up -to time.” - -He was a little surprised, therefore, as he came downstairs, to find his -mother’s maid waiting for him outside the drawing-room door with the -information that Mrs. Romayne was already in the carriage; and he ran -hastily downstairs, put on his overcoat, and proceeded to join her. - -“I’m awfully sorry, dear,” he said, with eager apology. “I thought it -was earlier. The fact is, I was awfully late getting in. I found -‘ladies’ teas’ going on at the club--so awfully stupid of me to -forget--you might have liked to go--and it was rather good fun. How are -you, dear?” - -He had let himself into the brougham as he spoke, had shut the door, and -seated himself by the figure he could only dimly see sitting rather back -in the corner so that little or no light fell on the face. He had kissed -his mother, hardly stemming the flood of his eloquence for the purpose; -and he now hardly waited for her word or two of reply before he plunged -once more into eager, amusing talk. He did not give his mother time to -do more than answer monosyllabically, and it followed that her silence -did not strike him. He sprang out, when the carriage stopped, to give -her his hand, but before he had given his instructions to the coachman, -and followed her into the house, she had disappeared into the ladies’ -cloak-room. Consequently it was not until she came to him as he waited -to follow her into the drawing-room that he really saw her. As his eyes -rested on the figure coming towards him, he suddenly saw, not it, but a -sweet, white face with wistful eyes looking at him from out of a dingy -frame. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - - -Always excellently dressed, Mrs. Romayne’s appearance at that moment was -brilliant; almost excessively brilliant it seemed for a small -dinner-party. Her frock was of the most pronounced type of full-dress, -and she wore diamonds; not many, but so disposed, as was her -reddish-brown hair, as to make the greatest possible effect. But the -detail which had caught her son’s experienced eye, and which had brought -before him by some unaccountable law of contrast that other woman’s -face, lay in the fact that to-night for the first time his mother was -slightly “made up.” The colour on her cheeks, the bright effectiveness -of her eyes, was the result of art. It made her look haggard, Julian -decided with careless, indifferent distaste; and then he was following -her into the room. - -She had hardly paused to speak to him; apparently she imagined that they -were late. - -They were widely separated at dinner, and were not thrown together, as -it happened, during the whole evening. But Mrs. Romayne’s personality -was a factor in the party not to be ignored that night; she was -delightful, everybody said. It was a very select little dinner, and -society romps went on afterwards; romps to which Mrs. Romayne -contributed her full share. And to Julian that newly acquired sense of -his mother’s artificiality was accentuated as the evening passed on into -something like repugnance; a repugnance which, when he was seated with -her at last in the brougham and driving home, produced in him a strong -disinclination to rouse himself to an assumption of vivacity, and made -him occupy himself with his own thoughts so exclusively that he never -noticed that his mother uttered not a single word. - -“Good night, mother!” he said absently, as they stood together in the -hall. He was stooping to kiss her when she stopped him with a slight, -peremptory gesture. - -“I want to speak to you!” she said. Her voice was tense and a little -hoarse. Without another word, without so much as glancing at him, she -passed him and led the way to his smoking-room; turned up the lamp with -a quick, hard gesture, and then turned and faced him. - -All the colour had faded from Julian’s face, and he had followed her -slowly. With the first sound of her voice the conviction had come to him -that he was discovered. There were certain weaknesses in him hitherto -undeveloped by the circumstances of his life, but radical factors in his -character. Morally speaking he was a coward. His hour had come, and he -was afraid to meet it. He came just inside the door and stood leaning -against the writing-table, confronting his mother, but neither looking -at her nor speaking. - -“Tell me where you have been since Friday!” she said, low and -peremptorily; and then she stopped herself abruptly, putting out her -hand as though to prevent him from speaking, as a spasm of pain -distorted her face. “No!” she said in a hoarse, breathless way. “No, -don’t! You’ll tell me a lie. Don’t! I know!” - -She had put out her hand and was steadying herself by the high oak -mantelpiece--part of her recent present to Julian--but her face was -rigid and set, and her eyes, full of a strange, indefinable agony, which -she seemed to be all the while holding desperately at bay, never left -the pale, downcast, almost sullen face opposite her. - -With a determined wrench and setting in motion of all his faculties, -Julian pulled himself together so far as to take refuge in that sure -resort of the deficient in moral courage--an assumption of jaunty and -light-hearted non-comprehension. Perhaps he had never in his life been -more like his mother than he was at that moment as he threw back his -head and answered, with an affected gaiety which was somewhat hollow and -unsuccessful: - -“What do you know, dear? You’re coming it rather strong, aren’t you?” - -“I know that you have been living with a common work-girl somewhere in -Camden Town for a month or more!” - -The words were spoken in the same hoarse voice which rang now, low as it -was, with an intolerable disgust. But its expression seemed to affect -Julian not at all. The words themselves were occupying all his -perception. A quick frown of consideration appeared on his forehead, as -though some relief or reprieve had come to him, bringing with it -possibilities the skilful turning to account of which called into play -his mental faculties, and in so doing strung up his nerve. He dropped -his artificiality of manner, and seemed to brace himself to meet the -emergency in which he found himself. The situation had evidently -suddenly altered its character for him. He was no longer cowed by it. - -There was a pause--a pause in which Mrs. Romayne’s eyes seemed to dilate -and contract, and dilate again under the suffering to which she allowed -expression in neither tone nor gesture; and then there came from Julian -four awkward, hardly audible words, jerked out rather than spoken, with -long pauses intervening: - -“How do you know?” - -A short, sharp breath came from Mrs. Romayne, and then she said, with -cold decisiveness, though it seemed that nothing would take that -hoarseness from her voice: - -“It matters very little how I know. That I know by one chance; that -some one else may know by another; some one else again by another--the -details in each case, when the chances are innumerable, are nothing! -Have you lived all this time in London not to know that discovery is -inevitable--to wonder ‘how’ when it comes?” - -There was a bitterness, a keenness of scorn in her voice which stung him -like a lash, and he answered hotly: - -“After all, mother, we are not living in Arcadia! We don’t talk about -these things, and I’m awfully sorry, I’m sure, that this should have -come to your knowledge; I’m awfully sorry to offend you. But, hang it -all, I’m not worse than lots of fellows about!” - -His tone had gathered confidence and defiance as he went on, and it -seemed to shake her a little. Her hold on the mantelpiece tightened, and -she spoke quickly and rather nervously. - -“It’s very likely,” she said. “I don’t want to argue the principle with -you. Young men have their own ideas, I know; but how many young -men--drop out? How many young men, with good positions, good chances, -somehow or other get into bad odour; get to be not received--or, if they -are received, it is with certain reservations--through this kind of -thing? Oh, of course I don’t say it’s inevitable. There are lots of men -about, as you say! But it’s an awful risk. In the case of a young man -like you, with no title to the position you hold in society but -your--your personality, don’t you see, it is a double and treble risk. -It is playing with edged tools; it is holding a knife to your own -throat. You would go under so horribly easily.” - -She paused abruptly, as though the image before her eyes were too -terrible to her to be pursued further, and tried to moisten her dry -lips, on which the touch of paint had cracked now, showing how white -they were beneath. The ghastliness of the incongruity between her manner -and the superficialities of which she spoke was indescribable. Julian -did not speak; he was moving one foot to and fro slowly over the carpet, -at which he gazed immovably, and his mother went on almost immediately: - -“You must give it up, Julian,” she said incisively. “I will do anything -that is necessary in the way of money; I don’t want to be hard upon -you. Anything the girl wants you shall have; but you must break with her -at once.” - -She paused again, but still Julian did not speak; still he did not raise -his eyes. She went on with a growing insistence in her voice which went -hand in hand with a growing agony of appeal: - -“If you don’t see the necessity now, you must believe me when I tell you -that you will--you will. Look, dear! your life is surely not so dull -that you need run after such distraction as that! You shall marry if you -want to. You shall marry any one you like. But you must--you must give -this up. Julian----” She stopped for a moment, and her voice grew thin, -almost faint, as she pressed so heavily on the carving by which she held -that her hand was bruised and blackened. “Julian, I am not telling you -what it has been to me to know that you have deceived me. I am not going -to try and make you feel--I don’t want you to feel it, dear--what it has -been to me to go over your home-life of the last few weeks and know -that you have lied to me at every turn--to me, who have only wanted to -make you happy. I won’t reproach you. Perhaps young men think it a kind -of right--a kind of right----” She repeated the sentence, unfinished as -it was, as though it contained an idea to which she clung. “It is not -for my sake--to spare my feelings, that I tell you you must give it up. -It is for your own. Julian, my boy, you must believe me.” - -Her words, quivering with entreaty, died away; her eyes, full of -supplication, were fixed on his; and Julian spoke--spoke without lifting -his eyes from the ground. - -“Suppose I married her?” he said in a low, shamefaced voice. - -“What!” The monosyllable rang out sharp and vibrating, and Mrs. Romayne, -all softness or relaxation struck from her face and figure in one sudden -bracing of every muscle, stood staring at him out of eyes alive with -horror. - -“Suppose--I married--her!” - -“Supposing that--I will tell you! You would have to keep her and -yourself! You would have no more of my money, and you would never be -acknowledged in my house again!” Her low voice was like fine, cold -steel, and she paused. Then quite suddenly, as though the horror kept at -bay in her eyes had leapt up and mastered her in an instant, she flung -out her hands wildly, crying: “Julian, Julian! You are not married? Tell -me, tell me you are not married?” - -And Julian, white to the very lips, said low and hurriedly: - -“No!” - -There was a long silence. With a choked, hysterical cry, Mrs. Romayne -dropped into a chair near her, and covered her face with her hands. -Julian drew out his pocket-handkerchief and mechanically wiped his -forehead. At last he began, in a nervous, uneven voice: - -“Mother, look here, I--you don’t quite understand me! I--she--it’s--it’s -not the kind of girl you think!” He stopped and drew his hand -desperately before his eyes. That innocent, white face, in its dingy -frame, what did it want before his eyes now? How could he get on if he -kept looking at it? “She--we--it was my fault! Mother, look here, I -ought!” - -Mrs. Romayne took her hands away from her face and clenched them -together. - -“You shall not,” she said in a low, steady voice. - -“She--she--was an awfully good girl, don’t you know. She’s not--of -course she’s not one of our sort, but--she would learn. Mother, after -all, why not? Nothing else can--can make it right!” - -“Nothing else can ruin you completely!” was the steady answer. “You -shall never do it if I can prevent it. I have told you what I would do; -think it well over. Think what it would mean to you to have not one -farthing but what you can earn! To be cut by every one who knows you! To -be without a chance of any kind! I told you that if you married I would -disown you! Now I tell you something else! Break off this miserable -connection and you shall have, as I said, anything in reason to give the -girl in compensation once and for all. Refuse to do so and I will cut -off your allowance until you come to your senses!” - -“Mother!” he cried fiercely. “By Heaven, mother!” - -“You can take your choice!” was the unmoved answer. - -Her face was sharp and haggard; the artificial colour stood out on it in -great patches, throwing into relief the vivid pallor beneath. She had -thrown aside her cloak as though the physical oppression was unbearable -to her, and the contrast between her face and her gorgeous dress with -its glittering ornaments was horrible. - -A smothered oath broke from the young man, and lifting his right hand, -he began to rub it slowly up and down the back of his head as an -expression of heavy, fierce cogitation settled down upon his face. To -his unutterable surprise, as he made the gesture, there stole over his -mother’s face an expression of such deadly terror as he had never before -seen. He stopped involuntarily, and she staggered to her feet, holding -out two quivering, imploring hands. For the first time in his life -Julian was using a gesture habitual in his dead father; for the first -time in his life, looking into her son’s face, Mrs. Romayne saw there -the face of William Romayne. - -“My boy!” she gasped. “My boy. Don’t do that! Don’t look like that, for -Heaven’s sake! For Heaven’s sake!” - -She swayed for a moment to and fro, and then fell heavily forward into -his arms. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - - -A bitter east wind, which was taking sufficiently depressing effect upon -all London, was dealing with peculiar grimness with Redburn Street, -Camden Town. The neat little houses in that dreary grey dryness looked -sordidly wretched; there was something deserted and hopeless about them. -No one was to be seen, except that at a first-floor window about -half-way down a woman’s figure was standing; and as Dennis Falconer -turned into the street his footsteps rang with heavy distinctness on the -glaring pavement. He strode slowly and steadily along, and his solitary -figure, as it stood out with that peculiar sharpness of outline which is -a characteristic production of east wind, harmonised absolutely with the -sombreness of the background. His face was full of sombre purpose, grave -and stern. - -It was about three o’clock in the afternoon of Wednesday--two days after -Julian’s return home. On the morning of the preceding day Julian and his -mother had had a second interview, which had ended in his giving a -sullen and reluctant assent to her demands; and in the evening Dennis -Falconer had received from Mrs. Romayne a brief, almost peremptory note, -begging him to come to her. He had gone to Queen Anne Street -accordingly, severely unsympathetic, but also severely reliable, early -on Wednesday morning. - -He had found Mrs. Romayne in a feverish agony of agitation beyond even -the power of her will to conceal or wholly to control. Her voice, -painfully thin and sharp; her gestures restless, nervous, irritable; her -utterance hard and rapid; had all testified to a strained, tense -excitement before which all her artificiality was utterly submerged, and -in which Falconer himself was obviously regarded by her solely as the -one instrument at hand to her necessity. Her whole soul seemed to be set -upon the immediate termination of “the affair,” as she called it. It -affected her evidently in only one way, she looked at it from only one -point of view: as something to be finished up, put away, buried out of -sight. It was the thought of delay in the doing of this, only, that -appeared to torture her; of the affair itself with all its terrible -significance, its inevitable consequences, she had, as far as Falconer -could divine, no adequate conception. The girl must be bought off; must -be sent away; must be sent right out of the country, in case--and here -came the one agonised sense of a possible consequence which Falconer -could detect--in case Julian should marry her after all! - -It was evidently the haunting terror of such a contingency which had -driven her to send for Falconer. It was obvious, though she seemed to be -striving hard to conceal it even from herself, that she could not trust -her son; that she could find no rest in the promise she had wrung from -him. What she had to say to Falconer was, in effect, that some one else -must see the girl; the arrangement to be surely effected must be brought -about by a third person who would set about the business promptly and -act decidedly. It was this service which she wanted of Falconer, and -Falconer, after a moment’s grave self-communing, agreed to render it. He -was as far removed from sympathy with her in this her hard, agonised -reality as he had been from the artificial woman of the previous months, -or from the real woman of eighteen years before. He considered her point -of view in the present instance absolutely revolting in her. But no man -could question the practical sense of what she said, or the advisability -of the course she proposed, and his conception of his obligations as her -sole male relative and trustee was too intimately intertwined with his -sense of duty and self-respect to allow him to entertain, even for a -moment, the possibility of refusing to act for her. He had stood by her -side, impelled by that sense of duty, gravely reliable, and -unsympathetic, eighteen years before. The irony of fate decreed that it -was for him, and for him only, to act for her now. To him it was simply -the stern dictate of moral necessity to be obeyed as such. - -Accordingly he had received her instructions, offering now and again a -grim, practical suggestion, with a stern air of businesslike reserve; -had undertaken--being at the bottom of her opinion as to the -desirability of instant measures--to see “the girl” that same afternoon; -and he was walking down Redburn Street now, in the pitiless east wind, -to carry that undertaking into effect. - -He reached the house, knocked, and asked briefly for Mrs. Roden. The -landlady, whose sentiments towards her lodgers had developed rapidly in -consequence of the enquiries which Falconer had felt it his duty to -make, received his words with a sniff expressive of contempt; and then -informed him, with a stare of insolent curiosity, that “she” was -“hupstairs,” and led the way thither; evidently urged to that act of -civility solely by a hope of finding out something. She was a coarse, -vulgar-looking woman, with small red eyes, which glittered expectantly -as she flung the door open and announced, in a loud and denunciatory -voice, “‘Ere’s a gentleman!” - -But if she had hoped for startling revelations she was disappointed. -Dennis Falconer advanced into the room with stern composure; the figure -in the window turned quickly but quietly to meet him; and Mrs. Jackson -was obliged to shut the door upon the two. - -Clemence was looking very pale. The vague shadow which had fallen upon -her as she journeyed up to London two days before had deepened into a -wistful, questioning sadness. She had not seen Julian since she parted -from him at Victoria Station. On the previous day she had received a -note from him which told her that “work” kept him from her for that day, -but that he would come as soon as he was able. There was nothing to -distress or alarm her in the fact itself; more than once before a -similar disappointment had come to her; and even though the second day -brought her no letter, the blank merely meant, as she assured herself -hour by hour, that she would see him before the day was done. But strive -against it as she might, and did, she had spent the past twenty-four -hours weighed down by a sense of trouble utterly undefined; utterly, as -it seemed to her, without reason. She had borne her burden with mute -patience, reproaching herself as for ingratitude and an inordinate -desire for active happiness, and struggling bravely to conquer it; but -neither arguing about it nor denying it, as a less simple and -straightforward nature would have done. And now the appearance of -Falconer seemed suddenly to focus and define her vague distress. The -sudden conviction that Julian was ill, and that this gentleman had come -from him to tell her so, held her still and silent in a pang of cruel -realisation and anticipation. - -The light, as she moved, had fallen full upon her face, and as he saw it -a certain shock passed through Dennis Falconer. He had seen her figure, -and even her face in the distance more than once, but he had never -before seen it with any distinctness, and for the first instant the -simplicity and purity of its beauty, with the expression deepened by the -strange shadow through which the past two days had led her, clashed -almost painfully with that idea of “the girl” which had grown, during -his conversation with Mrs. Romayne, into a kind of fact for him. The -next moment, however, he had reconciled appearances and realities, as he -conceived them, with the grim reflection that there is no vice so -vicious as that which wears an innocent face; and in doing so had -quenched what might have been perception beneath a weight of narrow -truism. - -No greeting of any kind passed between them. All Clemence’s faculties -were absorbed in her dread. Falconer was busied with the process of -reconciliation. The strange little silence was broken eventually by -Falconer, and he spoke with the unbending sternness and distance which -that process and its conclusion had naturally accentuated. - -“I am here as the representative of Julian Roden’s nearest relative and -guardian,” he said. It had been arranged between himself and Mrs. -Romayne, on the suggestion of the latter, that “the girl,” if she did -not already know it, should be kept in ignorance of Julian’s real name. - -The statement was slightly over-coloured, since Julian was of age, and -his mother was no longer his guardian in any legal sense; but to stern -moralists of Falconer’s type, to whom the pretty little falsenesses of -life are wholly to be condemned, a slight misstatement in such a case is -frequently permissible. The brief, uncompromising words had seemed to -him to set the key of the interview beyond mistake. He was consequently -slightly taken aback by their effect. - -Every trace of colour died out of Clemence’s face, and two great dilated -eyes gazed at him for an instant in dumb agony before she whispered: - -“He’s not--dead?” - -Falconer made a slight, almost contemptuous, negative gesture. He had no -intention of being imposed upon by theatrical arts, and as Clemence, her -self-control shattered by the sudden relief, turned instinctively away, -and pressed her face down on the arm with which she had caught at the -curtain for support, he went on with immoveable sternness: - -“My business has to do with his life, not his death. The main point is -very simple, and I will put it to you at once. Absolute ruin lies before -him. Is he or is he not to embrace it?” - -He saw her start, and she lifted her face quickly, and turned it to him -all quivering and unstrung from her recent suffering, and quite white. - -“He is in trouble!” she cried, low and breathlessly. “Oh, what is it? -What has happened?” - -Dennis Falconer’s patience was approaching its limits, and he spoke -curtly and conclusively. - -“I think we may dispense with this kind of thing,” he said. “It can -serve no purpose, as everything is known. I come now from his mother -with full power to act for her----” - -He was interrupted. A burning colour, the colour of such paralysing -surprise as can take in hardly the bare statement, much less the -consequent developements and inferences, had rushed suddenly over -Clemence’s face, dyeing her very throat. - -“His mother!” she exclaimed. “His mother!” Her tone dropped as she -repeated the words into a strange, uncertain murmur, in which -incredulity, acceptance--as a kind of experiment--and something that was -almost fear, were inextricably blended. - -The fear alone caught Falconer’s ear. His lips were parted to resume his -speech with grim decisiveness in the conviction that she understood at -last that nothing was to be gained by trifling with him, when she said, -as though he had had nothing to do with her previous words: - -“Go on, please.” - -He looked at her again, and was struck by a new look in her face, as he -had been struck by a new tone in her voice. She was evidently going to -drop all theatricalities, he told himself. - -“Perhaps you were not aware that he is, practically, under the control -of his mother,” he said. “That is to say, he is dependent on her for -every penny he spends. It is quite out of the question that he should -make money at the bar--by his own profession, that is to say--for two or -three years at least. Consequently the cutting off of the allowance made -him by Mrs. ---- Roden will mean for him absolute penury.” - -She was staring at him; staring at him out of two wide, intense brown -eyes; with such a helpless bewilderment in her face that she seemed to -be quite dazed. She put her hand to her head as he paused with a -feeble, uncertain gesture; but she did not speak, and Falconer went on -severely: - -“I conclude that he has not represented these facts to you as they -stand. They are facts, nevertheless. You will, therefore, understand -that, his allowance withdrawn, he will be entirely without the means of -supporting you. You may possibly consider that some shifty means might -be found which, by putting him in possession of small sums of money, -would enable him for a time to defy his mother. Let me point out to you -something of what such a course would involve. Julian Roden is a young -man with a good position in society--I mean he is accustomed to be made -much of by men and women who are his equals; he has chances and -opportunities of which he intends, no doubt, to avail himself. All this, -in taking such a step, he would throw away for ever. Social intercourse, -future career, would go with his income at his mother’s word. Now, I -will ask you only how long you could hope to depend on him in such -circumstances; how long it would be before his only feeling for the -woman whom he had allowed to drag him down and to destroy all his hopes -in life would degenerate into sheer repugnance; and for how long he -would care to keep her?” - -He paused, and after a moment’s dead silence Clemence spoke in a weak, -eager, almost desperate voice: - -“There must be some mistake! It--it can’t be--the same!” - -The words seemed to Falconer a mere miserable subterfuge, and he -answered very sternly: - -“There is not the faintest possibility of mistake. Julian Roden has -owned the whole affair to his mother, who taxed him with it on her -discovery----” - -“Oh, wait a minute! Wait a minute!” - -There was a ring of such intolerable pain, such shame and anguish, in -the voice, that Falconer’s attention, heavy and prejudiced as it was, -was arrested by it. Dimly and uncertainly, and for the first time, the -girl before him appeared to him, not simply as a representative of a -degraded sisterhood, but as a woman. He looked at her for a moment, as -she stood with her face buried in her hands, quivering from head to -foot, with a severe kind of pity. - -“I will tell you, as briefly as may be, what I am charged to say,” he -said gravely, but not ungently. “Mrs. ---- Roden is determined to break -off her son’s disgraceful connection with you at the cost of any -suffering to herself or to him. She is willing to believe that her son -is to be considered in some sort as the more guilty party of the two in -having acted as the tempter, and she has no wish to deal otherwise than -generously by you. But there are conditions.” - -He paused again. Over the slender, bowed woman’s figure before him there -had gradually crept, as he spoke, a stillness like the stillness of -death; and now, as he waited for her to speak, Clemence slowly lifted -her head and looked at him; looked at him with dull, sunken eyes, which -seemed the only living points in a face out of which all life and -expression seemed to have been crushed by a rigid, haggard mask. - -“Conditions?” she repeated. - -Her voice was hollow, and had a monotonous, far-away sound, and the -word seemed to have no meaning for her. - -A sense of vague discomfort took possession of Dennis Falconer. A dim -sense that he was not being met as he had expected--as he had a right to -expect--disturbed and annoyed him. He had no idea that what he was -chiefly discomposed by was a hazy consciousness that a touch of -unconscionable respect for the woman who, as he believed, was utterly -unworthy of respect, was mingling with his already sufficiently -unorthodox sense of pity; but he entrenched himself in a triple armour -of stiffness. - -“The conditions are these,” he said. “You will give your written word, -as under penalties for having obtained money by false pretences, to -leave England on a given date and by a given route, and not to return to -England within the next ten years. Mrs. ---- Roden in return will pay -you the sum of five hundred pounds. If you refuse these terms, and Roden -submits to his mother, you will simply be the poorer by five hundred -pounds. If you induce him to defy his mother, the consequences I have -already described to you will inevitably ensue.” - -He waited for her answer, steadily fortifying himself against being -surprised at anything she might say; but no answer came. That strange, -stricken face was still turned full towards him, but he had an uneasy -sense that he was not seen by the great, dull, dark eyes. He felt, too, -that as she stood there with her hands tightly clasped together, she was -not thinking even remotely of the choice he had set before her, though -he knew that she had heard his words and understood them. It was with an -instinctive desire to rouse her, to bring back some expression to her -face, that he said, with an awkward gentleness which was quite -involuntary: - -“There is no need for you to decide hastily. You understand the -alternative thoroughly, no doubt. I will leave you my address, and you -can write me your answer.” - -He felt in his pocket for his card-case, and the movement seemed to -rouse her. She stopped him with a slight motion of her hand. - -“There’s no need,” she said. As though the act of speaking had brought -her back from somewhere far away, and as though the claims of the moment -were gradually becoming present to her, she paused as if to gather -force, and to close upon herself a certain strangely fine reserve, which -seemed at once to hedge her about and hold her aloof from the man to -whom she spoke; and then she spoke very quietly. “I don’t want any -money. If it is better that he should be free of me, he shall be free. -That’s all.” - -“You are making a mistake!” returned Falconer quickly. There was -something about the dignity of her manner which made him feel curiously -impotent and small, as though in the presence of an unknown power -greater than himself, and the sense increased the touch of irritation he -had already experienced. His tone was no longer coldly stern; it was -insistent and annoyed. “You should consider your future. If you accept -Mrs. Roden’s offer and leave England with a small capital you will have -a chance of beginning life again. The step you have lately taken may be -your first step on the downward path--I conclude that it is. You should -reflect how difficult it is to pause there. With a little money you may -establish yourself in a respectable business, and in the course of time -you may even redeem your unfortunate past.” - -Not a muscle of the still, pale face moved. It seemed to have grown -strangely older and stronger in the course of the short interview, and -it listened to him with an air of courteous patience which seemed to set -an impassable distance between them. The perfect steadiness of her voice -as she replied was the steadiness not of composure but of reserve. - -“It is quite impossible!” she said. - -“Then I am sorry to have to say that I consider you both foolish and -ungrateful!” said Falconer with increasing severity. “You put it -entirely out of our power to do anything for you. Am I to understand -that you refuse to leave England?” - -“I don’t know. I must think!” Still the same distant, unmoved patience. - -“You will do well to think,” was Falconer’s reply, “and to put away from -you in doing so a false pride, which is entirely misplaced. I will give -you twenty-four hours for consideration, and to-morrow afternoon I will -call and see you again.” On second thoughts it had occurred to Falconer -that it would be a false step to give her his name and address. “I shall -hope to find that you have come to a sensible decision.” - -He paused a moment, and she made a slight gesture of acquiescence, -rather as though his words were indifferent to her than in any token of -assent to what he said. He added a stiff, formal “Good afternoon!” and -as her lips moved mechanically as if to frame the words in answer, he -turned and left the room. - -As though his presence and his words had been so mere a drop in the deep -waters of suffering which held her that his withdrawal affected her not -at all, Clemence stood for the moment just as he left her, hardly -conscious, as it seemed, that he was gone. Then, as though the sense -that she was alone had come to her gradually, she dropped feebly into a -chair, and let her face fall heavily forward upon the table. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - - -The hand crept round the clock, the swift November twilight fell, and -still she did not move; only her clasped hands stretched themselves out -as if in prayer. She was not praying though. The attitude was -instinctive and unconscious; a blind, mute appeal. She was simply -stunned. The room grew darker and darker until its only light was a ray -from the street-lamp outside falling straight across the bowed head; and -then there was a ring at the bell and a slow step upon the stairs. -Clemence knew the step well, though she had never before heard it fall -like that. As it fell upon her ear now, a strong shiver ran all through -her, and her hands were drawn sharply to cover her face. The door was -opened, and her face was pressed down still more tightly. - -“Clemence! What, all in the dark? Why, Clemence----” The masterful, -rather aggressively cheerful young voice stopped abruptly, and Julian -Romayne stood still against the door he had closed behind him, -listening; listening to a low, pitiful sound, which seemed to fill the -very air--the sound of a woman’s heart-broken crying. At the first tone -of his voice great, scalding tears had started to Clemence’s eyes -suddenly and without warning; a low, choking sob had shaken her from -head to foot, and she was crying now with the hopeless abandonment of -suddenly loosened grief. - -There was a moment during which the only sound in the room was the sound -of her quivering sobs. Julian stood quite still; on the first instant -there leapt into his face such a look of fierce, vindictive anger as -absolutely transformed it. The look faded slowly into a kind of bitter -background, and a hard sullenness settled itself upon it--settled with -some difficulty as it seemed, for his lips twitched a little. Then he -advanced into the room and broke the silence, and the roughness in his -tone seemed to defy something within himself. He made no attempt to -light the gas. The lamp outside made it possible to move about, and -apparently he did not care for further illumination. - -“Come, Clemence,” he said, “what’s the matter?” - -He had not approached her; on the contrary, he was on the other side of -the room looking down at her across the lodging-house table. She did not -raise her head or move as she replied; indeed, the choked, broken words -were rather the expression of the mingled shame and pity with which she -was crushed than a definite answer to his words. - -“Oh! Julian! Julian! Julian!” - -Apparently the tone of her voice affected him in spite of himself, for -his face twitched again, and he spoke more harshly still. - -“What’s the matter, I say?” - -She stretched her hands out to him across the table, still without -lifting her face, in an unconscious gesture of appeal. - -“Oh, don’t!” she cried beseechingly and piteously. “Don’t, dear! Don’t -pretend any more. I--I know!” - -The hands thrust deep down into Julian’s pockets were clenched -fiercely, and his teeth were set together, as a look rose in his eyes -which they had never held before. - -“My mother?” he said. - -She answered only with a slight shivering gesture, but it was enough. -With his young face white to the lips with passionate resentment, Julian -turned brusquely away and took two blind strides to the window, with a -muttered oath. - -There was a long silence. Julian stood at the window, staring blankly -out into the darkness with hard eyes. Clemence was indeed, as she -believed herself to be, his wife. How it had come about, how he had -drifted into anything so far from his vague thoughts in his first -meetings with her, he could not have said. What it was that had shaped -and moulded his intention into something so much purer and more manly -than his own nature, he only now and then felt faintly and indefinitely -when he touched it, as he could touch it rarely and densely, in the -woman from whose higher nature it emanated. He had married her with that -reckless carelessness for the future which seems almost abnormal, but -which is not an uncommon characteristic of weakness; and now he was -quite incapable of facing and enduring the legitimate consequences of -his action. He had lied to his mother to save himself from the heavier -penalty with which she threatened him, and his suggestion as to the -possibility of his marrying the girl she believed him to have ruined, -had been a miserable, consciously degraded attempt at cutting the -Gordian knot. He had lied to his mother again, deliberately and without -compunction, at their second interview, giving her a promise which he -knew to be an empty form, in his word to break with the girl who was his -wife. He had come to Clemence to-day, intending to arrange for that -temporary suspension of intercourse with her, which was inevitable as a -blind to his mother, by telling her that he was obliged to go abroad -immediately for an indefinite period. - -Now as he stood there in the dark little room, with his eyes fixed on -the solitary gas-lamp outside, he was gradually realising that it was -all over. His mother had sent, had possibly come herself, to Clemence, -he supposed, and Clemence had, of course, declared herself his wife. -His plans were all upset. His carefully made calculations were no longer -of any avail. It was all over. His brain gradually ceased to busy -itself; he was staring darkly at penury, humiliation, ostracism--not -thinking of them or feeling them, but just contemplating them with a -stupid, mental gaze. - -Gradually a sense of his surroundings began to return to him. He became -conscious that it was a street-lamp at which he was looking; that there -was a dark little street before him; that there was a dim room behind -him; and then from that room a low sound came to him--faint, exhausted, -long-drawn sobs, as of a woman who has wept herself into quiet. He began -to listen for them and count them involuntarily. Then they began to hurt -him; each one seemed to stick something into his heart. At last he -walked across almost mechanically, and laid his hand tentatively on her -shoulder. - -“It’s all right, Clemence!” he said huskily. “It’s all right, dear. -After all, you know, you are my wife all right!” He was conscious of a -vague idea that it was the supposition he had allowed that had cut her -so cruelly. - -There was another moment’s pause, and then Clemence slowly lifted her -head and looked at him for the first time. Her face was white and -exhausted-looking with her tears, and her eyes, luminous and -inexpressibly mournful, seemed to look through the pale, good-looking -young features above her into the poor cramped soul they hid. - -“I?” she said. “What does it matter about me, Julian? It’s you! Oh, my -dear, my dear, it’s you!” - -“It--it’s awkward!” returned Julian gloomily; his consciousness of the -prospect before him seemed to quicken and writhe at what he supposed to -be her realisation of it. “It’s loss of everything practically, of -course. One will be cut right and left, and where money is to come -from----” - -He was interrupted by a low cry. Clemence had drawn a little back as -though to see him better, and was looking up at him with her delicate -eyebrows drawn together in intense, painful perplexity and wonder. - -“Oh, Julian!” she said, and her low voice had for the first time a ring -of reproach in it. “Oh, Julian, it isn’t that, dear! It isn’t that! What -does that matter?” - -“What does it matter?” echoed Julian with an angry laugh. Her words, in -the total want of comprehension, the total incapacity for sympathy with -his position, to which they witnessed, seemed to him to throw into -sudden, glaring relief the class distinction which lay between them; and -the sense of it came upon him, jarring and overwhelming, like an earnest -of all he had done for himself. “It matters a good deal, let me tell -you, Clemence. It matters--as you can’t understand, you know! It matters -just everything!” - -“But--compared!” she said in a low, quick tone, a bright, pained light -in her eyes. “I know--I know, of course, that there is a great deal I -can’t understand. But--compared!” - -“Compared with what, in Heaven’s name?” said Julian angrily. - -“Compared with--yourself, Julian!” she cried, laying a tender, clinging -touch on his arm. “Compared with your own truth! Oh, don’t you know it’s -that, it’s only that that has been so dreadful to me--that made me feel -as if my heart was breaking! It’s thinking that you’ve been false, dear! -That you’ve said what’s not true, acted what’s not true! Oh, it’s that -that I can’t bear for you, my dear, my dear!” - -He stood looking down, not at her face, but at the worn, trembling hand -holding his in such a clasp of love and shame--shame for him as he -vaguely felt; suspended between wrath and a certain cold, creeping -feeling which he could not analyse, but which seemed to be gradually -turning him into a horrible shadow. It was an involuntary, unwilling -concession to this feeling, as one might throw a sop to an on-coming, -all-threatening monster, that he muttered awkwardly: - -“I--I’m sorry I deceived you, Clemence.” - -“Deceived me!” There was an emphasis on the pronoun which seemed to lift -her far above him in its absolute, unconscious, self-abnegation. “Me! -Oh, it isn’t that! It doesn’t matter who it is or how many people it -is! It’s the thing itself. It’s the meaning to yourself, and--and Heaven -above! Julian, dear, you believe in Heaven above, don’t you?” Clemence’s -creed was very simple; the attitude of the spirit which “Heaven above” -had given her was not an affair of many words. “You know it’s oneself -that matters. It isn’t what one has or the friends one has that make the -difference--they’re not anything really. It’s oneself!” - -She paused a moment, but he did not speak. He was still looking heavily -down at the hand on his arm, and she went on again, her voice trembling -with earnestness. - -“Julian, there’s that at the bottom of everything in all kinds of life! -It doesn’t matter whether one’s rich or poor, it doesn’t matter whether -people think well of us--we can’t always make them, and we can’t all be -rich. But we can all be good, dear. Heaven means us all to be good, -don’t you think? Oh, if it didn’t, if it wasn’t that that mattered most -of all down at the bottom, what would the world come to be like? And why -should anybody go on living!” - -Julian Romayne was very young. Far down in his nature; in that awful -inextricable tangle which, because it is so awful and so far beyond his -reach, man struggles so insanely to reduce to his poor little level, to -define, and label, and explain away, but which remains in spite of him a -mystery of God; there was that strange affinity for noble thoughts and -things which is the sign manual of His part in man, never wholly -withdrawn by its Creator from the earth. It is in the young that that -instinctive affinity is most easily reached and touched; and the simple, -ignorant, unworldly words--words which could have touched in Julian no -reasoning powers--were the medium which reached it now. Clemence had -reached it more than once or twice before, and its feeble stirring in -response had quickened it, and rendered it, in some poor and -infinitesimal degree, sensitive to her touch. - -He drew his arm sharply from those clinging, pleading hands, and turned -away, leaning his arm on the mantelpiece so that she could not see his -face. That cold, creeping feeling which seemed to sap all his reality -had stolen over his whole personality, and he was held numb and -paralysed in the clutch of an all-dominating question. Was it really as -she said? His own life, his own world had faded into shadows as of a -very dream. Strange, distorted shapes, conceptions so new to him that -they wore a weird and ghostly air of unreality, seemed to be rising -round him, pressing him into nothingness. Was it as she said? He did not -speak, and after a moment Clemence went on; very tenderly, very -delicately, as though in her intense sympathy and feeling for the -suffering she ascribed to him by intuition, she dreaded to hurt him -further; diffidently and with difficulty, because she was so little used -to clothing in words all that to her was most real and vital in life. - -“You--you must think of the future, dear. I know--I know that you can -hardly bear to look at the past, but it--it is past! It hasn’t been you, -really! I know it can’t have been! And--it will wear out of your life at -last, dear, by--by truth. You will tell your mother that we are -married”--a scarlet, agonising colour dyed her face for an -instant--“perhaps you have told her already? And perhaps, perhaps she -will forgive you! If not--why if not, perhaps the--the pain will help to -wear it out, my dearest.” - -Her voice and the expression of the sweet, white face she lifted to him -had changed subtly as she spoke. Her great pity and sorrow for him had -developed a strange, new phase in her love for him. It had become -tenderer, deeper. She had lost her reverence for him, but her love had -triumphed over the loss, and through the pain and victory it had won -higher ground, and become the love of sympathy and consolation. - -But Julian hardly heard her last words. His attention had stopped, as it -were, at those preceding them: - -“You will tell your mother that we are married!” - -Had Clemence not told, then? Was it possible that she had not mentioned -it; that his mother did not know even now; that there was still hope? - -The thought arrested the current of his thoughts in an instant. The -possibilities the thought suggested; all the tangible, definite -advantages it held; swept over those faintly quickened perceptions in a -sudden wave of excitement, numbing them on the instant. The things which -had been realities to him as long as he had had any consciousness, took -to themselves substance once again and pressed about him. Life and the -world resumed their normal complexion, and he lifted his head quickly -and turned. - -“Do you mean--have you seen my mother? Whom have you seen? Do you mean -that you have said nothing?” - -There was a pause as Clemence looked at him for a moment confused and -startled, it seemed, by his manner. There was a wonderful, unconscious -touch of dignity in her gentle manner as she answered: - -“I never thought of it!” - -“Was it my mother?” - -“No; a gentleman.” - -Julian moved abruptly with a low exclamation, and began to walk rapidly -up and down the little room absorbed in eager thought. Clemence watched -him with a puzzled, surprised look in her eyes, and a little touch of -reserve creeping over her face. At last he stopped suddenly and began -to speak, looking anywhere but on her face. - -“Look here, Clemence, I’m afraid this sounds an awfully blackguardly -thing to suggest, but you’ll see it’s necessary. It won’t do for me to -tell my mother just yet. To tell you the truth she is frightfully set -against my marrying. I am done for all round as soon as she knows, and -it would be just cutting our own throats to tell her--yet, you know. You -see,” he went on hurriedly, evidently anxious to prevent her speaking, -“you see, as I am I’ve got very good prospects. In a few years, if all -goes well, I shall be making heaps of money at the bar--a fellow that is -well known, you know, can always get on--and then it will be all right -and simple. Meanwhile, you see, I have plenty of money, and we can be -together almost as much as we like, quietly, you know. Whereas if we -burst it all up now we shall just starve and be out of it all our lives. -Don’t you see?” - -He stopped awkwardly, but for the moment he had no answer. Clemence had -listened to him, the expression of her face changing from wonder to -incredulity, from incredulity to agony, from agony to the look of a -creature stricken to death. She lifted her hand in the silence slowly -and heavily to her head. Julian saw the gesture, though he could not see -her face, and its heaviness somehow increased his discomfort. - -“You see it’s only common sense!” he said impatiently. - -“You mean that you want to go on living a double life--that you don’t -want, don’t mean to try, to do right!” The voice was not like the voice -of the Clemence he knew. It was low, distinct, and stern, and she spoke -very slowly. - -“I mean that I don’t want to ruin myself out of hand!” he said harshly. -“Don’t be foolish, Clemence!” - -“Ruin!” she said in the same tone. “You don’t know what real ruin means! -I don’t know how to make you understand; I’m not clever enough. But I -can tell you just this! I would rather die than have it as you say. For -your sake, not for my own only, I would rather die. Until your mother -knows the truth I won’t even see you or speak to you again. As to -taking a penny of your money, I would starve first.” - -Her tone, vibrating with intensity of meaning, was quite low. She was -not declaiming or protesting. She was simply making her stand at a -proposition so terrible to her that it had carried her beyond the bounds -of emotion. For the moment Julian was startled and aghast. - -“You don’t mean that!” he said. “Clemence, that’s nonsense!” - -“It’s truth!” she said steadily. “You must choose!” - -She was standing facing him, her slight figure erect and straight as he -had never seen it. Her face was white as death, and set into strange, -fine lines quite new to it; all the softness about her mouth was being -gradually pressed out as the latent strength developed, as it seemed, -with every breath she drew. It was as though the crisis, in its sudden -demand upon her forces, was transforming her as she grappled with it; -transforming her into a woman before whom Julian felt himself shrink -into utter contemptibility. He took the only means he knew to reassert -himself, and lost his temper deliberately. - -“Well, then, I do choose!” he cried violently. “You’re a foolish girl, -who doesn’t understand, Clemence, and by-and-by you’ll own I was right! -As to not taking my money, that’s absurd, you know! You must! But I’m -not going to ruin both of us for absurd fancies!” - -He stopped, hoping she would answer and give him some advantage, but she -stood silent, gazing at him with stern, searching eyes, as though she -were trying in vain to reconcile the man before her with the man she -loved. Julian felt her gaze though he could not see it, and he went on -hotly, trying, as it were, to gather round him the rags of his old -authority and superiority. - -“You don’t suppose, Clemence,” he said, “that I propose this because I -like it? It’s not a nice thing for a man to propose to his wife, I can -tell you. I should have hoped you would have understood that. But after -all it’s only for a time, and it won’t make any real difference to -you--things will be just as they have been. And if you can’t feel about -it as I do, you must remember it’s because you’ve got a great deal to -learn still, and you must believe that what I say is right. Anyway, -you’re my wife, you know, and you’re bound to obey me!” - -“I’m bound to obey you in all things that it’s right you should ask. But -I’m not bound to do what would be dragging you down and me too. I can’t -make you do what’s right; it wouldn’t do you any good for me to tell -your mother; but until you do, it will be as I said.” - -“Then it’s you who part us,” he cried passionately. “You don’t love me, -Clemence! You can’t ever have loved me!” - -There was a moment’s pause, and then her answer came in a strange, still -voice. - -“I do love you!” she said. “I love you so that I would give my life to -blot out what you’ve said!” - -A dead silence--a silence in which Julian Romayne seemed to feel -something pulling and straining at his heart-strings. Then with a -reckless, desperate effort he tore himself away from its influence and -spoke. - -“It can’t be helped, then,” he said fiercely and defiantly. “You must -go your own way until you come to your senses! Some day, perhaps, you’ll -be grateful to me for refusing to make fools of us! I wouldn’t have -believed it of you, Clemence! You make me almost sorry that I ever saw -you. Now, look here; I’ve put it to you from every point of view; I’ve -tried as hard as ever I can to make you understand, and if you won’t, -you won’t! As to the money, of course, I can’t hear of your not taking -that. I shall send you so much regularly every month--it won’t be very -much either, but it’ll be enough to keep you--and, of course, you’ll -have to spend it. But you need not be afraid that I shall want to see -you again until you come to a more sensible frame of mind.” - -He waited, but again there was no answer, and again some influence from -her still presence discomfited him, and made him hurry on. - -“I’m going now!” he said roughly. “Good-bye, Clemence!” He made a -movement as though to go, without a tenderer farewell, but quite -suddenly his heart failed him. He turned again and took her into his -arms impulsively and tenderly. “Clemmie!” he said brokenly. “I -say--Clemmie!” - -Her arms were round his neck pressing him closely and more closely, with -a desperate, agonised pressure, and a long, clinging kiss was on his -cheek. - -“Don’t keep me waiting long,” she whispered hoarsely. “You will do it at -last. I know, I know you will. But--don’t keep me waiting long!” - -She released him and drew herself gently out of his arms, and Julian -turned and stumbled out of the room and down the stairs, the most -consciously contemptible young man in London, and with no strength to -act upon his consciousness. - - - - -CHAPTER X - - -“You admire it, Mrs. Romayne? It strikes you as true? Ah, but that is -very charming of you!” - -A confused babel of voices--that curious, indefinable sound which is -shrill, though its shrillness would be most difficult to trace; harsh, -though it arises from the voices of well-bred men and women; and -absolutely unmeaning--was filling the two rooms from end to end; and the -soft light diffused by cleverly arranged lamps fell upon groups of -smartly dressed women and men equally correct in their attire on male -lines. It was about five o’clock, not a pleasant time on a gusty, sleety -November afternoon if Nature is allowed to have her own way; but inside -these rooms it was impossible to do anything but ignore nature; the air -was so soft and warm--faintly scented, too, with flowers--and the -colour so rich and delicate. The rooms themselves were a curious hybrid -between the fashionable and the artistic; that is to say, they were not -arranged according to any conventional tenets, and there were various -really beautiful hangings, “bits” of old brass, “bits” of old oak, and -“bits” of old china about. But all these, though very cleverly arranged, -were distinctly “posed.” The larger of the two rooms was obviously a -studio; rather too obviously, perhaps, since the fact was impressed by a -certain superabundance of artistic prettinesses. Charming little -arrangements in hangings, palms, or what not, “composed” at every turn -with the constantly shifting groups. The unconventionalism, in short, -was as carefully arranged as was the attitude of the host of the hour as -he stood leaning against a large easel, mysteriously curtained, talking -to Mrs. Romayne. He was a painter, and a clever painter; he had married -a clever wife, and as a result of the working of their respective brains -towards the same goal he had become the fashion. “Everybody” went to -“the Stormont-Eades’ affairs,” whether the affair in question was a -little dinner, a little “evening,” or a little tea-party--Mrs. -Stormont-Eade always affixed the diminutive; consequently everybody was -obliged to go; a fact which if carefully thought out, will lead to some -rather curious conclusions. And the little tea-parties, particularly in -the winter, were considered particularly desirable functions. One of -these tea-parties was going on now. - -Mr. Stormont-Eade himself was a tall, good-looking man who had nearly -succeeded, by dint of careful attention to his good points, in conveying -the impression that he was a handsome man. He had fine eyes, really -remarkably fine, as he was well aware, when they were earnest, and they -were looking now with a deep intensity of meaning, which was their -normal expression, into Mrs. Romayne’s face; his mouth was not so -admirable except when he smiled, and consequently his thin lips were -slightly curved; his figure was too thin, and the touch of -picturesqueness about his pose and about his velvet coat redeemed it; -but his closely-curling hair was cut short and trim, and showed the -excellent shape of his head to the best advantage. He had come up to -Mrs. Romayne only a minute or two before at the conclusion of a song; a -very little very fashionable music was always a feature of the -Stormont-Eades’ entertainments, and “good people”--the phrase in this -connection representing clever professionals possessed of the social -ambition of the day--were glad to sing or play for them; and she had -begun to speak of a little picture of his which was one of the themes of -the moment. - -Mrs. Romayne was dressed from head to foot in carefully harmonised -shades of green--green was the colour of the season--with a good deal of -soft black fur about it. Her bonnet became her to perfection; her face -was so animated that in the soft light a certain haggard sharpness of -contour was hardly perceptible. Her smiles and laughs as she exchanged -greetings and chat were always ready; if they left her eyes quite -untouched, her attention was apparently as free and disengaged as were -the gay little gestures with which she emphasized her talk. There was -absolutely nothing about her which could have suggested to the ordinary -observer anything beyond the surface of finished society woman which she -was presenting so brightly to the world. But on the previous evening she -had had a note from Falconer, written immediately after his interview -with “the girl,” telling her only that he was to have a second -interview, and would see her on the following day. That day was now -drawing to a close, and she had as yet heard nothing further. - -“It enchanted me!” she said now. “But then your things always do enchant -me, you know! By-the-bye, people say that you are going to do a big -picture. I hope that is not so? Little bits are so much more -fascinating.” - -Mr. Stormont-Eade smiled--the tender, comprehending smile that was one -of his charms. - -“No, it is not true,” he said. “One is so fettered with a large work, -but little things represent the inspiration, the feeling of the moment. -If they have any value, it lies in that.” They had a distinct financial -value, though it is doubtful whether the dealers would have recognised -the source. - -“Ah, the feeling of the moment!” said Mrs. Romayne with pretty fervour. -“That is what one so seldom gets, isn’t it? And it is so delightful!” - -Then she broke off with a charming smile to shake hands with Mrs. Halse, -brought by the constant shifting of the groups into her vicinity. Mrs. -Romayne was an excellent listener, and reputed a good talker, though she -had probably never said a witty or a clever thing in her life; but she -was never exclusive; she was always, so to speak, more or less in touch -with the whole room, and ready to extend her circle. - -“I’ve been making for you for hours,” she said gaily. “Ah!” The word was -an exclamation of pleased surprise as she suddenly became aware of a -girl’s figure behind Mrs. Halse; a girl’s figure much better dressed -than had been its wont, and very erect, with a latent touch of triumph -and excitement on the pretty face. It was Miss Hilda Newton. - -“I did not know you were in London,” went on Mrs. Romayne, holding out -her hand with gracious cordiality. - -“She is staying with me on most important business,” said Mrs. Halse. -Mrs. Halse had accommodated herself to her increasing portliness by this -time, and had apparently thought it necessary to increase the exuberance -of her manner proportionately. Her voice, and the laugh with which she -spoke, were equally loud. “Trousseau, you must know. She is to be -married directly after Christmas. And when I heard it I wrote and said -she’d better come straight to me, and then I could see that she got the -right things. Of course, as she’s to live in town, she must have the -right things, you know.” - -“Of course,” assented Mrs. Romayne gaily and airily. “And you are very -busy?” - -The last words were addressed to Hilda Newton, whose hand Mrs. Romayne -still held. There was a curious mixture of resentment, defiance, and -triumph in the girl’s face as she confronted the suave, smiling -countenance of the elder woman, which just touched her voice as she -answered: - -“Very busy indeed!” - -She was conscious of a desire so to frame her answer as to suggest the -position in society which was to be hers on her marriage, but she could -think of no words in which to do it. - -“And where is Master Julian?” broke in Mrs. Halse. Delicacy and tact had -never been more than names with her; as her fibre, mental and physical, -coarsened, she was beginning to think it quite unnecessary to maintain -even a bowing acquaintance with these qualities; and her strident voice -expressed a great deal that Hilda Newton would like to have expressed. -“He must be made to come and offer his congratulations--or perhaps Hilda -will compound with him for a particularly handsome wedding-present. He -knows Talbot Compton, of course? Otherwise, they must be introduced.” - -“He is not here this afternoon, I’m sorry to say,” returned his mother, -smiling. Mr. Stormont-Eade, if he could have recognised “the feeling of -the moment” in this particular crisis, might have learnt a lesson on -several points. “He has turned into a tremendously hard worker, you -know. An astonishing fact, isn’t it? I tell him he has secret intentions -of taking the bench by storm.” - -She was laughing and looking idly away across the room, when quite -suddenly she stopped. Just inside the doorway, shaking hands with Mrs. -Stormont-Eade, and having evidently just arrived, was Dennis Falconer, -and as she caught sight of him there flashed into her eyes, through all -the superficial brightness of her face, something which was like nothing -but a sheer agony of hunger. It came in an instant, and it was gone in -an instant. As he turned away from his hostess and caught her eye, she -made him a light gesture and smile of greeting, and turned again to Mrs. -Halse; and Mrs. Halse was not even conscious of a pause. - -“It’s almost too astonishing, don’t you know!” said that vociferous lady -with a laugh. “I don’t half believe in these sudden transformations. If -I were you I should make him produce his work every night for -inspection. It’s my belief he is getting into mischief. These -hard-working young men are such frauds!” - -She laughed loudly, and at that moment accident brought Falconer, on his -way across the room, to a standstill a few paces from her. He had -evidently intended to pass the little group, but Mrs. Halse frustrated -his intention. With a peremptory gesture she claimed his attention, and -as he drew nearer, she said boisterously: - -“Now, don’t you agree with me, Mr. Falconer? Aren’t these good, -hard-working boys the greatest scamps going?” - -Falconer was looking very severe and impassive; he shook hands with Mrs. -Halse, and then turned perforce to Mrs. Romayne, taking her hand with an -almost solemn gravity, which contrasted sharply with the careless gaiety -with which she extended it. - -“I didn’t expect to see you this afternoon,” she said lightly. “Stupid -of me, though; every one comes to the Stormont-Eades’.” - -“I did not expect to meet you,” he answered sternly. “I have called at -Queen Anne Street.” - -He had been astounded at not finding her at home. He was distinctly of -opinion that afternoon teas were not for a woman who should be sitting -in sackcloth and ashes, and the sight of her had shocked not only his -sense of propriety, but some deeper sense of the reality of the crisis -at which he was assisting. Perhaps Mrs. Romayne understood that her -presence at the “little tea-party” scandalised him, for there was a -strange, bitter smile on her lips before she turned to Mrs. Halse, and -said, with a rather hard, strained ring in her gay voice: - -“You’ll get no support from my cousin, I assure you, Mrs. Halse. He was -a most praiseworthy----” - -Her voice was drowned in a ringing chord on the piano, and as the -prelude to a song filled the room, she made a mocking gesture -expressive of the impossibility of making herself heard; and turning her -face towards the singer, as she stood by Falconer’s side, she composed -herself to listen. Her face grew rather set and fixed in its lines of -animated attention as the song went on, and when it ceased, her comments -were of the indefinitely delighted order. She made them very easily and -brightly, however, and then she turned carelessly to Falconer. - -“Are you thinking of staying long?” she said lightly. “I rather want to -talk to you, do you know--this unfortunate man is my man of business, -you must know, Mrs. Halse--and I thought perhaps that I could drive you -somewhere.” - -“I shall be happy to go whenever you like,” was the grave answer. - -Mrs. Romayne laughed lightly. - -“Oh, I don’t want to take you away immediately!” she said. “You’ve only -just come, I’m afraid. In a little while!” - -She smiled and nodded to him, and to Mrs. Halse and Miss Newton, and -moved away to speak to some other people. - -About a quarter of an hour later Falconer, who was a somewhat grim -ornament to society in the interval, saw her coming smiling towards him. - -“Ready?” she said. “That’s very nice of you! Suppose we go, then?” - -He followed her out of the room and down the stairs, her flow of -comments and laughter never ceasing; put her into her carriage, and got -in himself. - -“Home!” she said sharply to the coachman. The door banged, they rolled -away into the darkness and the wet, and her voice stopped suddenly. - -They rolled along for a few minutes in total silence. Shut up alone with -her like that, the isolation and quiet following so suddenly on the -crowd and noise of a moment before, Falconer’s only conscious feeling -was one of almost stupid discomfort. Her sudden silence, too, had an -indefinable but very unpleasant effect upon him. At last he said with -awkward displeasure: - -“I was going to write to you! I----” - -She lifted her hand quickly and stopped him. - -“When we get in!” she said in a quick, tense voice. “You can come in? -It is just six. It need not take long.” - -“I am quite at your service.” - -She leant back in her corner with a sharp breath of relief, and neither -moved nor spoke again until the carriage drew up at her own door. - -She opened the door with a latchkey, and moved quickly across the hall -to the foot of the stairs, motioning to Falconer to follow her. Then she -stopped abruptly and turned. A servant was just crossing the hall to the -dining-room, where the preliminary preparation for a dinner-party could -be seen. - -“Is Mr. Julian in?” said Mrs. Romayne sharply. - -“Not yet, ma’am.” - -“If he should come in before I go to dress, tell him that I am engaged.” - -She turned again and went on to the drawing-room. - -“Now!” she said in a breathless peremptory monosyllable, facing Falconer -as he shut the door. She did not attempt to sit down herself or to -invite Falconer to do so. All her senses seemed to be absorbed in the -desperate anxiety with which her face was sharp and haggard. She looked -ten years older than she had looked in Mr. Stormont-Eade’s studio. -Falconer answered her directly with no preliminary formalities. - -“I saw the--the young woman yesterday,” he began; “but I was unable to -bring about any arrangement. I gave her twenty-four hours for -consideration, and this afternoon I called to see her again.” - -“Yes, yes!” - -“I found that she had left the house this morning, leaving no address.” - -“Left!” The erect, tense figure confronting him staggered back a step as -though a heavy blow had fallen upon it, and Mrs. Romayne caught -desperately at the back of a chair. “Left--and you don’t know where she -is? You’ve settled nothing? We’ve no hold over her!” - -The words had come from her in hoarse, gasping sentences, each one -growing in intensity until the last vibrated with an agony of very -despair, but Falconer’s face grew grimmer as he listened. How it was he -could not have told, but a strange, uncomfortable remembrance of the -girl he had seen on the previous day, which had haunted him at more or -less inopportune moments ever since, seemed to rise now and accentuate -all his usual antagonism to the woman who was talking of her. - -“I think you need not distress yourself,” he said stiffly. “Perhaps I -had better tell you at once that your son knows no more of her -whereabouts than we do.” - -The drawn look of despair relaxed on Mrs. Romayne’s face; relaxed into -an agony of questioning doubt. - -“Doesn’t know?” she said sharply. “Julian doesn’t know?” - -“The landlady of the house,” continued Falconer, “a very unpleasant and -loquacious woman, was eager to inform me that on the arrival of your son -yesterday afternoon, about an hour after I saw the young woman, there -was a quarrel between them and that he left the house in anger. To-day, -very shortly before my arrival, he returned and was astonished to find -that the young woman was gone. He demanded her address, and was furious -to find that it was not known. I think there is no room for doubt that -the young woman has left him!” - -The colour was coming back to Mrs. Romayne’s face slowly and in burning -patches, and her clutch on the chair was almost convulsive. - -“Left him!” she said under her breath. “Left him!” There was a moment’s -pause, and then she said in a harsh, high-pitched, concentrated tone: -“Do you mean--for good? Why? Why should she?” - -“I am sorry to have to say it to you,” said Falconer slowly, “but I fear -the case against your son is even blacker than it appears on the -surface. I think it more than possible that he deceived the young -woman.” - -The slowly-formed conviction--and it became conviction only as he spoke -the words--was the result of that vague and disturbing impression made -on Falconer on the preceding day by “the young woman.” It had worked -slowly and almost without consciousness on his part, but it had refused -to die out, and it had attained the only fruition possible to it in his -last words. - -“And you believe that she is really gone? That there is nothing more to -fear from her?” - -It was the same absorbed, intent tone, and her eyes, fixed eagerly on -Falconer now, were hard and glittering. The terrible significance of his -words, with all the weight of tragedy they held, seemed to have passed -her by, to have no existence for her. It was as though the sense in her -which should have responded to it was numbed or non-existent. And -Falconer, scandalised and revolted, replied sternly: - -“I think you need have no anxiety on that score. She has disappeared of -her own free will, and your son, upon reflection, will probably be glad -to accept so easy a solution of what he doubtless recognises by this -time as a troublesome complication.” There was a rigid and utterly -antipathetic condemnation of Julian in his voice; he had judged the -young man, and sentenced him as vicious to the core, and for all his -experience, he held too rigidly to his narrow conception to consider the -possible effect upon youth and passion of so sudden and total a -thwarting. “My only fear,” he continued, “is that serious injustice has -been done. The young woman is by no means the kind of young woman I was -led to believe her. I have grave doubts as to whether it was not our -duty to enforce a marriage upon your son, instead of negativing the -suggestion.” - -The words were probably rather more than he would have been prepared to -stand to had they been put to a practical issue, and he had spoken them, -though he hardly knew it, more from a severe desire to arouse what he -called in his own mind “some decent feeling” in the woman to whom he -spoke, than from any other reason. From that point of view they failed -completely. It was a bright light of triumph that flashed into Mrs. -Romayne’s eyes as she said quickly, and in an eager, vibrating tone, -which seemed less an answer to him personally than to the bare fact to -which he had given words: - -“Fortunately there is no more fear of that.” - -The tall clock standing in a corner of the room chimed the -three-quarters as she spoke, and she started as she heard it. - -“It is a quarter to seven,” she said. “And I have people to dinner. You -have nothing else to tell me, have you? Nothing to advise?” - -“Nothing,” was the grim answer. - -“You do not think--would it be a good thing, do you think, to have the -girl traced so that we could always be sure?” - -“You need take no further trouble in the matter, in my opinion. If you -should observe anything in your son’s conduct to revive your uneasiness, -the question must, of course, be reconsidered. You will observe him -closely, no doubt.” - -There was a moment’s curiously dead silence, and then it was broken by a -strange half-laugh. - -“No doubt!” said Mrs. Romayne. “No doubt!” - -Another pause, and then she turned and glanced at the clock. - -“I must go,” she said. “Thank you.” - -She held out her hand, and he just touched it as though conventionality -alone compelled him. - -“I have considered myself bound in duty in the matter,” he said stiffly. -“Good night!” - -No touch of artificiality returned to her manner even in dismissing him. -It remained hard and practical. Her intense absorption in the subject of -their interview did not yield by so much as a hair’s breadth, and she -remained absolutely impervious to any thought of the man before her. His -slight, cold touch of her hand, the sternness of his obvious -condemnation of her, were evidently absolutely unobserved by her. - -“Good night!” she returned; and as he left her without another word, she -crossed the room rapidly and went upstairs to dress for dinner. - -The dinner-party of that evening was unanimously declared by the guests -to be quite the most delightful Mrs. Romayne had ever given. The dinner, -the flowers, all the arrangements, were perfection, of course; but even -when this is the case the “go” of a dinner-party may be a variable or -even a non-existent quality; and it was the “go” of this particular -occasion that was so remarkable. All the component parts of the party -seemed to be animated and fused into one harmonious whole by the spirits -of the hostess and host. Mrs. Romayne was so charming, so bright, so -full of vivacity; Julian, who put in his appearance only just before the -announcement of dinner, was so boyish, so lively, so ingenuous. He was a -little pale when he first appeared, and the lady he took down to dinner -reproached him with working too hard; but as the evening wore on he -gained colour. The relations between himself and his mother had always -been quite one of the features of Mrs. Romayne’s entertainments, but -those relations had never been more charmingly accentuated than they -were to-night. - -Until he came gaily in among her guests that evening, Julian and his -mother had not met since that second interview which had prompted her -summons to Falconer. Julian had dined out on both the intervening -evenings, and it was easily to be arranged under these circumstances, -if either of the pair so willed it, that forty-eight hours should go by -without their coming in contact with one another. And an onlooker aware -of the circumstances of their last meeting, and watching the mother and -son through the evening now, might have reflected that the laws of -heredity seldom operate exclusively through one parent. - -“Good night, dear Mrs. Romayne! Such a delightful evening! How I do envy -you that dear boy of yours! It’s the greatest pleasure to see you two -together.” - -The speaker was a good-natured old lady, and she had thought it no harm -to put into words what her fellow-guests had only thought. She was the -last departure, and Mrs. Romayne followed her to the top of the stairs, -with a laughing deprecation of the words which was very fascinating, and -then turned back into the drawing-room with another “good night,” as -Julian prepared to attend the old lady to her carriage. - -The hall door shut with a bang, and then there was a moment’s pause. The -mother in the drawing-room above, and the son in the hall below, stood -for an instant motionless. A subtle change had come over Mrs. Romayne’s -face the instant she found herself alone. It had sharpened slightly, and -an eager, haggard anticipation was striving to express itself in her -eyes, only to be resolutely veiled. But to Julian’s face as he stood -with his hand still resting on the hall door there came a great and -sudden alteration. All the light and gaiety died out of it before a -wild, fierce expression of rebellion and distaste, repressed almost -instantly by a pale, sullen look of determination. He moved, and Mrs. -Romayne, hearing his step, moved slightly also; he came up the stairs, -and as he came he seemed to force back into his face the easy smile it -had worn all the evening. - -“It’s been a great success, hasn’t it, dear?” he said lightly as he -crossed the drawing-room threshold. - -“A great success!” she said in the same tone--though in her case it rang -a little thin. - -An instant’s silence followed, and then she laid her hand airily on his -arm. Her lips were white and dry with agitation, and she knew it; she -wondered desperately whether her voice rang as unnaturally in Julian’s -ears as it did in her own, as she said with what she meant for perfect -ease: - -“Dear boy, let us say our final words upon that wretched business -to-night and wake up clear of it to-morrow. May I be happy about you? -That’s all there is to be said, isn’t it?” - -She tried to smile, but she knew the effort was a ghastly failure, and -again she wondered whether Julian saw. She need not have feared! Julian -was busy with his own histrionic difficulties, and had neither sight nor -hearing for her. - -“You may be quite happy, little mother!” he said, and the frank -tenderness of his tone and manner were only very slightly -over-accentuated. “I’ve made up my mind to do as you wish, and I won’t -make such a fool of myself again!” - -They were standing close together, looking each into the other’s face, -and he patted her hand as it lay on his arm as he finished. Yet between -them, parting them as seas of ice could not have parted them, there lay -a shadow beneath which love itself survives only as the cruellest form -of torture; the shadow of the unspoken with its chill, unmoveable dead -weight against which no man or woman can prevail. - -The hand on Julian’s arm trembled a little. The terrible presence, which -is never recognised except by those to whom its chill is as the chill of -death, was making itself vaguely felt about his mother’s heart. She let -her eyes stray from his face with a painful, tremulous movement, and her -fingers tightened round his arm. - -“It is all over?” she murmured in a low voice. “It is all over, really?” - -As her self-command failed her his seemed to strengthen. He patted her -hand again reassuringly, and said, confidently: - -“Yes, dear, indeed! I’ve only got to beg your pardon, and I do that with -all my heart.” - -He stooped and kissed her tenderly, and as he did so she seemed to rally -her forces with a tremendous effort. She returned his kiss with a -pretty, effusive embrace, though her lips were as cold as ice. - -“I grant it freely,” she said. “And if I’ve felt obliged to be--well, -shall we say rather autocratic?--for once in a way, you must forgive me, -too, eh?” - -But the unspoken, terrible reality as it is, was to be touched by no -such ghastly travesty. Julian’s laugh was only a firmer echo of his -mother’s gay artificiality of tone, but as she heard it her lips turned -whiter still. - -“That’s of course,” he said. “Of course.” - -“Then it’s all settled!” she responded gaily. “We’ll draw a veil over -the past from to-night, and behave better in the future. Good night, -dear boy!” She kissed him again, patted him lightly on the shoulder and -moved away. On the threshold she stopped, turned, and blew him a kiss -over her shoulder. “Forgiveness and oblivion from to-night,” she said; -and there was a strange, defiant gaiety in her voice. - -With another smile and a nod she went upstairs, and as she went her face -grew lined and drawn, like the face of an old woman, and the defiance -that had lurked in her voice stared out of her eyes, half-wild and -reckless. - - - - -CHAPTER XI - - -It was a bright spring day; one of those days on which the freshness and -renewal of life which only spring knows, and for the sake of which even -the cold monotony of winter is endurable, seem to be in the very air, -and to radiate with the light itself. Even in London, where nature’s -broadest effects, only, can be felt, there was a sense of exuberance -which was almost excitement. The sun shone with a brightness which -seemed to shed oblivion over past darkness. The air was quickening and -stirring with vague and limitless possibilities. - -It is rather a notable arrangement which makes the quickening of life in -one of the least natural systems in the world, London society, -simultaneous with nature’s great awakening. It presents a suggestion of -combined travesty, patronage, and unconscious testimony to that affinity -between man and nature which nothing can wholly destroy, which, if -worked out with a certain amount of latitude to a fantastic imagination, -will have a rather bewildering effect upon the focus of things in -general. But it is nevertheless a fact that on this particular day in -May very many of the impulses stirring in nature had their strangely -distorted counterparts in the impulses of society. Society, like nature, -had discarded its winter garments, its winter habits; society, like -nature, was restless with fresh beginnings, fresh hopes, fresh -tendencies. The resemblance lay on the surface; the contrast was farther -to seek. - -It was about three o’clock in the afternoon, and a certain section of -society--a gathering, at least, very fairly representative of a certain -section--was surging in a good-tempered, aimless, demoralised way in a -very fashionable church in Kensington. Some of the demoralisation was -due to the occasion--a smart wedding--but the gaiety and the general air -of readiness to be pleased which prevailed were as certainly the -outcome of the wider spirit of the hour as were the smart spring gowns -and the quantities of spring flowers carried or worn by the women. The -bridal party had left the church and a general exodus was in progress; -progress rendered rather slow by reason of the difficulties attendant on -the bringing together of carriages and owners, and involving a -considerable crush inside the church door. In the middle of this crush, -allowing himself to be pushed and drifted along towards the door, was a -man who was apparently too fully occupied in casting keen, comprehensive -and reconnoitring looks about him, and in returning the gestures of -greeting and welcome which returned his glances on all sides, to take -much heed as to the manner or direction of the movement imposed upon him -by the moving crowd. It was Marston Loring, and as he finally emerged -into the air he was lightly clapped on the shoulder by Lord Garstin, -who, a few yards in front of him during their compressed passage out of -the building, had waited for him on the pavement. - -“Glad to see you back, Loring!” he said. “Heard last night of your -arrival. How are you?” - -“Not sorry to be back,” returned Loring nonchalantly, as he shook hands. -“I’ve come to the conclusion, though, in the course of the last -half-hour, that six months is a mere nothing!” - -“Are you walking round to the house?” asked Lord Garstin. “So am I. Let -me have your news as we go.” - -Marston Loring had spent the winter at the Cape. His departure had been -alluded to among his smart acquaintances as “a sudden affair” more or -less indefinitely connected in their minds with that “business” of which -Loring was understood to be a devotee. To Loring himself it had been by -no means a sudden thing. That is to say, the necessity for it had been -gradually growing up about him in his professional life much against his -will, though it had reached a crisis somewhat unexpectedly. He had been -absent six months, and this was, practically, his social reappearance; -but looking at him as he turned into the street with Lord Garstin, it -would have been difficult to believe that he had been away at all; far -less that he had passed through any striking experiences of men and -life. His keen, cynical, unpleasant face was entirely unaltered; his -manner was perfectly calm and unmoved. If he had his observations to -make on his return, if the result of those observations was rather -exciting than indifferent to him, interest and emotion were still -entirely outside his pose. - -The talk between the two men, however, as they passed along the streets -was such talk as passes when one of the two is occupied in picking up -dropped threads, and the other is well calculated, and well satisfied, -to help him in the process. In his heart of hearts--if such a spot could -have been reached in him--Lord Garstin would probably have confessed to -little personal liking for Loring; his cordiality was the result of -considerably involved workings of social politics. Just at this moment -in particular, with the prestige fresh upon him of sundry smart magazine -articles on Cape affairs which he had sent home from time to time, and -which had been a good deal talked about, Marston Loring was distinctly -a man to be noticed and encouraged. - -Details connected with the wedding at which they had just assisted were -naturally the first topics that presented themselves. It was Hilda -Newton’s wedding; she had been married with much circumstance from Mrs. -Halse’s house; and, before Loring left England, it had been said that -she was to be married at Christmas at her own home in Yorkshire. About a -month before the day fixed for the wedding, however, the aunt with whom -she lived had died; the wedding had perforce been postponed, and when it -became possible to consider another date, Mrs. Halse--in the absence of -any near relation to the bride-elect--had taken the matter in hand. - -“A very nice affair she’s made of it!” commented the elder man, as he -finished his explanation, interspersed with discursive items of news of -all sorts appertaining to society and its doings. “A little loud, of -course; that goes without saying; and, really, nowadays it’s rather the -thing! A pretty girl in her way, Mrs. Compton. And talking of pretty -girls, Maud Pomeroy looked well. They’ve been at Cannes since the end of -January; only just back, like yourself.” - -“So I heard,” answered Loring indifferently. “By-the-bye, I didn’t see -the Romaynes. Aren’t they in town? I’ve not had time to look any one up -yet, of course, but I thought I should see Julian to-day.” - -Lord Garstin paused a moment before he answered. - -“They were there,” he said. “I saw them come in. You’ll see them at the -house, no doubt. The little woman’s been invisible for two or three -days; ill--rather bad, somebody said.” - -“Ill!” echoed Loring; and there was a genuine surprise in his tone which -no information yet bestowed upon him had evoked. “Really!” He paused a -moment, and then said, with his own peculiar smile: “And how is Julian? -Does the hard-working line hold out?” - -Lord Garstin smiled, more pleasantly than Loring had done, and shrugged -his shoulders. - -“Pretty well, I suppose,” he said. “I met his chief the other night, -and he was not enthusiastic. He’s a nice boy, though. You’re a great -chum of his, aren’t you, Loring?” Loring nodded. “Then let me give you a -hint to have an eye to his proceedings at the club. Cards are all very -well, you know, but a boy like that should be moderate. You might be -able to talk to him about it. I gave his mother a hint a few weeks ago. -She’s a nice little woman. See what you can do, will you? I’ve got an -idea that the foolish fellow doesn’t play only at the club.” - -They were close to Mrs. Halse’s house as Lord Garstin finished, and his -last words were spoken quickly and significantly. Loring answered only -by a slight movement of his eyebrows, and then they were in the hall, -being swept on by a seething crowd to pay their respects to the hostess -and the bride. - -“Loring, old man! How are you?” - -Loring and Lord Garstin had been thrown together again after offering -their congratulations, and they were standing side by side. Julian -Romayne was close beside them, having come up from behind through the -crowd unperceived, his hand eagerly, even demonstratively, -outstretched. - -Thinking things over in private later on, Marston Loring thought with a -cynical smile that if he had not previously realised his six months’ -absence, he might have done so when young Romayne’s voice fell on his -ear. The change in it, though subtle, was so marked--to the man who had -not heard it in course of transition--that it seemed to place years -rather than months between their last meeting and the present, and it -amply prepared Loring for what he saw when he turned round. - -All alteration in manner and appearance consists rather in the -accentuation or modification of original characteristics than in the -developement of fresh ones; consequently it is very seldom noticed by a -casual observer when intercourse is unbroken. To Lord Garstin and to -dozens of his other acquaintances, Julian Romayne was still a “nice -boy,” just as his good-looking features were still the young features of -a year ago. To Loring the difference in face was as perceptible as was -the difference in the young man’s whole personality, and the key-note -of the difference lay in the absence of genuineness in both; in the -deliberate assumption in the present of what had been natural and -uncalculated in the past. Julian’s face had grown thinner and harder, -and the boyish smile which was in consequence no longer perfectly -harmonious was a trifle over-accentuated; while the bright, ingenuous -glance of his eyes had grown extraordinarily like his mother. His manner -was the gay, young manner which had gained him so many friends, with -just that touch of exaggeration added to it which artificiality gives. - -His cordiality as he wrung Loring’s hand was rather--like the -demonstrative welcome in his voice--admirably adjusted to meet the -requirements of the moment than an expression of the man himself. He was -very carefully dressed, with a particularly dainty flower in his -buttonhole. - -“Back again at last, old fellow!” he said buoyantly. “By Jove, what an -age it is since you went! And have you had a good time? When did you -reach home? Tell us all about it! You’ve no idea how glad I am to have -him back, Lord Garstin!” he added, greeting the elder man with a boyish, -half-laughing apology for his exuberance which was very effective. His -manner to Lord Garstin was as charming as ever; rather more so, indeed, -as its frank deference had acquired a polish derived from sundry little -artistic touches such as only calculation and intention can bestow. - -“You seem to have managed very well without me!” returned Loring, with -good-humoured satire. “The world seems to have used you pretty fairly, -I’m glad to see! I’ve only been back about forty-eight hours or I should -have looked you up, of course. I hope Mrs. Romayne is here?” - -“I hope she is better?” said Lord Garstin, with genuine concern. “We -have all been desolated over her illness!” - -Julian, who had nodded lightly to Loring, turned to Lord Garstin with a -bright, affectionate laugh--also very like his mother’s--and to Loring’s -quick and alert perception an added touch of artificiality became -apparent in his manner as he said: - -“It has been desolating, hasn’t it? It’s very good of you to say so, -though! Thanks, I am delighted to say she is all right again. We had a -terrific encounter as to whether she should or should not come to the -affair, and she carried the day.” - -“Being perfectly restored to health she didn’t see the force of allowing -herself to be shut up and coddled by a silly boy.” - -The light, high-pitched voice, somewhat thin, as was the characteristic -laugh with which the words were spoken, came from directly behind -Julian, and as Loring, who had seen her coming, stepped forward to meet -her, Mrs. Romayne, with a passing shake of her son’s arm, stretched out -her hand with graceful cordiality. - -“Welcome back, Mr. Loring,” she said. “I thought your first visit would -have been to this good-for-nothing boy, but I am very glad to meet you -here all the same. Lord Garstin,” she continued, as she turned to shake -hands, “I believe you were enquiring after my health? I can’t allow good -breath to be wasted in that way! I assure you it has been much ado about -nothing, and I am perfectly, ridiculously well!” - -She laughed as she finished, but a certain strained insistence had grown -in her tone as she spoke, as though her desire to impress the fact she -stated was strong enough to undermine her control of her voice. - -But Loring, looking at her, was too fully occupied in criticising her -appearance to notice the tone of her voice. There must have been some -society fraud at the bottom of her reported illness, he decided, and -that was why she was so anxious to pass it over; for certainly he had -never seen her look better. She was admirably dressed, and she was very -slightly and skilfully “made up”; a condition new to him in her, and one -of which Marston Loring emphatically approved in women past their first -youth. He told himself, moreover, that either his impression of her had -been fainter than the reality, or else she had actually gained in what -he could only define to himself--and define roughly and inadequately as -he was well aware--as “grip.” There was the faintest flavour of nerve -and concentration behind her admirable society manner, which gave it a -wonderful piquancy in the eyes of her observer; a flavour which was -evidently quite unconscious and involuntary, and had its origin in -ingrain character. Loring admired power--of a certain class--in women. - -In his interest in her expression, and his mental comments on -it--determined, as they could not fail to be, by his own character--he -was deceived by her cleverly arranged colouring into ignoring the almost -painful thinness of her face; nor did he understand how hollow and -sunken those glittering eyes would have been less cleverly treated. - -She replied gaily to Lord Garstin’s gallant reception of her assurance, -and then turned again to Loring with an easy interested question on his -voyage. - -“You are not the only returned traveller to-day!” she said, as he -answered her. “By-the-bye, Julian, I was on the way to send you into the -other room. There is some one there you will like to see!” - -She smiled significantly up at him, patting his arm as she spoke, and -Julian answered with boyish eagerness. - -“In the other room?” he said. “Well, perhaps I ought just to say how do -you do, you know, oughtn’t I? Loring, old fellow, we shall meet again, -of course? What are you going to do afterwards? We might go down to the -club together? And he must come and dine with us, mustn’t he, mother? -Suppose you arrange it!” And with a comprehensive gesture and another, -“I’ll just say how do you do, I think!” he disappeared in the crowd. - -Mrs. Romayne turned with a shrug of her shoulders and a pretty -expressive grimace to the two men. - -“Poor boy!” she laughed. “What a thing it is to be young! And what a -tantalising spectacle a wedding must be under the circumstances! A -pretty wedding, wasn’t it?” - -“An ugly wedding would be rather a refreshing change, don’t you think?” -suggested Loring. “One has seen a good many pretty ones, if you come to -think of it!” - -“You’re not in the least changed by six months in Africa,” returned Mrs. -Romayne, shaking her head at him prettily. “Now, tell me, really, have -you had a good time out there?” - -The question was friendly and interested after a society fashion, but -the interest was entirely on the surface, and the little talk that -followed about Loring’s experiences was joined in as a matter of course -by Lord Garstin. It lasted until Mrs. Romayne said lightly: - -“And now, I suppose, I ought to follow Julian’s example and ‘just say -how do you do, don’t you know!’ I have only seen Mrs. Pomeroy in the -distance as yet.” - -She nodded, and moved away, stopping constantly on her way through the -rooms to exchange scraps of conversation until she came to where Mrs. -Pomeroy, amiable, inert, and smiling as though she had been sitting -there for the last three months, was holding a small court. She welcomed -Mrs. Romayne as she had welcomed all comers. - -“So glad to see you,” she said placidly. “Such a long time! And how are -you?” - -“So immensely pleased to have you back again,” said Mrs. Romayne -enthusiastically; there was a ring of genuineness in her voice which the -fashionable exaggeration of her speech hardly warranted. “And you -really only arrived yesterday? Miss Newton--Mrs. Compton, I mean--was -in a dreadful state of mind the other day lest her bridesmaid should -fail her. And how is Maud? How sweet she looked! Quite the prettiest of -the six. Where is she?” - -“She was here just now,” returned Maud’s mother, as though that were -quite a satisfactory answer to the question, and then as an afterthought -she added vaguely: “I think she went to have an ice; your son took her.” - -“Ah!” said Mrs. Romayne, smiling. “Then there is one perfectly happy -person in the house!” - -Mrs. Pomeroy only smiled with vague blandness; evidently the relations -between the Romaynes and the Pomeroys had developed extensively before -the departure of the latter for Cannes; and as evidently they were quite -undisturbing to Miss Pomeroy’s mother. - -“The bridesmaids’ dresses were very nice, I think,” she said, with -amiable irrelevancy. “I was afraid they sounded trying. But it has been -very pleasant altogether, hasn’t it? I wish we were going to stay in -town. We had a shocking crossing.” - -A keen attention had sprung into Mrs. Romayne’s eyes, and for an instant -it seemed as though all the society gaiety died from her face, leaving -exposed the hard, almost fiercely determined, foundation on which it was -imposed. Then the foundation disappeared again. - -“To stay in town!” she echoed lightly. “Why, are you not going to stay -in town, dear Mrs. Pomeroy?” - -“Unfortunately not,” was the answer. “My sister who lives in -Devonshire--I think you have heard me speak of her?--is ill, and has -begged me to go and see her. So we are going for a week or ten days, I -am sorry to say.” - -“I am sorry to hear,” said Mrs. Romayne, with pretty concern. “Just at -the beginning of the season, too. It’s rather hard on poor Maud, isn’t -it?” - -“Yes, it is hard on poor Maud, isn’t it?” was the undisturbed response. - -There was a moment’s pause, and then under her paint a burning colour -crept up to the very roots of Mrs. Romayne’s hair, and her eyes shone. - -“My dear Mrs. Pomeroy,” she began gaily, but speaking rather quickly, -too, and in a higher pitch than was usual with her, “don’t you remember, -months ago, promising to lend me Maud for a little while? This is the -very opportunity. Of course,” she lowered her voice a little, “I -wouldn’t propose it if you did not know quite as well as I do how the -land lies. But, as I think we two old mothers are of one mind on that -point, I shan’t scruple. Let Maud come to me, if she will, while you are -in Devonshire. Oh, of course it needn’t mean anything--it’s an old -promise, you know, and she and I are great friends on our own account. -Talk of the angels!” she went on gaily, nodding towards a slim, white -figure coming towards them with Julian in its immediate wake. - -Maud Pomeroy was looking as pretty and as proper as she had looked every -day since she had emerged from the school-room, but there was a little -flush on her face which was not habitual to her. She returned Mrs. -Romayne’s greeting with the grateful cordiality so pretty from a girl -to an older woman, evinced as was her wont more by manner than by -speech; and indeed Mrs. Romayne gave her little time for speech. - -“Your mother has been telling me of this dreadful Devonshire business!” -she said. “And I’ve had what I flatter myself is a happy thought! I want -you to come to me, Maud, dear, while your mother is away. You know you -promised ages ago to let yourself be lent to me for a little while, and -this is the very opportunity, isn’t it?” - -It would not have been “the thing” under the circumstances that any one -of the trio should glance at Julian; consequently no one noticed the -curious flash of expression that passed across his face as his mother -spoke. Maud Pomeroy hesitated and looked dutifully at her mother. - -“It’s very kind of Mrs. Romayne, Maud, dear, isn’t it?” said Mrs. -Pomeroy with noncommittal amiability. - -“It is sweet of her,” responded Maud prettily. - -“Well, then, do let us consider it settled. I shall enjoy it of all -things. When do you go, dear Mrs. Pomeroy? To-morrow week? Oh, it will -be too tantalising to whisk Maud away when she had just begun to enjoy -herself; wouldn’t it, Maud?” - -Miss Pomeroy hesitated again, and the colour on her cheeks deepened by -just a shade. She did not glance at her mother this time. - -“Thank you very much,” she said at last. “But shan’t I be a nuisance to -you?” - -There was just the touch of charmingly conventional demur in her tone -which made her submission seem, as all her actions seemed, the result of -a gentle, easily influenced temperament. Mrs. Romayne assured her -merrily that she would indeed be a terrible nuisance, but that she -herself would do her best to bear it, and then rose, her eyes very -bright. - -“I must run away now,” she said. “I’m so delighted that we’ve settled -it. Let me know when to expect you, then, dear. Good-bye, Mrs. Pomeroy; -I’ll take every care of your child and return her when you want -her--only don’t let it be too soon! I needn’t take you away, sir,” she -continued, turning to Julian. He had been standing by ever since that -flash had passed over his face with an expression of eager interest in -the discussion. “I dare say you’re not in any hurry. No, you need not -even come downstairs with me. I see Mr. Loring. He’ll take care of me, -I’m sure.” - -Mr. Loring, who was within hearing, as the tone of the words -implied--indeed, they were more than half addressed to him--came up -promptly. - -“For how long may I have that privilege?” he said. - -She explained to him lightly as he shook hands with Mrs. Pomeroy and her -daughter, and then with another farewell and a pretty, affectionate “_Au -revoir!_” to Julian, she turned away with him. - -He put her into her carriage and she held out her hand with a gesture of -thanks and farewell. - -“Thanks,” she said; her tone and manner alike were very friendly and -familiar in the exaggerated style which had certainly grown on her; and -they seemed to imply something beyond the superficial interest to which -she had kept, perforce, in her society intercourse with him. “It is so -pleasant to see you again! When will you come to see me quietly? Before -you are hard at work, you know! To-morrow, now? To-morrow happens to be -a free day with me. Come to tea. Good bye!” - - - - -CHAPTER XII - - -Ten minutes after Mrs. Romayne’s departure Julian was standing before -Mrs. Pomeroy, his whole demeanour typical of the man who lingers, -knowing that he should linger no longer. - -“What a nuisance appointments are!” he said, with a boyish frankness of -discontent which was irresistible. “I wish I could stay a little longer, -but I know I oughtn’t.” He laughed quite ruefully, and fixed a pair of -ardent eyes on Miss Pomeroy’s demurely averted face. “It’s been such an -awfully jolly affair, hasn’t it? And it’s so awfully jolly to have you -in town again”--this, with delightful deference, to Mrs. Pomeroy. “Well, -I really must go, you know! Good-bye! Perhaps you won’t be staying very -much longer?” - -“If you stay here bemoaning yourself very much longer we shall probably -leave before you do!” suggested Miss Pomeroy, with the rather faint -smile which was the only sign of amusement she ever gave, and which -always accompanied her own mild witticisms. Julian turned to her -eagerly. - -“Now, that’s awfully unkind!” he said. “You won’t bully me like that in -Queen Anne Street, will you?” The term “bullying” was so profoundly -inapplicable to Miss Pomeroy’s words that its use suggested a certain -amount of arrangement rather than absolute spontaneity about Julian’s -speech. But exaggeration was the fashion, and not to be commented on. -“Come in a very kind frame of mind, won’t you?” he went on pleadingly. - -“Am I a very violent person?” the girl answered, with the same smile. -“Good-bye!” She held out her hand as she spoke, and Julian took it with -laughing reluctance. - -“You are an absolutely heartless person,” he said daringly, “to dismiss -me like this! However, I suppose you are right. If you didn’t dismiss -me I probably shouldn’t go, and I really ought, you know!” - -“You’ve told us that before; now do it!” was the answer. “Good-bye!” - -“Good-bye!” returned Julian, with mock meekness. He shook hands again, -which seemed hardly necessary, and then he turned away. - -But the necessity which enforced his departure had apparently slackened -its pressure on him by the time he actually left the house. As he walked -away down the street there was no sign about him of that haste which -should characterise a man who has lingered to the risking of an -appointment, or who has, indeed, any engagement in immediate prospect. -The bride and bridegroom had already left, and people were beginning to -go, and until he reached the end of the street in which was Mrs. Halse’s -house, he was passed every instant by carriages to whose occupants his -hat had to be smilingly lifted. Then he turned into a main thoroughfare, -and hailed a hansom--still not in the least like a man in a hurry. He -gave the cabman an address in the Temple, and was driven away. - -His face as he went would have been a curious study to any onlooker -possessed of the key to its expression; to any onlooker who could have -detected the constant struggle for dominance between something that -seemed to lie behind its new artificiality and that artificiality -itself, evidently maintained under an instinctive sense of the chances -of observation. It was not until he turned his key in the lock of a set -of chambers in the Temple that the boyish vivacity died wholly out of -his face; he went into his room--he shared the chambers with another -embryo barrister--shutting the door behind him; and as he did so he -seemed to have shut in, not the light-hearted young fellow who had paid -the cabman in the street below, but another man altogether. No one -looking at him now could doubt that this was the real Julian Romayne of -to-day, as certainly as that light-hearted young fellow had been the -real Julian Romayne of a year ago. This was a man with a hard, angry -face; a face on which the anger stood revealed, not as the expression of -the moment, but as the normal expression of a mind always sore, always -at war, always fiercely implacable. - -The room was plainly, almost barely furnished, and there was no trace of -any of the luxury that surrounded him in Queen Anne Street. His smart, -carefully got-up figure looked absolutely incongruous among such unusual -surroundings, as he crossed to the window, and flinging himself down in -a shabby easy-chair, lighted a cigarette. He threw his cigarette-case on -the table, and then drew out of the breast-pocket of his coat a couple -of letters. - -He had read them before, evidently, but as evidently they had lost none -of their interest for him. He read them both through attentively, and as -he did so there came to his mouth a set which his mother, could she have -seen it, would have recognised instantly; which any one, indeed, must -have recognised who had ever seen his dead father. Both the letters -dealt with money matters; one was from a bookmaker, the other from a -broker whose name was far from bearing an unblemished character in the -City; and both referred to large sums of money recently made on the -turf and on the Stock Exchange by Julian Romayne. - -He flung the last on the table as he finished it, and there was an -expression in his eyes of reckless, rebellious triumph not good to see. - -“It’s a good haul!” he said, half aloud. “A good haul! Now, with what -I’ve got already----” He rose and went across to the writing-table, -unlocked a drawer, and taking out various papers, began to make rapid -calculations. - -Then--his eyes hard and intent on his work--he stretched out his hand -and felt in the drawer for another paper. He took out an envelope, and -drew out the letter it contained without glancing at it. A folded paper -fell out as he did so, and as though the slight sound had roused him, he -glanced at it quickly, and from it to the open letter in his hand. -Apparently it was not the letter to which he had intended to refer, for -his face changed suddenly and completely. - -“I can’t take your money. Try and understand that I can’t!--Clemence.” - -His fingers tightened upon the thin sheet of paper until the knuckles -whitened, and the eager calculation vanished utterly from his face, -overwhelmed as it seemed by the fierce tumult of warring passions that -struggled now in every line. Impotent anger which was the more violent -for something within itself which was not anger; reckless defiance; a -wild, raging desperation behind all, which was nearly hatred; all these -emotions were faintly shadowed forth on his face as he stared down at -the few simple words. All these emotions had been surging in his heart -during the six months that were gone, and it was their unceasing strife -and tumult which was rousing into life the new Julian Romayne, latent -for so many years. - -It was to that which was least broadly painted on his face that all -these passionate forces owed their life. As with a wild animal wounded -by a dart, and feeling that dart--lodged in his side--pricking and -piercing him, who plunges wildly hither and thither, chafing and -striving in blind, brute fashion to rid himself of the sensation he -cannot understand; and in his very efforts presses in the cause of his -pain, increases his sufferings, and again redoubles his struggles and -his fury, not knowing that he is his own tormentor; so it had been, in a -sense, with Julian Romayne during the last six months. The dart in his -case was double-edged; its edges were the strange, weak reality of his -love for Clemence, and a stinging sense of shame. It had lodged in that -almost inanimate better part of his nature. He had left that little room -in Camden Town smarting and wincing under it, and it had never ceased to -prick him since. Scarcely less blind and ignorant under such -circumstances than “a beast having no understanding” in his total want -of all principle, except the principles of worldly wisdom, with his -utterly dormant moral perception--his morality, such as it was, being -the merest matter of habit and conventionality--the effect on him of the -smart was first the developement in him of a blind, unreasoning -resentment; and then, as anger proved of no avail, a passionate rousing -and rising of all his latent forces in repudiation of his discomfort. - -To charge upon some one else the difficulties which he had created for -himself, to provide some object against which his blind sense of wrath -and rebellion could pit itself, was a primary instinct with such a -nature as Julian’s, so situated, and that object was ready to his hand. -The first article in the faith of the new Julian Romayne was the belief -that he had been forced into his present position by his mother; that he -had been parted from his wife by his mother; that he had been covered -with humiliation by his mother. Every fresh stab, every movement of -revolt, as that two-edged dart pressed itself deeper into his -consciousness with every struggle he made for freedom, added something -to the account he held against her; increased the bitterness of his -resentment against her and brought it one degree nearer to hatred. His -love for her, in spite of its charm of expression, had been the merest -boyish sentiment; with no roots deeper than those afforded by easy -companionship and apparent indulgence; founded on habit and expediency -rather than on respect. Real devotion would have seemed out of place in -the atmosphere of affectation and superficiality in which he had been -reared, and he had known only its travesty. On this, the first real -conflict between his will and hers, that travesty showed itself for what -it was, and shrivelled into nothingness. To free himself from her -control, became the one object and desire of his life. In doing this, -and in doing this only, to his distorted perceptions, lay release from -the stinging, goading misery of his present life, and to do this one -means only was adequate--money. With money at his command the victory, -as he conceived it, would be his. Some centre, some mainspring had -necessarily to grow up in the confused strivings and blind, desperate -impulses of a newly-awakened nature, and gradually that centre had -declared itself in an unreasoning determination to make money. - -But there were in Julian Romayne tendencies, latent, or nearly so, -throughout his youth and early manhood; manifested during those easy, -untempted periods only in a slight superficiality, a slight want of -perception as to the boundary line between truth and falsehood; but -radical factors in his being. In the shock and jar of the mental -struggle and quickening involved in the continued presence in his -consciousness of that remorseless dart, these tendencies leapt into -over-stimulated life and grew, strengthened, and developed, with the -unnatural rapidity of such life, until his whole character seemed to be -over-shadowed by them. In Julian Romayne’s being, woven in and out with -the threads which had hitherto seemed so pliable and colourless; those -threads of all shades, from pure white to dark grey, which make up -character in every man; were sundry grim black threads--threads such as -are only to be plucked out when the very heart’s blood of the man has -spent itself in the struggle, and when in that struggle he has come very -near to God. It may be that the sins of the fathers are indeed visited -on the children in this sense; in the dictation of the form taken by -that struggle with evil which is every man’s portion; and sometimes--for -purposes of which no man may presume to judge--in the exceptional agony -of that struggle. Julian Romayne, the son of a liar and thief, and, -moreover, of a woman whose morality was the morality of conventionality -and nothing more, had an instinctive faculty for, an instinctive -inclination towards, dishonesty of word and deed. Such a twist of his -moral consciousness as had been predicted for him, a little child of -five years old, by Dr. Aston, had lain dormant among the possibilities -of his being throughout the nineteen years that intervened. It was this -inheritance which, in the sudden upheaval of his moral nature, had -awakened, asserted itself, and seized, as it were, the first place in -his nature. - -Throughout his boyhood, easy as it had been, untouched by any strong -passion or desire, he had lied now and again, naturally and -instinctively. He had lied to save himself trouble, to save himself some -slight reproach--as he had lied to his mother on the subject of his -visit to Alexandria, to save himself from the confession of having -forgotten her commission. He had lied to Clemence from first to last, -and the first prick of that dart, which was now his constant companion, -had touched him when he first felt shame for those lies. But there was a -reckless, calculating deception about his life now which went deeper -and meant more. He lied to his mother with every word and action, and -with the unreasoning cruelty of his mental attitude towards her--there -is nothing towards which a man can be so heartless as the object to -which he has transferred his own wrong-doing--he hugged his deception of -her, and revelled in the sense of independence and power it gave him. -The endless deception which the fundamental falsity of his present life -necessitated, radiated on every side. To please his mother, as he told -himself with an ugly smile, he had flirted with Miss Pomeroy in the -early part of the winter until--a certain distance in her manner to him -melting--he had hailed her departure for Cannes as a blessed reprieve. -He had flirted with her this afternoon at Mrs. Halse’s, excited by the -news contained in the two letters he had since re-read, reckless in the -prospect of release they brought nearer to him, and with a certain -delight in the daring defiance of consequences. He had lied to Lord -Garstin when that good-natured mentor had let fall a warning word as to -the “bad form” of gambling; he lied to his coach when his frequent -absences were commented on. - -In that desperate craving for money, in which all the passion of his -life was centering itself, dishonesty of deed was the natural and -inevitable corollary of dishonesty of word. The possession of money was -his one object in life; his conscience as to the means by which that -money was to be obtained he deliberately put into abeyance for the time -being. He had become possessed in the course of the last six months of -some thousands, not one of which had been earned by honest work; much of -which had come to him by more than questionable means. - -That two-edged dart must have been finely tempered that it never seemed -to blunt! The dormant life in that higher part of him, to which it had -penetrated, must have been life indeed, that it should throb and quiver -stronger and stronger, side by side with all that was lowest and worst -in him, making the struggle grow always fiercer, and goading him on and -on. The dart owed its edge, the life its growing sensitiveness, to a -touch which lay always on Julian’s consciousness, haunting him night and -day. Not to be driven away or obliterated; not to be crowded out of his -soul by any stress of evil passion; a white light on the soiled, tangled -web of his life, which shone steadily in the strength of a power no -struggle of his could touch; was the thought of Clemence. Clemence, who -had trusted him; Clemence, hoping, longing, loving him, as he knew in -every wretched fibre; Clemence, for whose presence he longed at times -with a heart-sickness of longing which reacted in a very orgy of -passionate bitterness. He had received a note from her a few days after -her disappearance, telling him in a few simple words that she had got -work; that she relied on him not to drive her out of it by trying to see -her, until he “was ready,” as she phrased it. Again and again a reckless -impulse to see her, and force his will upon her, had seized him, but -something had always held him back. Again and again he had sent her -money, always to have it returned to him with a little line of hope or -patience. In the reception of those notes; in the writhing love, and -longing, and shame they stirred in him, the dart went home and tortured -him indeed. - -He crushed the sheet of common note-paper almost fiercely in his hand -now, and thrust it away to the back of the drawer from which it had -come. He caught up the paper which had fallen from it--the cheque he had -sent her three days before--and tore it savagely into fragments. Then he -swept the papers on which he had been busy unheedingly into a drawer, -locked it sharply, and rose, white to the very lips. - -“It can’t be long now,” he muttered. “It shan’t be! Men make their piles -in a day--in an hour; why should not I? It shan’t be long!” - -He stood for a moment, his hand clenched, his features compressed, his -eyes full of a sullen fire. Then he turned sharply away and left the -room. - -There was no trace of any fire about him, however, except the harmless -irradiation of youth and good spirits, when he opened the door of his -mother’s drawing-room a few minutes before their dinner-hour. He had -spent the intervening hour at his club, the most lightly good-natured, -and thoroughly easy-going and irresponsible young man there, and there -was precisely the same character about him now as he crossed the room to -his mother. - - - - -CHAPTER XIII - - -There had been a slight, sudden movement as Julian opened the door, as -though Mrs. Romayne had changed her attitude quickly. She was leaning -forward now, looking at an illustrated paper, but the cushions behind -her were tumbled and crushed, as if she had been leaning back on them, -and leaning heavily. She was wearing a tea-gown, and she seemed to keep -her face rather carefully in shadow. - -“Rather an amusing party, wasn’t it?” she said lightly, looking up as he -came in. “Everybody goes to that woman’s. I can’t imagine why. Well, and -is there any news, sir?” - -“I’m afraid not,” returned Julian gaily. “I’ve spent an hour at the club -to try and pick up some crumbs for you, but there was nothing going.” - -The manner of each to the other was precisely the same, now that they -were alone together, as it had been when they addressed one another -incidentally in the course of general conversation. The very familiarity -between them had a flavour of artificiality about it, and that flavour -was mainly given, strangely enough, by Mrs. Romayne rather than by -Julian. It was her manner, not his, that lacked ease and overdid the -spontaneity. They chatted brightly about men and things, but she never -asked him a single personal question, though at any incidental allusion -let fall by him as to his doings a faint contraction of the muscles -about her eyes gave her a hungry, concentrated look, as of a creature -catching at a crumb. It seemed to be in a great measure that tendency to -keen intentness of expression which had so greatly altered her face. - -“You see I’ve been lazy!” she said lightly, indicating her dress with a -slight gesture as they sat down to dinner. They were going out in the -evening, and she usually dressed before dinner on such occasions. “I -really couldn’t be bothered to dress before!” - -The lamplight was full on her face now, and Julian, his attention drawn -to her by the words, saw that she looked frightfully haggard and worn -under her paint and her little air of gaiety. Paint had ceased to be an -appendage of full dress with her since her three days’ illness. The -combination added a touch of repulsion to his feeling towards her. But -his tone as he answered her was the tone of affectionate concern, -over-elaborated by the merest shade only. - -“You’ve not over-tired yourself, I hope, dear?” he said. “I don’t -believe you ought to go out again to-night, do you know!” - -Mrs. Romayne’s thin fingers were tearing fiercely at the -pocket-handkerchief in her lap as he spoke, and her eyes were bright -with pain. It seemed as though her ears had caught that subtle shade of -over-elaboration, though they must have been quick indeed to do so. But -she answered, almost before he had finished speaking, in a rather -high-pitched tone of eager determination. - -“Silliest of boys,” she said; “the topic is threadbare. I am quite well! -Oh, it is very evident that my retiring to bed for a day or two is an -unparalleled event, or you would not be quite so slow in grasping the -fact that it is possible to recover after such a terrific crisis! Now, -do promise not to talk any more about what you don’t in the least -understand!” - -The merriment of her tone was fictitious, even to Julian’s unheeding -ear, but he took it up with a mental shrug of his shoulders. It was not -his fault, he told himself, if she would overdo herself for the sake of -a little excitement. - -He told himself the same thing, carelessly enough, when he put her into -her carriage two or three hours later. It was early; Mrs. Romayne had -declared the party to be insufferably dull and had stayed only half an -hour, during which time she had been as vivacious and attractive as -usual. But towards the end her eyes had become feverishly bright, and -Julian, as he took her out, could feel that she was trembling from head -to foot. - -“Are you coming home?” she said to him. - -“Well, if you don’t mind, dear, I was thinking of going to look up -Loring at the club.” - -A breath of relief parted Mrs. Romayne’s lips, and she answered hastily. -Apparently she had no desire for her son’s company on her way home. - -“Go, by all means!” she said. “Of course I don’t mind!” - -She pulled up the window almost abruptly, nodding to him with a smile, -the singular ghastliness of which was, presumably, referable to some -effect of gaslight. Then as the carriage rolled away she sank back and -let her face relax into an expression of utter weariness, with a little -gasping catch of her breath as of deadly physical exhaustion. - -His words about Loring had been a mere figure of speech on Julian’s -part, but he did intend to go to the club, and he carried his intention -into effect. He glanced round the smoking-room as he went in to see if -Loring was there, but the fact that he was not visible in no way -affected his serenity. He was so altered from the boy of a twelvemonth -before, and his intercourse with Loring had been so completely suspended -during the period of his developement, that their friendship seemed now -to belong to some previous phase of his existence; it was his sense that -he had passed utterly out of touch with the man with whom he had once -been intimate, together with a conviction that Loring’s keen perceptions -would be by no means a desirable factor in his surroundings at the -moment, that had dictated his demonstration of delight at Loring’s -reappearance. An outward show of enthusiasm was a very effective blind, -in his opinion. - -His manner was regulated on the same principle on Loring’s appearance in -the smoking-room about half an hour later. He was on his way to the -card-room, and he was anything but pleased at the frustration of his -plans in that direction; but his reception of Loring indicated, rather, -that he had spent the last half-hour in watching for him. - -“Here you are at last, old man!” he cried. “I thought you’d turn up some -time or other! What became of you this afternoon? I never saw you after -you disappeared with my mother.” - -The two men had met close to the door, and they were still standing, -Loring, as _blasé_ and imperturbable-looking as usual, with his -observant eyes on Julian’s face. - -“I didn’t care to spoil sport!” he returned with a significant smile. -“You seemed to be particularly well employed!” - -Julian laughed--the conscious, not ill-pleased laugh which belonged to -his part. Such contingencies were all incidental to the situation. - -“Oh, come, old boy,” he said deprecatingly. Then he laughed again, and -added: “I suppose my mother said something to you?” - -“No!” returned Loring quietly. “I happen to have eyes, you see!” - -“Don’t make magnifying glasses of them, then!” was the laughing retort. -“Now then, there are several fellows here who have been asking for you.” - -But as Julian glanced round he became aware that the room chanced to be -almost empty. Loring understood at the same time that he had wished to -make the conversation general and impersonal, and a slight smile touched -his lips. - -Marston Loring had various reasons of his own for not intending to allow -himself to be eluded by Julian Romayne. The change in the young man -alone would have excited his curiosity; and sundry details which had -already come to his knowledge, notably one across which he had stumbled -in the City that morning, had quickened that curiosity. His suspicions -of the preceding autumn, that there was something behind Julian’s life -as it appeared on the surface, were by no means forgotten by him. His -departure for Africa had taken him out of the way of the crisis, but he -more than half suspected that a crisis there had been. The connection -between the present and the past, and the means by which it could be -most advantageously applied to the furtherance of his own ends, were the -problems he had set himself to solve. - -“We’re rather in luck!” he said. “We can have a quiet chat together.” - -He established himself lazily and comfortably as he spoke, as Julian -with much apparent satisfaction flung himself into another chair, and -took out his cigar-case. - -Julian’s questions followed one another thick and fast. His interest in -his friend’s life during the last six months seemed to be inexhaustible -in its intelligence and sympathy. He had a great deal to tell, too; and -he told it so fluently and gaily as almost to disguise the fact that the -allusions to his own doings were of the most superficial type. But at -last there was a pause. Julian was pulling out his watch, and saying -something about going home, when Loring lighted a fresh cigar and opened -the proceedings--as he conceived them. - -“I heard of you in the City this morning!” he said nonchalantly. - -There was no pause in the movement with which Julian returned his watch -to his pocket; nothing, absolutely, to betray the fact that the words -were a surprise to him. Yet they were a surprise, and an exceedingly -unpleasant one. His transactions in the City he had arranged to keep -secret; that their nature should become known was eminently -undesirable, and he had decided that the fact itself would be -inconsistent with his pose before the world. That Loring should be the -man to unearth them was exceptionally unfortunate. - -“Did you?” he said lightly; “and who was saying what of me in the -City--a vague locality, by-the-bye.” - -“The introduction of your name was accidental--accidents will happen, -you know, even in Adams’s office. Is that a definite locality enough to -please you?” - -Julian burst into a boyish laugh and flung himself back in his chair; he -carried his cigar to his lips as he did so, not noticing apparently that -it had gone out. Loring noticed it, however. - -“What a fellow you are, Loring!” he cried. “You’ve not been in England -three days before you unearth a poor chap’s most private little games! I -say, you’ll keep it dark, won’t you? I wouldn’t have it come round to my -mother, you know! She’s so awfully generous to me, and it might hurt her -feelings.” - -There was an ingenuous frankness and confidence in his voice which gave -to the whole affair the aspect of a youthful escapade. Loring smiled as -he answered: - -“I wouldn’t have a hand in hurting Mrs. Romayne’s feelings for the -world.” He paused a moment, and then added carelessly, as if the whole -transaction was the merest matter of course: “Been doing much?” - -Julian shook his head. - -“No, of course not,” he said lightly. “Only a little occasional lark, -don’t you know. I leave the big things to clever fellows like you. -By-the-bye, Loring, I’d no idea you did anything in that way.” - -Loring puffed slowly at his cigar before he answered. - -“I’m an old hand,” he said nonchalantly. “I wait for certainties, my -boy!” He paused again. “To tell you the truth,” he said slowly, -fastening a keen, cleverly-veiled gaze on Julian’s face, “I did not ask -the question altogether idly. It occurred to me that if you had made -anything worth mentioning you might be on the look-out for a means -of--well, we’ll put it mildly and say--increasing it.” - -There was considerable meaning in Loring’s voice, careless as it was. -Julian became very still, and into his eyes there crept an eager, hungry -light which harmonised ill with the fixed nonchalance of the rest of his -features as he answered with a laugh: - -“I don’t know the fellow who could refuse to admit that soft -impeachment! We’re all in the same boat as far as that goes, I take it. -You haven’t got a good thing up your sleeve, old man, have you?” - -Loring smiled ambiguously. - -“Most ‘good things’ would come to an untimely end if every one with a -finger in them spread them abroad, my boy!” he observed. “Since it can’t -concern you personally--if you’ve no capital--we’ll say no more about -it.” - -A certain amount of Loring’s practice dealt with financial affairs; he -was no mean authority on City matters, and there was something about his -manner indescribably provocative. Julian leaned forward with a movement -of irrepressible eagerness. - -“Is it really a good thing?” he said. He spoke with a quick, low-toned -directness which put aside the fencing of the previous dialogue, and -replied not to what Loring had said, but to what he had implied. Loring -looked him full in the face and answered laconically and significantly: - -“Rather!” - -The hungry light was burning fiercely in Julian’s eyes, and he turned -his face away from Loring and began to fidget with an ash-tray lying on -the table by him. - -“Capital?” he said. “What do you call capital, now?” - -“Oh, anything between ten thousand and five-and-twenty thousand,” said -Loring carelessly. - -There was a silence. Julian’s brain was working feverishly, and Loring -was well content to let it work. At last Julian began to speak in a low, -rapid tone, with the air of one who has made up his mind to frank -confidence. He had intended to keep Loring at arm’s length; he had -decided now to play a bolder game, and use him. - -“Look here, Loring,” he said, “I may as well make a clean breast of it! -I have gone a bit farther than I said. You see, as I told you, my -mother’s most awfully generous, and I wouldn’t let a hint of this get to -her for the world; but a man doesn’t like to feel that he’s dependent on -his mother for everything, don’t you know--especially if he’s thinking -of marrying. You know what it is when one once begins to feel the money -come in! I’ve gone on, you see--as lots of fellows do--and I’ve got a -tidy little pile. Of course I’m very keen on making it more -before--well, before I propose, don’t you know! And if you can give me a -lift up I shall be eternally obliged.” - -He stopped, and Loring smoked for a minute or two in silence. At last he -said slowly: - -“I understand! It’s natural, of course. Well, I don’t stand alone in the -affair, to tell you the truth. There’s another man to be consulted. But -I’ll talk the matter over with him, and if I can manage to get you in -you may be sure I will. You shall have a line in a day or two, or I’ll -see you again.” Loring dropped the end of his cigar into the ash-tray -and rose. - - - - -CHAPTER XIV - - -The clock in Mrs. Romayne’s drawing-room chimed the half-hour--half-past -four--and Mrs. Romayne glanced up as she heard it. She was alone, -sitting at her writing-table answering invitations. She was looking -better than she had looked on the preceding day--less haggard, and -physically stronger. - -She answered and put aside the last invitation-card, and then she drew -out a letter in a straight, clear, girl’s writing. It was signed: -“Affectionately yours, Maud Pomeroy,” and it bore reference to Miss -Pomeroy’s prospective visit to her. Mrs. Romayne glanced through it, the -vigour of her face seeming to accentuate as she did so, and then -proceeded to write a few cordial, affectionate lines in answer. She was -just directing the envelope when a servant came in with tea. - -Mrs. Romayne rose. - -“Send these letters to the post,” she said. - -She glanced at the clock again as she spoke, and at that moment the -front-door bell rang. - -Left alone, Mrs. Romayne moved quickly to the looking-glass, and took an -anxious, critical look at herself; it was as though she had learnt to -distrust her appearance. The inspection, however, proved satisfactory, -apparently; and as she turned quickly away as she heard steps upon the -stairs, there was a self-dependence and sense of power in the bright, -expectant keenness of her eyes. - -“Mr. Loring!” announced the servant, and Mr. Loring followed his name -into the room. - -“I am very glad to see you,” said Mrs. Romayne, advancing to meet him. -“This is a much better way of welcoming a friend than our meeting -yesterday. I think I shall celebrate the occasion by saying not at home -to any one else. Julian will be in, perhaps, and he will like to have -you to himself. Not at home, Dawson,” she added in conclusion. - -There was a verve and brightness about her manner which was not exactly -its usual vivacity, and which faintly suggested the presence of some -kind of special excitement in her mind. - -Loring’s perceptions were in a state of rather abnormal acuteness; the -situation had meanings for him, which had braced up his forces not -inconsiderably. He detected that inward excitement about Mrs. Romayne -instantly, and he was convinced also, though he could hardly have given -a reason for the conviction, that there was not the smallest chance of -Julian’s appearance. Both circumstances he reckoned as points in his -favour in the game he was going to play. - -“It’s very charming of you,” he said. “Do you know this is the first -time I have really felt that coming back to London means--something.” - -He took the chair she had indicated to him on the other side of the -little tea-table as he spoke, and there was nothing lame or unfinished -about the words spoken as he spoke them. His eyes were fixed upon Mrs. -Romayne, but she was pouring out tea with so intent a look on her face -as almost to suggest preoccupation. She did not look up, nor did the -tone of his voice reach her, except superficially, apparently, for she -replied with a pleasant, friendly laugh. - -“I should hope it did mean ‘something,’ indeed,” she said. “Friends -should count for ‘something,’ surely, especially when they have really -taken the trouble to miss you very much. Have you had such an unusually -fascinating time in Africa, then?” - -She handed him a cup of tea, and as he rose to take it from her, he -answered: - -“Well, not exactly that. I’m afraid I don’t believe in fascinating -times, you know. Perhaps I am too much of a pessimist.” - -He spoke with that tone of personal revelation and confidence which is -always more or less attractive to a woman, coming from a man; and Mrs. -Romayne responded with the gentle loftiness of sympathy which the -position demanded. - -“I’ve often been afraid you felt like that,” she said. “And it is really -quite wrong of you, don’t you know. You ought to be such a particularly -well-satisfied person! I suppose you are horribly ambitious? Now, tell -me, has your business gone off as well as you hoped? I have been so -interested in your delightful articles!” - -“Does anything go off as well as one had hoped?” was the reply, spoken -with a cynical smile, indeed, but with a certain daring deprecation of -her disapproval, which was not unattractive. “No, I ought not to carp,” -he continued quickly. “I have every reason to be satisfied.” - -His tone implied considerably more in the way of success and latent -possibilities about his present position than the words themselves -conveyed; and Mrs. Romayne answered with cordial, delicately-expressed -congratulations, which drifted into a species of general questionings as -to his doings, less directly personal, but implying that he might count -on her sympathy if he chose to confide in her in greater detail. This -was no part of Loring’s plan, however. He led by almost imperceptible -degrees away from the subject, and before very long they were talking -London gossip as though he had never been away, the only perceptible -result of his absence evincing itself in the touch of additional -intimacy which his return seemed to have given their relations, -necessarily at Mrs. Romayne’s instigation. - -The talk touched here and there, and by-and-by an enquiry from Loring -after a mutual friend elicited a crisper laugh than usual, and an -expressive movement of the eyebrows, from Mrs. Romayne. - -“Haven’t you heard?” she said. “Oh, it’s an old story now, of course! -Well, they don’t come to town this season, I believe. Lady Ashton -suffers from--neuralgia!” - -She laughed again, and then in response to a cynical and incredulously -interrogative ejaculation from Loring, she clasped her hands lightly on -her knee and went on with the animation of a woman who has a good story -to tell and enjoys telling it. - -“She contracted the complaint, they say, in a poky little church in -Kensington into which Gladys Ashton strolled one morning and got herself -married. Oh, dear no! Her mother wasn’t there! That’s one of the points -of the affair. And Lord Rochdale wasn’t there either.” - -“Gladys Ashton jilted Rochdale after all!” - -“After all!” assented Mrs. Romayne gaily. “After all that poor woman’s -trouble, after the quite pathetic way in which she has slaved to catch -him, she gets a letter from the ungrateful girl--at an afternoon tea, -too, heaps of people there--to say that she is Mrs. Bob Stewart. -Baccarat Bob you wretched men at the clubs call him, don’t you?” - -“That was enough to induce convulsions, let alone neuralgia,” commented -Loring. - -They both laughed, and the laugh was succeeded by a moment’s silence. -Then Loring said casually: - -“What has become of your cousin, Falconer, among other people, -by-the-bye? I don’t hear anything of him, and his grim presence was -hardly to be overlooked. Have you any little escapade of his to reveal, -now?” - -Mrs. Romayne laughed a little harshly. - -“Unfortunately not,” she said. “His absence is due to the most -characteristically orthodox causes. He was ill about three months ago. -He went into a hospital sort of place--one of those new things--and he -was rather bad. Now he’s somewhere or other recovering. I fancy he won’t -be in London again yet.” - -Loring received the news with a comment as indifferent as his question -had been, and then there fell a second silence. Loring’s eyes, very keen -and calculating, were fixed upon the carpet; on Mrs. Romayne’s face was -an accentuation of the intent, preoccupied look which had lain behind -all her previous gaiety. The two faces suggested curiously that the man -and woman alike felt individually and each irrespective of the other -that something in the shape of a prologue was over, and that the real -interest of the interview might begin. - -The silence was broken by Mrs. Romayne; she pushed the tea-table further -from her and leaned back in her chair, as she said casually: - -“Did you and Julian meet at the club last night?” - -Loring followed her example and took an easier and more careless pose. - -“Yes!” he said. “We had an hour’s talk together. I was very glad I had -looked in. I hardly expected to find him there!” - -Mrs. Romayne laughed, and the sound was rather forced. “Oh,” she said -lightly, “he is a tremendous clubbist! All young men go through the -phase, don’t you think?” She paused a moment, and her voice sounded as -though her breath was coming rather quickly as she said carelessly: - -“You find him a good deal altered, I dare say? Six months”--she paused; -her breath was troublesome--“six months makes such a difference at his -time of life!” she finished. - -Loring looked at her. He had long ago decided that when a woman was -“made up” it was of very little use to direct observation to anything -but her eyes. - -“Yes!” he said reflectively, as though debating a question already -existing in his mind, and answering it for the first time. “He is -altered! I suppose--yes, I suppose six months must make a difference!” - -A sharp breath as at a sudden stab of pain had parted Mrs. Romayne’s -lips at his first words, and he saw a hard, defiant brightness come -into her eyes. - -“I was very glad to see--well, may one allude to what one could not help -seeing yesterday?” he went on in another and much lighter tone. - -“One may allude to it confidentially!” returned Mrs. Romayne, and her -tone was rather high-pitched and uneven. “Not otherwise, I am sorry to -say--at present! Did Julian say anything about it?” Her tone as she -asked the question was carelessness itself, but her fingers were tightly -clenched round her handkerchief as she waited for the answer. - -“A word or two!” returned Loring. “I inferred that it was only a -question of time. Has it been going on long?” - -“All the winter!” she answered, and again there was that little forced -laugh. “You see, unfortunately, ‘she’ has been away! I had hoped that it -would have come off before she went away, but it didn’t!” - -She stopped rather abruptly; and Loring, watching her keenly, said: - -“You think it is time he should marry?” - -“I think--well, yes, I suppose I do! Don’t you agree with me? You young -men are so apt to get into mischief, you know!” - -“I suppose I can hardly deny the general principle,” answered Loring -with a slight smile, “though it is some time since I have been a young -man in any practical sense! But as to Julian, I hardly know----” - -“But you must know!” returned Mrs. Romayne quickly, and with an affected -laugh. “And you must know, in the first place, that I’m relying on you -for a good deal of co-operation--oh, of course, not in these delicate -affairs!” - -A certain shade of attention--just that attention which might become -gravely or gaily sympathetic according to the demand made upon -him--appeared in Loring’s manner. He replied to her last words with a -gesture of mock deprecation which answered the tone in which they were -spoken; but a quiet, reliable interest touched his voice as he spoke, -which seemed to respond rather to the possibilities of the situation. - -“You have only to command me!” he said. - -There was a hungry intentness about Mrs. Romayne’s mouth now, and about -her clenched hand, which only a tremendous effort and the sacrifice of -all reality of tone could have kept out of her voice. - -“To tell you the truth,” she said lightly, “there was rather a -catastrophe in the autumn; a girl, you know, silly boy--the usual thing! -I fancy it has upset him a good deal in every way, and there is nothing -like marriage for settling a young man down after such an affair!” - -She paused as though--while her confidence in her statement, and the -point of view from which she had presented the matter stood in no need -of confirmation--she yet craved to hear it subscribed to by another -voice. And Loring nodded with grave, attentive assent. - -“Quite so!” he said sententiously. - -“Now, of course,” she continued, “of course a woman can’t know all the -ins and outs of a young man’s life, even when she’s his mother. It’s out -of the question; and to be very frank with you”--there was something -painful now about the lightness of her tone--“his mother had to be -rather autocratic, and the boy didn’t much like it. Consequently I can’t -feel sure that--well, that she knows even as much as she might about his -affairs, now! That’s why I’m confiding in you in this expansive way! I -want you to look after him for me!” - -Loring changed his position, and nodded again gravely and -comprehendingly. - -“I understand!” he said slowly. “I understand!” The statement was true -in far wider sense than Mrs. Romayne could be aware of. There was a -moment’s silence, during which he seemed to deliberate deeply on the -facts presented to him, watched intently by Mrs. Romayne; and then he -roused himself, as it were. “I won’t say that your confidence in me -gives me great pleasure,” he said, “because I hope you know that. I will -simply say that I will do all I can!” - -The words were admirably spoken, with a gentleness and consideration of -tone and manner which were all the more striking from their contrast -with his usual demeanour; and they carried an impression of strength -and sympathy such as no woman could have resisted. A strange spasm as -of intense relief passed across Mrs. Romayne’s face, and for the moment -she did not speak. Then she said low and hurriedly: - -“I have heard that he plays, and it--it worries me! A boy will often -listen to a friend whom he respects, and--and--I rely on you.” - -“I consider myself honoured!” - -A pause followed, and then Loring continued with an easy seriousness -which was very reassuring: - -“I am very glad to know all this, for it gives me a key, without which I -might have blundered considerably! To return confidence for confidence, -and to assure you that I really have some power to help you, I will say -that I made a little discovery about Julian yesterday which perplexed me -a good deal. I shall know now how to act. If he must speculate----” - -He was interrupted. The daintily coloured face before him changed -suddenly and terribly; a ghastly reality that lay behind that expression -of carelessness seemed on the instant to crash through all veils and -masks as Mrs. Romayne rose to her feet with a hoarse cry, her face -drawn and working, her hands stretched out as though to ward off -something unendurably horrible. - -“No!” she gasped, and she was absolutely fighting and struggling for -breath, as though something clutched at her throat. “Not that! oh, good -heavens, not that! You must stop it! You must prevent it. He must not! -He must not! Do you hear me? He must not!” - -There are some natures which not even contact with throbbing, vibrating -reality can touch or thrill, and Loring, surprised, indeed, had risen -also, cynical, imperturbable, and cool-headed as usual. - -“By Jove!” he said to himself critically. “Who would have thought she -had it in her?” The choked, agonised voice stopped abruptly, and he met -her eyes, wild and fierce in their desperate command, and said quickly -and soothingly: - -“I will do anything you wish, I assure you! You have only to speak! I am -grieved beyond all words to have distressed you so! I had no idea----” - -A hoarse laugh broke from Mrs. Romayne, and she turned away with a -strange gesture almost as though it were herself she derided, and Loring -was forgotten by her, clasping her hands fiercely over her face. Loring -paused a moment and then went on smoothly: - -“There is nothing to disturb you, I assure you, in what I was going to -say. Most young men have a turn for dabbling in speculation at some time -or other, and though I know some ladies have a horror of it, I don’t -think you would find that there is much foundation for that horror.” He -stopped somewhat abruptly. He had suddenly remembered that he was -speaking to the widow of William Romayne, of whose final collapse he -knew the outline. He looked at the woman before him with her hidden -face, her figure rigid and tense from head to foot, and thought to -himself callously how curious these survivals of emotion were. She did -not move or speak, and he went on with a tone of delicate sympathy: - -“No doubt, if you really think it well to stop it with a high hand, it -can be done! I ought to say that I have rather broken confidence in -revealing Julian’s doings, as he is very anxious that you should not -think him dissatisfied or ungrateful, and did not wish you to hear of -them.” A shiver shook the bowed figure from head to foot. “I’m afraid I -thought more of reassuring you than of him! I thought that if you knew -that he and I were in the same affair, and that he would act solely on -my advice, you would, perhaps, feel happier about him!” - -But the answer he wanted, the answer which would have enabled him to -continue his reassurances on the purely personal line, was not -forthcoming. Mrs. Romayne neither spoke nor moved. He had no intention -of risking his position by foolhardiness, so he adjusted his line of -argument to the darkness in which her silence left him. - -“As I said, however,” he continued gently, “if you prefer to talk to him -on the subject, and ask him to give it up, no doubt he will do so rather -than distress you! And if you lay your commands on me to that effect, I -will certainly refuse to go any further with him! But may I say that I -think you would be wiser to let things take their course? It is not a -good thing to thwart a young man in the frame of mind you have hinted at -as being Julian’s at present. If you can conquer your horror of the -idea, I am sure you will be better satisfied in the end!” - -There was a dead silence. At last Mrs. Romayne raised her head slowly, -not turning her face towards Loring, but looking straight before her, as -though utterly oblivious of his personal presence. There was a strange, -fleeting dignity about her drawn face, with its wide, ghastly eyes; the -dignity which comes from horror confronted. - -“Take their course!” she said in a still, far-away voice. She paused a -moment, and then went on in the same tone. “You think this -is--inevitable?” The last word came with a strange ring. - -“I think that any attempt at its prevention would be most undesirable,” -said Loring. “It might lead--of course, it is not very likely, but still -it is possible--to private speculations on Master Julian’s part!” - -“Very well, then!” There was a curious, hard steadiness in her tone, as -of one who perforce concedes a point to an adversary, and braces every -nerve afresh to face the new situation thus created. - -“That is like you!” exclaimed Loring admiringly. The tone of her voice -had passed him by. “You will be glad, I know! Now, let me say again how -awfully sorry I am to have distressed you, and then I’ll go. You’ll be -glad to get rid of me!” - -She did not seem to hear the words, but as his voice ceased, she turned -her face slowly towards him with a vague, uncertain look upon it, as -though her consciousness was struggling back to him, and the life he -represented, across a great gulf. She looked at him a moment, and then -that dignity, and a strange pathos which that groping look had -possessed, gave way before a ghastly smile. - -“I’m afraid I’ve been making myself most ridiculous!” she said, and -there was a difficult, uncertain sprightliness about her weak voice. “So -awfully sorry! I’m rather absurd about speculation. Old memories with -which I needn’t bore you! You’ll look after my boy, then? Thanks!” She -held out her hand as she spoke with a little affected gesture, but as he -placed his hand in it her fingers closed with an icy clutch. “And now, -do you know, I must send you away! Too bad, isn’t it? But there is such -a thing as dressing for dinner.” - -“Quite so,” returned Loring gaily. “It is very good of you to have been -bothered with me so long! Good-bye!” - -“Good-bye!” she answered. “You’ll report progress, of course?” - -“Certainly! We’re a pair of conspirators, are we not?” - -When Mrs. Romayne came down to dinner that night her face was as haggard -as though the interval intervening had held for her another three days’ -illness. But the hard determination in her eyes was more intense than -ever. - - END OF VOL. II - - - 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. 2 of 3 - A Novel in Three Volumes - -Author: Mary Angela Dickens - -Release Date: February 2, 2017 [EBook #54094] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VALIANT IGNORANCE; VOL. 2 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="356" 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. II.<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> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">The</span> oppressive autumn weather continued for the next week and more, but -the atmosphere in the house at Chelsea gradually cleared; at least, the -electrical disturbances which had, as a matter of fact, culminated in -Julian’s departure for the club, subsided. As the days went on, Julian -gradually recovered his spirits. His temper, which had given way so -suddenly and completely under the strain put upon it by the -unprecedented thwarting to which he had been subjected, recovered its -careless easiness. The injured expression of moodiness disappeared -wholly from his face, and his manner resumed its buoyancy.</p> - -<p>Nevertheless, the life of the present autumn was by no means the life of -the past spring. Partly, of course, the different framework was -responsible; life, especially at this particular<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_002" id="page_002"></a>{2}</span> moment, when winter -society was as yet hardly formed, consisted by no means wholly of a -social existence. It was, in fact, distinctly “slack” and heavy on -social lines as compared with the high pressure of the season; and the -introduction into the routine of life of a certain number of hours of -regular work on Julian’s part—the first practical acknowledgement in -the house in Queen Anne Street, that work had anything to do with -life—could not fail to alter the tone to some extent. But there was a -subtle change in Julian himself, which was hardly to be accounted for on -such broad lines. He had recovered his normal mental temperature, -indeed, but the interval of disturbance seemed to have had some -indefinable effect upon him. He had recovered himself—but it was -himself with a difference. It was almost impossible to narrow the -difference into words. To say that he was colder to his mother, or that -he stood deliberately aloof from her, would not have been true. But -there was a touch of independence about his whole personality which was -new to it; a certain suggestion of a separate life and separate -interests, such as must inevitably come to a man sooner<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_003" id="page_003"></a>{3}</span> or later, which -seemed to tinge his intercourse with her—superficially the same as it -remained—with something of carelessness, and even a hint of unconscious -patronage.</p> - -<p>If the change was felt by Mrs. Romayne, she made no sign; or, at least, -entered no protest. After the little explanation which had taken place -in the railway carriage she had utterly ignored the cloud which his -moodiness had created; and she ignored its passing away. When Julian was -at home she was always bright and pleasant; always charmed to have him -with her; always ready to let him go. Her little jokes at his expense in -his new character of a worker were full of tact. Her playful allusions -to her own solitary days were always light and gay. Nevertheless, the -characteristics which the ten weeks of their absence from town had -brought to her face grew and intensified during the ten days that -followed their return. Her eyes grew more restless, her mouth more -sensitive, as though the strained, sharpened look of anxiety which -haunted her face during the hour which preceded Julian’s return, and -during the whole evening, when, as happened several times in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_004" id="page_004"></a>{4}</span> the course -of that ten days, he dined out, went deep enough to leave lasting tokens -of its presence. Her questions as to his work, and the new friends, the -new haunts, consequent upon it, seemed to come from her lips—far less -self-confident in expression in these days—almost in spite of herself. -They were always uttered with a playfulness which hardly masked a slight -nervousness underneath; a nervousness which seemed to be a reminiscence -of that first evening.</p> - -<p>She was sitting alone in her drawing-room one afternoon towards the end -of the second week of their return; she had a book in her hand, and a -tea-table before her. But she had neither poured herself out any tea, -nor could she be said to be reading. Every two or three minutes her -attention seemed to wander; her eyes would stray vaguely about the room, -and she would rise and move restlessly across it, to give some wholly -unnecessary touch to a drapery or a glass of flowers. Once she had -seated herself at her writing-table to begin a trivial note; but the -impulse had failed to carry her through, and she had returned to her -chair and her book.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_005" id="page_005"></a>{5}</span> It was half-past four, and she was expecting -Julian. He had dined out on three consecutive nights, and was doing so -again to-night. And in reply to her laughing protest against “never -seeing him,” he had promised carelessly to come home and have afternoon -tea with her.</p> - -<p>The door-bell rang at last, and as the drawing-room door opened she -lifted a smiling face with a gaily approving comment on his punctuality.</p> - -<p>“Good boy!” she began. Then she broke off and laughed lightly, though -the brightness of her face suddenly ceased to be genuine.</p> - -<p>The figure on the threshold was that of Marston Loring.</p> - -<p>“Thank you,” he said; “I am glad you think so!”</p> - -<p>“The observation was not intended for you, I’m sorry to tell you,” -returned Mrs. Romayne, as she rose to receive him. “And I’m afraid even -if I applied it to you, you would hardly condescend to accept it. How do -you do? When did you come back? Sit down and let me give you some tea.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_006" id="page_006"></a>{6}</span></p> - -<p>Loring sat down accordingly, with a mute witness in his manner of doing -so to a certain amount of intimacy both with the room and its mistress; -but that touch of admiring deference which had marked his demeanour -during the early stages of his acquaintance with Mrs. Romayne, was still -present with him, and was rendered only the more effective by the -familiarity with which it was now combined.</p> - -<p>“Thanks,” he said; “a cup of tea is a capital idea. But I don’t think -it’s quite kind of you to say that I wouldn’t condescend to the epithet, -‘Good boy.’ I should like to have it applied to me of all things. It -would be such a novelty, and so wholly undeserved!”</p> - -<p>He spoke in that tone of sardonic daring on which a great deal of his -social reputation rested, and Mrs. Romayne answered with a laugh.</p> - -<p>“No doubt it would,” she said, with that very slight and unreal -assumption of reproof with which such a woman invariably treats the -tacit confessions of a man of Loring’s reputation. “You only want the -epithet,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_007" id="page_007"></a>{7}</span> then, because you know you don’t deserve it.”</p> - -<p>She handed him the tea as she spoke with a shake of her head, and added:</p> - -<p>“But tell me, now, when did you come back, and where have you been?”</p> - -<p>“I’ve been to the Engadine,” he answered; “why, I don’t know, unless -that for six weeks, at least, of my life I might fully appreciate the -charms of London! I don’t admire glaciers; snow mountains bore me; -altitudes are always more or less wearisome; and society <i>au naturel</i> is -not to be tolerated. I reached town the day before yesterday.”</p> - -<p>Marston Loring was faultlessly dressed. It was impossible to associate -his attire with anything but Piccadilly and the best clubs and the best -drawing-rooms. His face, with its half-cynical, half-wearied expression, -was, in its less individual characteristics, one of the typical faces of -the society of the day. His voice and manner, well-bred, callous, and -entirely unenthusiastic, were the voice and manner of that world where -emotion is so entirely out of fashion that its existence as an<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_008" id="page_008"></a>{8}</span> -ineradicable factor of healthy human nature is hardly acknowledged.</p> - -<p>His presence and his cynical, cold-blooded talk seemed to do Mrs. -Romayne good. Her face and manner hardened slightly, as though her -nerves were braced, and something of the pinched, restless look of -anxiety faded.</p> - -<p>“It’s very nice of you to come and see us so soon!” she exclaimed with -genuine satisfaction. “Town has really been abominably empty these last -ten days. I suppose we came back rather too soon, but it seemed time -that Julian should get to work. Really, I’ve hardly seen a soul.”</p> - -<p>“It is a deadly time of year,” assented Loring, with a quick look at -her, “but I’m grateful to it if it makes my presence welcome to you. Of -course I called at once. I was rather afraid you might be still away.”</p> - -<p>“We came back ten days ago,” answered Mrs. Romayne, accepting and -putting aside his little compliment with a mocking gesture, as a form of -words entirely conventional. “Julian has been quite lost without you.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_009" id="page_009"></a>{9}</span> -He is looking very well, I think, and is working amazingly.”</p> - -<p>The introduction of Julian’s name into the conversation had in neither -case come from Julian’s friend; but this time it appeared to strike -Loring as incumbent upon him to pursue the topic.</p> - -<p>“The approving words with which you received me were intended for him, I -suppose,” he said carelessly. “You’re expecting him?”</p> - -<p>There was a moment’s pause while Mrs. Romayne turned her head, as if -involuntarily, and listened intently; that haunted look coming suddenly -back into her eyes. The moment passed, and she turned to Loring again -with a quick, self-conscious glance, and an unreal laugh.</p> - -<p>“I’m expecting him; yes,” she said. “I’m ridiculous enough to make that -very obvious, I’m afraid! I’m so glad he won’t miss you. He doesn’t -generally come in at this hour. This is a treat—for me!”</p> - -<p>She laughed, and Loring said with mock solemnity of interest:</p> - -<p>“Indeed!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_010" id="page_010"></a>{10}</span></p> - -<p>“I really had to be quite plaintive this morning,” she went on in the -same tone, “on the subject of not seeing him for four days except at -breakfast! He has made a good many new acquaintances already, it seems, -and has to dine out a good deal.”</p> - -<p>“Really!” commented Loring. His tone was quite unmoved, and Mrs. Romayne -did not see the expression in his shrewd, shallow eyes, as she spoke—an -expression of amused curiosity. “He dines at his club, I suppose?” he -enquired indifferently after a moment.</p> - -<p>“Yes; or at some ‘other fellow’s’ club,” laughed his mother. “Legal -institutions, I suppose!”</p> - -<p>There was a brief silence; one of those silences which come when one -branch of a conversation is felt to be exhausted; and then Loring -finished his tea, put down his cup, and settled himself into a -comfortable attitude.</p> - -<p>“I forget whether you were taken with the Ibsen craze last season, Mrs. -Romayne?” he said. “We shall all have to tie wet towels round our -heads—it won’t be becoming,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_011" id="page_011"></a>{11}</span> I’m afraid—and give ourselves up to -solitary meditation, I hear! He is to be the thing this winter, they -tell me.”</p> - -<p>“Ibsen?” repeated Mrs. Romayne reflectively; obviously searching in her -memory for some ideas to attach to the name, which she was as obviously -conscious of having heard before. “Ibsen? Oh, yes,” with a sudden flash -of inspiration, “oh, yes, of course; that ‘Dolls’ House’ man, that -everybody talked of going to see just at the end of the season.”</p> - -<p>The first of those startling pictures of human nastiness which have -since exercised criticism to so great an extent, and which may or may -not be revelations, had taken a wonderful hold upon a certain section of -“society,” and had become, as Mrs. Romayne’s words implied, almost the -fashion in the preceding June. Society is always inclined to be literary -and intellectual, or rather, to an assumption of those qualities, in the -winter. It was with a sense of the absolute duty of priming herself -beforehand that Mrs. Romayne continued, with every appearance of the -deepest interest:<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_012" id="page_012"></a>{12}</span></p> - -<p>“Ah, no! I’m sorry to say I was never able to spare an evening. -Everybody told me all about it, though. It must have been awfully clever -and interesting. But, you see, just at that time one has so much on -hand! There was that dreadful bazaar, too. By-the-bye, have the Pomeroys -come back yet, do you know, Mr. Loring?”</p> - -<p>Mr. Loring believed that they had not, and after a little discussion of -their probable plans, Mrs. Romayne returned to the subject of Ibsen.</p> - -<p>“Are they going to bring out a new play of his, did you say?” she said -carelessly.</p> - -<p>“So I hear,” answered Loring. “An extraordinary piece of work, with a -tremendous theory in it, of course. The idea is the influence of -heredity.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne started slightly. A strange flash leapt up in her eyes, and -as it died out, quenched as it seemed by iron resolution, it left a -curious expression on her face; it was an expression in which a light -scorn—the normal attitude of the shallow, fashionable woman towards -deep questions of any<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_013" id="page_013"></a>{13}</span> kind—seemed to be battling indomitably for a -place against something which was hardly to be held at bay, by no means -to be suppressed.</p> - -<p>“Heredity!” she said; and the ring of her voice matched the expression -of her face.</p> - -<p>“It’s rather an interesting subject,” continued Loring indolently. -Scientific questions in their social aspects were just becoming -fashionable. “It’s wonderful how long we have stopped short at the -inheritance of Roman noses, and violent tempers, and plain facts of that -kind without getting to anything more subtle.”</p> - -<p>“Yes; I suppose it is,” answered Mrs. Romayne. There was a hard -restraint in her voice, which Loring took for preoccupation and laid to -the account of her expectation of Julian. She was sitting with her back -to the light, and he could not see the expression of her face.</p> - -<p>“It’s awfully consoling, don’t you know,” he went on in the same tone, -“to feel that one can lay all one’s little failings to the account of -some dead and gone ancestor,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_014" id="page_014"></a>{14}</span> with a scientific mind. I don’t notice, -by-the-bye, that even the greatest and most enthusiastic scientists show -any tendency to refer their virtues and talents back. I presume they are -always self-developed.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne laughed, as she was obviously intended to do; but her laugh -was rather harsh.</p> - -<p>“Do you know, I think scientific men are a dreadful race!” she said. -“They think that they know so much better than everybody else, and that -what they know is so immensely important. As a rule, you know, it’s -about something that they really can’t know anything about, and if they -could, it would be a great deal better not to bother about it.”</p> - -<p>She spoke with a confident, conclusive superiority, which is only -possible, perhaps, in that section of society to which knowledge and -brain-power are among the minor and entirely unimportant factors of -life—except when the knowledge is knowledge of the world, and the -brain-power that which has adapted itself to the requirements of -society. But the superiority in her tone rang strained<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_015" id="page_015"></a>{15}</span> and false. She -seemed to be forcing the attitude on herself even more than on Loring; -and there was a faint ring of defiance in her voice—utterly -inconsistent and incompatible with the words she spoke. The combination -was curiously suggestive of that consuming fear which denies the very -existence of that by which it is created.</p> - -<p>Loring, however, was too fully occupied with a cynical appreciation of -the humorous aspect of the wholesale condemnation of learning by crass -ignorance to detect anything beneath the surface. An enigmatical smile -touched his lips.</p> - -<p>“There’s a great deal of penetration in what you say,” he said. “Of -course, there would be! But I think you’re a little sweeping, perhaps, -when you say that they don’t really know anything. Take heredity, for -instance; it’s an actual fact, capable of demonstration, that——”</p> - -<p>But Loring’s eloquence was broken short off. At that moment the door -opened, and Julian Romayne came into the room.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne started to her feet at the sight of him with a strange, -hardly articulate<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_016" id="page_016"></a>{16}</span> sound, which was almost a gasp of relief, though it -passed unnoticed by either of the two men, as Julian advanced quickly to -Loring.</p> - -<p>“How are you, old man?” he said pleasantly. “Awfully glad to see you -back again.”</p> - -<p>“This is the reward of merit, you see!” said Mrs. Romayne, as Loring -replied, in the same tone. “You come home to tea with your mother, and -you find a friend! Will you have some tea, sir?”</p> - -<p>Her face was still a little odd, and unusual-looking, especially about -the eyes; and the touch which she laid upon Julian, as if to enforce her -words, was strangely clinging and nervous in its quick pressure.</p> - -<p>The talk drifted in all sorts of directions after that; all more or less -personal, either to the speakers, or to mutual acquaintances. As the -moments passed, Loring’s eyes were fixed once or twice, with momentary -intentness, on the younger man. That new touch of independence about -Julian did not belong only to his manner with his mother. It was just -perceptible towards the friend<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_017" id="page_017"></a>{17}</span> whom he had hitherto admired with boyish -enthusiasm.</p> - -<p>Loring rose to go at last, and as he did so he turned to Julian.</p> - -<p>“If it were not that I don’t like to propose your deserting Mrs. -Romayne,” he said, “I should ask you if you wouldn’t come and keep me -company over a lonely dinner at the club, Julian? I suppose you don’t -want to get rid of him, by any chance?” he continued, turning to Mrs. -Romayne.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne and Julian laughed simultaneously; Julian with a little -touch of embarrassment.</p> - -<p>“I’m sure my mother has no objection to getting rid of me,” said Julian -rather hastily; “but, unfortunately, I’m engaged.”</p> - -<p>“Engaged!” said Loring. “Lucky fellow, to have engagements at this time -of year!”</p> - -<p>His tone was a little satirical, and Julian, who was following him out -of the room, flushed slightly. His colour was still considerably deeper -than usual when he dashed upstairs after seeing Loring out, and put his -head in at the drawing-room door.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_018" id="page_018"></a>{18}</span></p> - -<p>“I’m afraid I must be off directly, dear,” he said carelessly. “I was -awfully sorry to get in so late, but Allardyce wanted me.”</p> - -<p>An hour later, Julian was dining at a restaurant, dining simply, and -dining alone. Having finished his dinner, and smoked a cigarette, -glancing once or twice at his watch as he did so, he took his hat and -coat and strolled out. It was nearly a quarter past eight, and the only -light was, of course, the light of the street-lamps and the gas in the -shop windows.</p> - -<p>He passed along Piccadilly, not quickly, but with the deliberate -intention of a man who has a definite destination, until he came to a -certain side-street. Then he turned out of Piccadilly, and slackening -his steps, sauntered slowly up on the right-hand pavement. He had walked -up to the end of the street, casting sundry glances back over his -shoulder as he did so, and was turning once more, as though to saunter -down the street again, when the figure of a woman entered at the -Piccadilly end. As soon as he saw her, Julian threw away his cigar, and -quickening his steps, went to meet her.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_019" id="page_019"></a>{19}</span></p> - -<p>The face she raised to his was the face of the girl on whose behalf he -had interfered in Piccadilly ten days before, and her first words were -uttered in the soft, musical voice that had thanked him then.</p> - -<p>“Have you been waiting?” she said; “I’m sorry.”</p> - -<p>The tone of the few words with which he answered, together with the -expression with which he looked at her, showed as clearly as volumes of -explanation could have done where and how the new Julian was being -developed.</p> - -<p>“Only a minute or two,” he said. “A lonely fellow like me doesn’t mind -waiting a few minutes for the chance of a talk, as I’ve told you -before.”</p> - -<p>She looked up at him with simple, pitying eyes, and a certain -wistfulness of expression, too.</p> - -<p>“It seems so sad!” she said softly. “But you’ll make friends in London -soon, I’m sure. Have you been working very hard to-day?”</p> - -<p>“Have you been working very hard, is the more important question?” he -said,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_020" id="page_020"></a>{20}</span> turning his eyes away from those candid brown ones, with, to do -him justice, a certain passing shame in his own. “I’m afraid there’s no -need to ask that! You look awfully tired, Clemence!”</p> - -<p>She shook her head with a pretty, brisk movement of reassurance.</p> - -<p>“Oh, no!” she said, “it’s not been at all a hard day. It never seems -hard, you know, when we don’t have to stay late, unless something goes -wrong in the work-room; and I don’t think that happens very often.”</p> - -<p>There was a simple, genuine content in the tone and manner in which the -words were spoken, which, taken in conjunction with the colourlessness -of the face, the tired look about the eyes, and the poor, worn dress, -told a wonderful little story of patience and serenity of spirit.</p> - -<p>All that Julian Romayne knew of Clemence Brymer—the brief and very -simple outline of her life as she had told it to him—was comprised in a -few by no means uncommon facts. She was a “hand” in one of the big -millinery establishments, and had<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_021" id="page_021"></a>{21}</span> worked at the same place for the last -two years. Before that time she had lived from her childhood first with -a married brother, and then, when he died, with his widow and children. -From a certain touch of reserve in her manner of speaking of those -particular years, Julian had gathered that they had been hard ones. The -marriage of the brother’s widow, and her departure to Australia, had -left Clemence alone in London. Her parents, she told Julian, had come -from Cambridgeshire; and one of her faint recollections of her father, -who had died when she was only five years old, was of sitting on his -knee in their little attic room in London, and being told by him about -his country home. Her mother had died when she was a baby; and all her -scanty recollections seemed to centre round the father, who, as she said -simply, had been “a very good man.”</p> - -<p>The simple trust and confidence in her face as she raised it to Julian -now was a curious contrast to the nervous, half-frightened uncertainty -of her glance at him on that night in the spring when they had shared<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_022" id="page_022"></a>{22}</span> -for those two or three minutes the shelter of the same portico. But -paradoxical as it seems at first, both expressions were the outcome, on -different lines, of the same moral characteristic. Clemence, though -there was that about her—as her face testified—which kept her, in all -unconsciousness and innocence, strangely aloof and apart from her world, -had not spent her life in London without learning to know its dangers. -But the very purity which made the glances which she was forced to -encounter in the streets at night a distress to her; which made the very -proximity of an unknown “gentleman” an uneasiness to her; which made -theoretical evil, in short, a terror to her; rendered her singularly -incapable of recognising its existence on any but the baldest lines. Her -confidence was quickly won because, though she was conscious of a world -of evil about her, it was as a something large, and black, and obvious -that she regarded it. Brought into contact with herself, anything -fair-seeming was touched by the whiteness of her own temperament; and, -with such unconscious extraneous aid,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_023" id="page_023"></a>{23}</span> the thinnest veil was enough to -hide from her anything behind. Her confidence once won, might be -destroyed, but could hardly be shaken. Something in Julian’s face and -manner had won it for him, and the outline of his circumstances which he -had given her had won him something else—her pity.</p> - -<p>Exactly by what motive he had been actuated in his statements to her, -Julian would have found it rather hard to say; as a matter of fact he -never asked himself the question. Before the end of their first walk -together he had presented himself to her as a medical student living -entirely alone in London, having no female friends, or even -acquaintances, and wearying often of the rough masculine companionship -of his fellows. On these grounds he had asked her when they parted at -the end of a little poverty-stricken street near the farther end of the -Hammersmith Road, whether he might meet her now and again and walk home -with her. She had hesitated for an instant, and then had assented, very -simply.</p> - -<p>“You haven’t had to work late for four nights now,” she said, as they -turned their<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_024" id="page_024"></a>{24}</span> backs upon Piccadilly and began to walk steadily in the -opposite direction. “Shall you have to to-morrow night, do you think?”</p> - -<p>She lifted her eyes to his face as she spoke, and as he looked down and -met them it would have been clear to an onlooker what was the charm that -those long evening walks possessed for Julian. In the girl’s clear eyes -there was admiration and absolute reliance. In the look with which he -answered them there was conscious superiority and protection.</p> - -<p>Just at the moment when he was sore and smarting with a sense of -humiliation and futility; when in his newly-aroused angry discontent all -intercourse with women of his own class had become a farce and an -inanity to him; accident had thrown it into his power to create for -himself, as it were, a world in which all that had suddenly revealed -itself as lacking in his actual life should be lavished upon him. For -his acquaintance of Piccadilly he had absolutely no surroundings, except -such as he chose to give himself. The Julian Romayne of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_025" id="page_025"></a>{25}</span> society, the -nonentity, the “figure-head,” as he had muttered angrily to himself, had -no existence for her. It was Julian’s own private Julian, a personality -developed side by side with the sudden and violent re-adjustment of his -conception of his relations with the world, who was looked up to, -listened to, respected, and deferred to during the hour’s walk which lay -between that side-street out of Piccadilly and a certain little street -out of the Hammersmith Road. A vague, undefined craving for pre-eminence -and admiration had risen in him with his realisation of his dependence, -and the reflected nature of the light with which he shone in society. To -a weak nature in which that craving has once stirred it matters little -by what means it is met, so that it is to some extent satisfied.</p> - -<p>The walk of to-night was a repetition of the walks that had preceded it; -the talk a little more intimate and a little more personal in tone than -any of its predecessors, as that of each of the latter in its turn had -been.</p> - -<p>In the course of the day something had<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_026" id="page_026"></a>{26}</span> occurred to remind Clemence of -her father and her father’s old home, and in intervals of Julian’s talk -about himself, she told him a good deal about her thoughts of that -little country place; of how there had been Brymers here for generations -and generations.</p> - -<p>“You must have been Puritans once,” said Julian, laughing, as he often -laughed, at some little grave turn of her speech as he looked into the -sweet, serious face. Work-girl as she was, she seemed to have acquired -neither the talk nor the voice of her kind. The simple form of her -words, her accent, and her gentle voice, seemed to belong to a past, -quiet and full of a modest dignity of which the London of the nineteenth -century hardly knows. “You would have made an awfully jolly little -Puritan, Clemence!”</p> - -<p>“I don’t know,” she said simply; “I was so little when father died. But -he felt it dreadfully, I’ve heard, when he came to London; it nearly -broke his heart.”</p> - -<p>“Why did he do it, then?” said Julian lightly.</p> - -<p>“He thought he ought,” returned the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_027" id="page_027"></a>{27}</span> girl. “You see, there was nothing -to do at Feldbourne—nothing but ploughing, and country things, you -know. And father thought a man ought to do something—that everything -was meant to go on and get better, you know—and that every man ought to -help, ought to work. So, of course, he was obliged to come, you see.”</p> - -<p>They had come to the end of the road now, where they always said good -night, and as she spoke she was standing still, looking simply into his -face. He looked at her for a moment with something in his eyes which -seemed to be struggling vaguely into life side by side with the careless -mockery of his “set.”</p> - -<p>“He was obliged to come, because he thought he ought,” he said. “Do you -always do what you think you ought, Clemence?”</p> - -<p>“I try,” she said simply. “Every one tries, I suppose.”</p> - -<p>He laughed—the laugh that was so like his mother’s—but not quite so -freely as usual, and held out his hand.</p> - -<p>“I don’t know about that,” he said. “Good night, Clemence.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_028" id="page_028"></a>{28}</span></p> - -<p>“Good night,” she said.</p> - -<p>He hesitated a moment. He never went to meet her without a firm and -definite intention of sealing their parting with a kiss. But he had -never done so yet, and he did not do it now.</p> - -<p>“Good night,” he said again, rather lamely; and then they parted, she -going quickly and quietly down the street, he passing out of it into the -noise and bustle of the Hammersmith Road.</p> - -<p>Once there, he paused as though undecided.</p> - -<p>“It’s too early to go home,” he said to himself. “I’ll go down to the -club for a bit.”</p> - -<p>There were a good many men in the club-room when he entered it half an -hour later—and Julian—quite another young man to the Julian who had -walked to the Hammersmith Road—was discussing the latest society topic -with much animation over a whisky and seltzer, when Loring, to whom he -had nodded at the other end of the room, strolled up to him, cigar in -hand.</p> - -<p>“Dinner been a failure?” he enquired.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_029" id="page_029"></a>{29}</span></p> - -<p>There was nothing particular about the words; and the tone in which they -were uttered was singularly, almost significantly, devoid of expression. -But there was a keen, satirical expression in his eyes as he fixed them -on Julian.</p> - -<p>Julian started slightly at the words, and a curious flash of expression -passed across his face.</p> - -<p>“More or less,” he said, with a careless frankness that seemed just a -trifle excessive.</p> - -<p>“Who was the man?”</p> - -<p>“I don’t think you know him,” said Julian, his carelessness bordering on -defiance.</p> - -<p>Loring smiled. His smile was never particularly pleasant, and at this -moment it was unusually cynical.</p> - -<p>“I know a good many men, too,” he observed.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_030" id="page_030"></a>{30}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">The</span> slight alteration in Julian of which Marston Loring was conscious, -and a subtly evinced consequence of that alteration—namely, that -intimacy with the son no longer involved of necessity even an -introduction, far less intimacy, at the mother’s house—had no effect -whatever upon Loring’s relation with Mrs. Romayne, unless, indeed, it -might be said to emphasize his position as friend of the house. During -the three weeks which followed immediately upon his first call after his -return to town, he saw at least as much of Mrs. Romayne as he had done -in the course of any previous three weeks since Julian’s first -introduction of him; though the young man was no longer an obvious and -tangible link between them. He dined in Queen Anne Street a few days -after his return, but except on that<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_031" id="page_031"></a>{31}</span> occasion it chanced that he hardly -ever met Mrs. Romayne and Julian together. He met the latter often -enough at one or other of the clubs, or about town. On the former he -called, as in duty bound, after the dinner, and again and yet again at -short intervals. She had consulted him about a purchase of old oak, with -which she wished to surprise Julian, and the purchase seemed to -necessitate in his eyes frequent consultation. He also happened to meet -her once or twice when she herself was paying calls.</p> - -<p>She was always, apparently, pleased to see him. More pronounced, -perhaps, when she met him among other people than when she received him -alone, but still always more or less present, there was a certain eager, -unconscious assertion of something like intimacy with him about her -manner. Marston Loring was quick to observe the new note, and he prided -himself likewise on the caution with which he refused to allow it even -the value he believed it to possess. He caught her quick recognition of -his presence; her tendency to draw him always into the conversation in -which she happened to be engaged; the tacit<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_032" id="page_032"></a>{32}</span> assumption of mutual -interests and understanding lurking in her voice; and he sifted and -dismissed these things, cynically, as probably meaningless. But astute -as he was, he never thought of them in connection with the constant -references to Julian; the questions as to Julian’s doings; with which -her conversations with him were full. Of these latter he took hardly any -account—except for an occasional sardonic smile. Clever as he thought -himself, there were vast tracts of human nature to which he had no clue, -in the very existence of which he disbelieved; consequently, it was not -surprising that he should now and then mistake cause for effect.</p> - -<p>At about noon on a bright, cold October day he got out of a hansom at -twenty-two, Queen Anne Street, with a certain cynical expectancy on his -face. The weeks which had passed since Mrs. Romayne and Julian returned -to town on that close September day had brought on winter, and had -settled winter society fairly into its grooves; and on the previous -evening Marston Loring and Mrs. Romayne had met at a dinner-party. Mrs. -Romayne had been alone. To enquiries made<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_033" id="page_033"></a>{33}</span> for her son, and regrets at -his absence, she had replied, with a gaiety which became absolutely -feverish as the evening wore on, that he was unfortunately engaged. -Throughout the evening, as though some kind of strain were acting upon -her self-control, all the characteristics of her demeanour towards -Loring had been slightly exaggerated. Loring had detected, before he had -exchanged two sentences with her, that she was not herself; that she was -unstrung and nervous; and arguing on totally false premises he had come -to a totally false conclusion. She had pressed him restlessly about the -commission he was doing for her, and he had twisted it this morning into -an excuse for coming to see her when he knew she would be at home.</p> - -<p>“It is an unheard-of hour, I know,” he said, as she rose to receive him -with an exclamation of surprise. “But I want a little more detail, and -one or two measurements, before I can execute your orders -satisfactorily.”</p> - -<p>He had seen before she spoke that the weakness of the night before, from -whatever cause it had arisen, had passed away;<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_034" id="page_034"></a>{34}</span> the lines about her face -were set into a determined, uncompromising cheerfulness, and her voice -as she spoke conveyed the same impression.</p> - -<p>“It is more than kind of you, and I am very glad to see you,” she said. -“I’m always glad to see Julian’s friend, you know.” The last words with -a laugh. “You don’t happen to have met him this morning, I suppose?”</p> - -<p>Loring signified, without a hint of sarcasm, that it was more common not -to meet the man one would wish to meet in the Temple than to meet him, -and Mrs. Romayne laughed again.</p> - -<p>“I know,” she said. “But one gets an absurd impression that men doing -the same thing in the same place must be always coming across one -another. It’s very ridiculous, of course. You and he have always had a -knack of finding one another out, though. I suppose you are quite one -another’s greatest chums, aren’t you? Is ‘chum’ still the word, -by-the-bye?”</p> - -<p>“I believe so,” returned Loring carelessly. “Yes,” he continued in a -different tone, “I<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_035" id="page_035"></a>{35}</span> don’t know when I’ve taken to any one as I took to -Julian.”</p> - -<p>There was a little gesture, half-mocking, half involuntary, which -accepted the words as a personal compliment, and Mrs. Romayne said with -a smile:</p> - -<p>“You are a curious pair of friends, too, are you not? Julian”—her voice -in uttering the name seemed to have acquired a new tenderness in the -past month, and lingered over it now, evidently unconsciously and -involuntarily—“Julian is such a boy, and you are—a great deal older -than you ought to be.”</p> - -<p>She shook her head at him with a reproving laugh, and he answered in his -most <i>blasé</i> manner:</p> - -<p>“I’m a man of the world, you see. I knew it all through and through -before Julian had left school. I hope you wouldn’t have preferred -another boy for his ‘chum’!”</p> - -<p>There was a daring and a challenge in his tone which made the question -personal rather to himself than to Julian; but Mrs. Romayne took it from -the other point of view.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_036" id="page_036"></a>{36}</span></p> - -<p>“Quite the contrary!” she said quickly. “Another boy would not have been -at all the thing for him. I am delighted to think that his mentor is a -wise one. I rely on you, Mr. Loring, do you know!”</p> - -<p>She stopped abruptly. The last words, uttered suddenly and -involuntarily, had seemed curiously charged with a meaning which could -not get itself expressed. She paused an instant and then, half as though -she wished to laugh some impression away, half as though she wished the -words to have significance, she added:</p> - -<p>“You’ll remember that, won’t you? Shall we go down and see about the -fittings?”</p> - -<p>She rose as she spoke and led the way down to Julian’s room. The room -was already as perfect as might be. Only a great restlessness, an -irrepressible and incessant impulse to give pleasure to its occupant, -could have dictated further improvements; and as Mrs. Romayne talked and -explained, the same restless instinct of service expressed itself in -sundry little involuntary touches to trifles about the room—about -Julian’s chair and his writing-table.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_037" id="page_037"></a>{37}</span></p> - -<p>The door-bell rang at length, and her face, over which that new and -weaker expression had stolen, hardened suddenly.</p> - -<p>“I’m afraid I must send you away now!” she said, turning to Loring. -“I’ve made an appointment for this morning to get through some bothering -business. You understand now just what I want, though, don’t you?”</p> - -<p>“I think so!” answered Loring reflectively. It would have been strange -indeed if he had not understood by this time. “But I’m sorry I must go!”</p> - -<p>“I’m sorry too!” said Mrs. Romayne lightly. “I hate business, and it -loses none of its solemnity, I can assure you, when it is transacted by -my connexion, Dennis Falconer. He is my trustee, you know!”</p> - -<p>Loring smiled. He did not detect anything behind her words, and it -struck him always as perfectly natural that Mrs. Romayne and her -“connexion” should be somewhat antagonistic. “I should imagine he would -be a rather ponderous man of business!” he said.</p> - -<p>The parlour-maid entered at this moment to announce that Mr. Dennis -Falconer was in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_038" id="page_038"></a>{38}</span> the drawing-room, and as they left the room Mrs. -Romayne turned again to Loring.</p> - -<p>“To tell you the truth I find him rather ponderous at all times!” she -said with a laugh. “Didn’t you say once that altitudes were oppressive? -Well, I must go and be oppressed!”</p> - -<p>She held out her hand as she spoke, and then paused.</p> - -<p>“Oh, by-the-bye,” she said, “Julian wants you to come and dine one day -next week—only he’s so much engaged. Which day will suit you?”</p> - -<p>“Thanks!” answered Loring. “I shall be charmed!” His face was quite -impassive as he spoke, but he was wondering nevertheless whether Julian -had as yet heard of the invitation. From what he had observed lately, he -fancied that Julian had reasons of his own for avoiding home -engagements. “I am engaged on Tuesday and Thursday,” he continued, “but -on any other day I shall be delighted. Did Julian have a successful -evening yesterday?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne had explained to him on the previous night with forced -merriment<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_039" id="page_039"></a>{39}</span> that her son was “dining with a fellow, he says!”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I think so!” she answered lightly. “I don’t know which ‘fellow’ it -was, you know. Well, then, I will send you a note.”</p> - -<p>They had moved out into the hall as they talked, and now as she paused -at the foot of the stairs he shook hands again, and went out of the -house as she turned and went up to the drawing-room. Dennis Falconer was -standing waiting by the fire.</p> - -<p>“Most punctual of men!” she said airily as they shook hands. “How do you -do?”</p> - -<p>Dennis Falconer had by this time had five months of inaction and -ill-health, and the fact that he was heartily weary of both by no means -served to soften the natural tendency of his manner towards reserve and -severity. In settling down to London life for the winter, too, the fact -that he was no longer a new lion gave an added tinge of monotony to -existence for him, honestly unconscious as he was of this truth. The -days went very heavily with him; he was conscious of having come to a -dreary bit of his life’s journey, and he endured it conscientiously<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_040" id="page_040"></a>{40}</span>—if -with rather self-conscious self-respect. An added gravity and silence -seemed to him under the circumstances by no means to be deprecated.</p> - -<p>Under these circumstances the contrast between him and Mrs. Romayne as -they exchanged the trivialities of the situation was inexpressible, and -it was not surprising that they touched almost instantly upon the -business which was the cause of their interview. It was not a long -affair; it turned upon Mrs. Romayne’s desire to have rather more ready -money at her command; and Dennis Falconer, having explained the -situation to her; having stated his views, evidently conscientiously -compelled thereto; and having entered a formal protest against her -instructions; returned to his pocket the notebook to which he had been -referring as if to emphasize the close of the matter. Then he paused.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne had drawn a quick, slight breath of relief at his action, -but the breath seemed to suspend itself for an instant on this pause, -and the eyes with which she watched his were very bright and intent.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_041" id="page_041"></a>{41}</span></p> - -<p>“As your only near relative,” he began with formal gravity, “and as your -son’s only near relative, I feel myself bound to take this opportunity -of approaching a subject which has been in my thoughts for some time. -Any man of ordinary knowledge and experience of the world, having regard -only to the most ordinary circumstances, would tell you that so large an -allowance as you make your son is not an advisable thing for any young -man.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne had listened with her expression veiled and repressed into -an intent vigilance, and as he finished a dull flush—which was none the -less hot and significant because it had not the vivid intensity of the -angry flush of youth—crept into her face, and her eyes glittered. Her -tone as she spoke witnessed to a strong self-control, and an intense -determination not to abandon her position or to lessen by one jot the -distance she had set between them.</p> - -<p>“I am sorry you think so!” she said carelessly.</p> - -<p>“I think so, emphatically,” he returned. “I should think so for any -young man. For William Romayne’s son—<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_042" id="page_042"></a>{42}</span>—”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne had been gathering up some papers from the table with -light, careless movements; she rose now rather suddenly but still -carelessly. What seemed to him almost shameful callousness quickened -Falconer into what he thought a righteous disregard for all -conventionality.</p> - -<p>He too rose, but his movement was no response to hers; rather it seemed -to crush and dominate its suggestion of easy dismissal with the -implacable austerity of a reality not to be put aside. He stood looking -at her, forcing her, by the suddenly asserted superiority of his man’s -determination and mental weight, to meet his grave, condemning eyes.</p> - -<p>“Does your son know what his father was?” he said in a low, stern voice.</p> - -<p>He had forced down the barrier, he had annihilated the distance, and she -faced him with glittering eyes, that dull flush all over her face, its -mask gone.</p> - -<p>“No!” she said, and from her hard, defiant voice, also, all -artificiality had dropped away.</p> - -<p>“He knows nothing of his danger; he<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_043" id="page_043"></a>{43}</span> has no safeguards, and he has money -at his command which would be temptation to any young man. Think what -you are doing!”</p> - -<p>For a couple of seconds they confronted one another, separated by no -conventionalities, man and woman, with the common memory of a common -horror between them, holding them together in spite of every obstacle -which temperament and habit, mental and moral, could interpose.</p> - -<p>Then with a tremendous effort the woman’s strength reasserted itself, -and by sheer force of her will she thrust away the horrible reality -which he had forced upon her. She laughed.</p> - -<p>“I really don’t know what we are talking about!” she said. “I am sure -you mean most kindly as to my spoilt boy’s allowance, but we won’t -trouble to discuss it! So good of you to take the trouble to think of -it—and so unnecessary!”</p> - -<p>For a moment Falconer gazed at her almost petrified with amazement and -disgust. His perceptive and imaginative faculties had not developed with -the passing of years; his mental processes were slow; and for all their -ghastly exaggeration he accepted the careless,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_044" id="page_044"></a>{44}</span> shallow artificiality of -her tone and manner, and the smiling unfeelingness of the rebuff she had -given him, exactly as they appeared upon the surface. It was some -seconds, even, before he thoroughly realised how ruthlessly and -completely she had imputed to him all the attributes of a meddler; and -as he did so an added distance touched the uncompromising sternness -which had gradually settled down upon his face.</p> - -<p>“I beg your pardon!” he said, and the formal, unmeaning words seemed, in -their enforced condescension to her level, to carry with them a lofty -condemnation which was even contempt. “Good day!” he added stiffly; and -then, not seeing, apparently, the hand she extended to him with a hard, -smiling “Good-bye,” he left the room.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne’s face remained curiously blanched-looking all the -afternoon, as though she had received some kind of shock. She spent the -afternoon in paying calls, and whenever she returned alone to her -carriage there crept back into her eyes—bright and eager as she talked -and laughed—a certain<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_045" id="page_045"></a>{45}</span> haunting questioning, not to be driven quite -away by any simulation of gaiety.</p> - -<p>As her afternoon’s work drew to a close, her eyes were no longer quite -free from it, even as she made her attractive conversation, and when she -rose to bring her last visit to an end she was looking very tired. She -was just shaking hands with her hostess when Mrs. Halse was announced.</p> - -<p>To spare herself one iota of what she considered her social duty—even -when that duty took the form of civility to a woman she disliked—was -not Mrs. Romayne’s way. With exactly the exclamation of pleasure and -surprise which the situation demanded she waited, pleasantly desirous of -exchanging greetings with the new-comer, while Mrs. Halse bore down -vociferously upon the mistress of the house. Mrs. Halse had only very -recently returned to town, and there was all the excitement of novelty -about her appearance. She was a good deal louder even than usual, partly -as the result of this excitement, and partly as the result of absence -from town; and she had also grown considerably<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_046" id="page_046"></a>{46}</span> stouter. Announcements -of this fact, lamentations, and explanations mingled with her greetings -of her hostess, and were still upon her lips when she turned to Mrs. -Romayne.</p> - -<p>“Abominable, isn’t it?” she said, pouring out her words as fast as they -would come, and without waiting for any answers. “Such a trial! I -suppose I shall have to go in for Turkish baths or something horrible of -that sort. And how is everybody? How is that wicked young man of yours, -Mrs. Romayne? I heard of his goings on at the Ponsonbys’! By-the-bye, do -tell him that Hilda Newton is engaged to be married. So good for him! No -doubt he thinks she is pining away. A very good match, too—young -Compton; rich and good-looking; rather a fool, but don’t tell Master -Julian that.”</p> - -<p>Master Julian’s mother was smiling so charmingly that it was with some -difficulty that Mrs. Halse, who, with the assistance of Miss Newton, had -guessed the substance of the conversation which had actually taken place -between the mother and son in the railway carriage during their journey -from Norfolk,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_047" id="page_047"></a>{47}</span> had some slight difficulty in restraining the -ejaculation, “Cat!”</p> - -<p>“Really!” was the suave answer. “Miss Newton is really engaged, and so -well. So glad! Such a charming girl! Yes, I’ll tell Julian, certainly. -His heart will be broken—temporarily. Fortunately his fancies are as -ephemeral as they are numerous. Good-bye! So glad to have seen you.”</p> - -<p>She pressed Mrs. Halse’s hand cordially as she spoke, and pursued her -graceful way to the door.</p> - -<p>Julian was dining out again that night, and her lonely evening -apparently affected his mother’s nerves. At any rate, Julian received a -message the next morning—a Sunday—to the effect that she had slept -badly and was resting, but would see him at lunch, and at lunch-time -accordingly she appeared.</p> - -<p>She laughed at his half-careless, half-affectionate enquiries, calling -herself quite rested and quite well. And after his first enquiries as to -her health, Julian relapsed into rather moody silence—silence with -which his mother had apparently nothing to do. That tone of independence -which had come to him,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_048" id="page_048"></a>{48}</span> and which was sometimes hardly perceptible, -could hardly have been more strongly evidenced than by his one or two -spasmodic efforts to pass out of his own life—where something was -evidently not to his liking—into the life they shared.</p> - -<p>Such a state of things is always more or less disturbing to the mental -atmosphere; more or less according to the sensitiveness of the person -upon whom it acts; and as Mrs. Romayne sat opposite Julian the furtive -glances which she cast at his moody, preoccupied face became more and -more anxious and restless. A tentative, uncertain tone in her manner of -dealing with him, which had developed during the last month, increased -moment by moment; and her voice and laugh as she chatted to -him—ignoring his indifferent reception of her little bits of -news—became moment by moment more forced and unreal. That her nerves -and her self-control were not so reliable as they had once been was -evident in the fact that she took refuge—as was not unusual with her in -these days—in painful exaggeration.</p> - -<p>Her bright little flow of talk stopped at<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_049" id="page_049"></a>{49}</span> last, however; and Julian -making no attempt to fill the gap, there was total silence. It was -broken again by Mrs. Romayne, and she was talking now, evidently, for -talking’s sake, as though she was no longer capable of weighing her -words; but, in her intense desire to penetrate the vague atmosphere -which she could not challenge, was making her advances blindly.</p> - -<p>“I met Mrs. Halse yesterday,” she began gaily. “Did I tell you? -Fortunately I only encountered her for a few moments, or I doubt whether -I should be alive to tell the tale.”</p> - -<p>She paused, and Julian smiled absently. They had finished lunch, and he -had risen and strolled to the fire with a cigarette, and he was thinking -vaguely, as her voice broke in upon his meditations—or perhaps rather -feeling than thinking—that his mother was rather artificial. All -society women were artificial, he had thought once or twice lately; and -the word was acquiring a new significance to him.</p> - -<p>“She bestowed an immense amount of conversation upon me in the course of -those<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_050" id="page_050"></a>{50}</span> few minutes!” continued Mrs. Romayne in the sprightly tone which -her son was beginning to hear for the first time as something jarring. -“Amongst other things she told me a little piece of news which will -interest you.”</p> - -<p>“Yes?” said Julian indifferently.</p> - -<p>A fellow didn’t always want to be entertained, he was saying to himself -irritably; it was a nuisance. His thoughts had wandered completely, and -he was going over a fruitless hour which he had spent alone walking up -and down a certain side-street off Piccadilly, on the previous -evening—an hour which was accountable for his gloomy humour this -morning—when he became aware of his mother’s voice saying with -insistent gaiety:</p> - -<p>“Well, sir, aren’t you broken-hearted?”</p> - -<p>Julian started and made a futile effort to realise what his mother had -said. The necessity for the effort and its failure proved by no means -soothing to him, and he said rather impatiently:</p> - -<p>“I’m awfully sorry, mother, but I’m afraid I didn’t hear.”</p> - -<p>“He didn’t hear!” echoed Mrs. Romayne<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_051" id="page_051"></a>{51}</span> in mock appeal to heaven and -earth to witness the fact. She, too, had made an effort and a failure, -and the result with her was to increase her nervous recklessness. “Five -weeks ago he was ready to eat his poor little mother because she -prevented his proposing to this young woman, and now when I tell him -she’s engaged he doesn’t even hear! Perhaps you’ve forgotten Hilda -Newton’s very existence, my lord! Who is her successor?”</p> - -<p>Julian flushed angrily, and his good-looking face took a sullen -expression.</p> - -<p>“She’s not likely to have a successor, as you call it,” he said. “A -fellow doesn’t care to have that kind of thing happen twice.”</p> - -<p>His mother broke into a thin, nervous laugh.</p> - -<p>“You don’t mean to say it rankles still!” she said gaily. “Is this the -reason of your devotion to work and ‘fellows’? You silly old boy, you -ought to be thoroughly glad of your escape by this time! I think I shall -follow Dennis Falconer’s advice, and cut down your allowance to teach -you reason. Shall I?”</p> - -<p>The jest, dragged in as it was, had a forced<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_052" id="page_052"></a>{52}</span> ring about it; perhaps it -bore all-unconscious testimony to the oppressively insistent power of -that haunting questioning of yesterday. But Julian, knowing nothing of -this, was simply conscious of ever-increasing irritation from her voice -and manner.</p> - -<p>“I don’t see what business my allowance is of Dennis Falconer’s!” he -said gruffly. And then side by side with his growing sense of his -mother’s artificiality, there grew in him an overmastering desire for -another woman’s presence—a simple presence, to which social subtleties -and affectation were unknown. Why hadn’t Clemence met him yesterday -evening? How could he tell when he would see her again? To-morrow he -could not meet her. Then his reflections paused, as it were, absorbed in -a vague sense of discomfort and discontent, until a fresh thought stole -across them; a thought which presented itself by no means for the first -time that day.</p> - -<p>Why should he not go and see her this afternoon? After all, why should -he not? He never had done such a thing, but—did it mean so much as it -seemed to mean? And if it did? Why not?<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_053" id="page_053"></a>{53}</span></p> - -<p>“I don’t see either,” his mother said; and Julian smiled grimly as he -thought how little she knew the question she was answering. “It’s our -business, isn’t it? And it’s my private business to find you a nice -wife—not yours at all, you understand.” These last words with a laugh. -“She must be pretty, I suppose—good style at any rate—and she must be -rich, and she must have the makings of a good hostess in her. Really, I -think I must begin to look her out. Don’t you think——”</p> - -<p>Julian interrupted her. He was hardly conscious that he was doing so; he -had hardly heard her words; but the atmosphere of the perfectly -appointed room, with its artificial mistress, had suddenly become -absolutely intolerable to him, and he had answered his own question -suddenly and recklessly.</p> - -<p>“I’m going out, mother,” he said. “I’ve got some calls to make, and it’s -getting late. You won’t go out this afternoon, I know. Good-bye.”</p> - -<p>He was gone almost before she had realised that he was going.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_054" id="page_054"></a>{54}</span></p> - -<p>To Mrs. Romayne it was a repetition of their first evening at home -together in the autumn. The nervous excitement under which she had been -acting died suddenly away, and she realised what had happened; realised -it, and sat for a moment staring at it, as it were, her hands clenched -on the tablecloth, her face haggard and drawn.</p> - -<p>To Julian it was no repetition. It was a new departure, sudden and -unpremeditated, and as he walked away from his mother’s house his face -was alight and eager with excitement and determination.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_055" id="page_055"></a>{55}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">On</span> finding himself condemned to twelve months in London, Dennis Falconer -had debated the question of where he should live at some length; and had -finally decided on returning to some rooms in the neighbourhood of the -Strand, in which he had been wont to establish himself during his -temporary residences in London for the past fifteen years. It was not a -fashionable part of London. Falconer was a richer man now than he had -been fifteen years before, and there were sundry luxuries to be had in -those quarters of London where wealthy bachelors congregate, which were -not recognised so far south of Piccadilly. It was also natural to him to -think twice before he abandoned the idea of living where it was “the -proper thing”—of the hour—to live. But he was known and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_056" id="page_056"></a>{56}</span> respected in -his old rooms; he would be received there with deferential delight; he -would be of the first importance in his landlady’s estimation; and these -things, little as he knew it, had a distinct influence on his decision.</p> - -<p>The two rooms which he occupied, on the first floor, bore a strong -likeness to the majority of first-floor rooms in the same street, -occupied by single gentlemen. These gentlemen were not, as a rule, of -the class who think it worth while to impress their artistic character -upon the room in which they live; as a whole, indeed, they might have -been said to lack artistic character. Here and there was a more -inveterate smoker, newspaper-reader, or novel-reader, as the case might -be, the sign manual of whose tastes was not to be obliterated. But as a -rule it was the landlady’s taste that reigned supreme and monotonous.</p> - -<p>Dennis Falconer’s rooms were no exception to the rule. The furniture was -very comfortable, very solid, and very ugly, in the style of thirty -years ago; an artistic temperament would have modified the whole -appearance of the room, insensibly and necessarily,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_057" id="page_057"></a>{57}</span> in the course of a -week. But Falconer was not even conscious that anything was wrong. He -was as nearly devoid of æsthetic sense, even on its broadest lines, as -it is possible for a civilised man to be; and the state of mind which -takes pleasure in the tone of curtains and carpets, and the form of -tables, chairs, or china, was to him incomprehensible, and consequently -a little contemptible.</p> - -<p>On a November morning, with an incipient yellow fog hanging about, the -appearance of the room in which breakfast was waiting for him was -calculated to cast a gloom over a temperament never so little open to -such influences; and Dennis Falconer as he opened his bedroom door and -came slowly out, looked as though his mental atmosphere was already -sufficiently heavy. He always breakfasted punctually at nine o’clock, -and he never went to bed before one; it simply never occurred to him to -make any concession to the emptiness of his present life by spending -more than seven hours out of the twenty-four in sleep, even if he had -been physically able to do so. And there were days when the intervening -seventeen hours hung on his hands with an<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_058" id="page_058"></a>{58}</span> almost unendurable weight. He -had never been a man who readily made friends, and his tendency in this -direction had steadily decreased as he grew older, so that the few men -with whom he was intimate were friends of his early manhood; and, as it -happened, none of these intimates were in England at the moment. He was -absolutely incapable of forming those cheery, unmeaning -acquaintanceships which make the savour of life to so many unoccupied -men. He was one of those men with whom no one thinks of becoming -familiar; who is vaguely supposed either to have a private and select -circle of friends, or to be sufficient for himself; whose demeanour, -correct, self-contained, and a trifle formal, seems to hold the world at -a distance. Consequently his intercourse with his fellow-creatures was -limited by his present life to slight conversation on the topics of the -day at his club, or in various drawing-rooms where he paid grave, stiff -calls, or attended stately functions. Cut off from his own particular -work he had no interests and no pursuits.</p> - -<p>It was a dreary life in truth, and it was little wonder that Falconer’s -expression grew<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_059" id="page_059"></a>{59}</span> rather more austere with every week. The sentiments of -a man of his temperament towards a world in which there seemed so little -place for him, and from which he could derive so little satisfaction, -would inevitably tend towards stern disapproval.</p> - -<p>On this particular morning the sense of dreariness was very heavy upon -him. On the previous day he had had an interview with the great doctor -to whose fiat he owed his detention in London. The great doctor had been -indefinite and unsatisfactory; had looked grave and talked vaguely about -troublesome complications and a possible necessity of complete repose. -Falconer had made no sign of discomposure, had taken his leave with his -usual courteous gravity, and had left the consulting-room with a cold -chill at his heart. The cold chill was about it still this morning as he -walked to his window before going to the breakfast-table, and stood -there looking blankly out. What he was really looking at was the -prospect before him if, as the doctor had hinted, he should have to lie -up for a time. A lodging and a nurse, or a hospital; solitude and -confinement in either case.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_060" id="page_060"></a>{60}</span></p> - -<p>He sighed heavily, and turning as though with the instinct to turn away -from his troubles, he sat down to the table, poured out his coffee, and -took up the letters lying by his plate. There were only two—one in a -common-looking envelope directed in an illiterate hand, the other in a -clear, characteristic man’s hand, at the sight of which his face -brightened perceptibly.</p> - -<p>“Aston,” he said to himself, and opened it quickly.</p> - -<p>His friendship for the little doctor, which time had only served to -strengthen, was, perhaps, the most genial sentiment of Dennis Falconer’s -life, and Dr. Aston’s absence in India at this particular period had -been a bitter disappointment to him. He had hoped for some time that the -doctor’s plans—always of a somewhat erratic nature—might bring him -back to London shortly; and as his eyes fell on the first sentence of -the letter a slight sound of intense relief escaped him; an eloquent -testimony to his present loneliness. Dr. Aston began by telling him that -he would be in England before Christmas.</p> - -<p>The letter was long and interesting; it<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_061" id="page_061"></a>{61}</span> abounded in bits of vivid -description and shrewd observation, and its comments on Falconer’s -proceedings were keen and kindly. Its recipient allowed himself to -become absorbed in it to the total neglect of his breakfast, and his -expression was lighter than it had been for weeks when he came upon -these sentences towards the close of the letter:</p> - -<p>“By-the-bye, in the ‘latest intelligence’ of London society—all is fish -in the shape of human nature that comes to my net, as you know, and I -study that curious institution carefully whenever I get the chance—I -constantly, nowadays, come across the name of a Mrs. Romayne. ‘The -charming Mrs. Romayne and her good-looking son’ is the usual formula. It -is not by any chance the little woman with whom I got myself and you -into such a terrible fix years and years ago at Nice—William Romayne’s -widow? Is it any relation? I should like to know what became of that -little woman, if you can tell me; she had stuff in her. And whether the -boy has dreed his weird yet?”</p> - -<p>Falconer laid down the letter abruptly, and turned to his breakfast, his -face stern and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_062" id="page_062"></a>{62}</span> uncompromising. His interview with Mrs. Romayne, now a -fortnight old, had accentuated markedly his grim disapprobation of her; -and the strong feeling of reprobation that stirred him then had so -little subsided that the least touch was enough to re-endow it with -vigorous life.</p> - -<p>“Stuff in her!” he muttered, with a world of contempt in the curt -ejaculation. “Stuff in her! If Aston only knew!”</p> - -<p>He glanced at the letter again, and a certain disapproval, personal to -the writer, expressed itself in the grave set of his lips as he re-read -the words about Julian; his whole mental and moral attitude was -antagonistic to, and inclined to condemn, what he characterised, now, as -“Aston’s dangerous theories.” He passed with what seemed to him -practical sense from “Aston’s extravagance” to a stern consideration of -the heinousness of such a life and education as Julian’s for a young man -in Julian’s position. Julian’s position, rightly considered, involved in -his eyes a reaping in obscurity, humility, and sombreness of life of the -harvest of shame and disgrace which his father had sown; and that<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_063" id="page_063"></a>{63}</span> there -was anything inconsistent between this view of the case and his -condemnation of Dr. Aston’s theories he was utterly unaware.</p> - -<p>He applied himself to his breakfast, still meditating on Mrs. Romayne -and the probable consequences of her callousness; and then he took up -the other letter and opened it.</p> - -<p>At the opening of his last expedition, one of the men attached to it had -met with a disabling accident, and had been sent home. The man had been -with Falconer on a previous expedition, and when the latter returned to -England he had made enquiries about him, and had finally, and with no -little difficulty, traced him out to find him crippled for life, and in -a state of abject poverty. Falconer, according to his narrow and -orthodox lights, as strictly conventional in their way as were Mrs. -Romayne’s in hers, was a good man. The letter he was reading now, from -the wife of this man, was written by a woman by whom he was regarded as -a kind of Providence; to be reverenced indeed, not loved, but to be -reverenced with all her heart. She and her husband had been<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_064" id="page_064"></a>{64}</span> rescued by -him from despair; all that medical skill could do for the man had been -done at his expense. The pair had been settled by him in a small house -in Camden Town, where Mrs. Dixon, a brisk, capable woman, was to let -lodgings. To this house Falconer had been once or twice to see the -crippled man; and he was not now surprised to receive from the wife the -information—conveyed in a style in which natural loquacity struggled -with awe of her correspondent—that the husband had had one of the bad -attacks of suffering to which he was liable, and that if Mr. Falconer -could spare half an hour, Dixon would “take it very kind with his duty.”</p> - -<p>Falconer smiled grimly at the words “if Mr. Falconer could spare half an -hour.” His whole day was practically at Dixon’s disposal. He would go up -to Camden Town that afternoon, he decided; he almost wished he had -thought of going before, and as the thought crossed his mind, the -remembrance of what might possibly be lying in wait for himself in the -not very distant future made him rise abruptly and thrust his letters -into his pocket.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_065" id="page_065"></a>{65}</span></p> - -<p>It was about twelve o’clock when he left his rooms and walked slowly -away in the direction of club-land. He usually got through an hour or so -at his club before lunch, reading the papers and so forth. The -threatening fog of three hours earlier had rolled away, and there were -gleams of wintry sunshine about which made walking pleasant. Dr. Aston’s -letter had cheered Falconer considerably; the feeling, too, that he had -a definite occupation for his afternoon, and an occupation which was not -invented, was invigorating; and altogether he was in better spirits than -he had been for many a day. He was walking up Waterloo Place, when his -eyes, which could not forego, even in a London street, their trained -habits of keen, accurate observation, lighted on Marston Loring, who was -coming down Waterloo Place on the opposite side of the road. Loring was -a man Dennis Falconer particularly disliked, and after one disapproving -glance he was looking away, when he saw the other suddenly stop with a -movement—and evidently an exclamation—of surprise and welcome. In the -same instant he became aware that Julian Romayne had turned out of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_066" id="page_066"></a>{66}</span> a -side-street, and was greeting his friend apparently with effusion. -Falconer’s brow clouded involuntarily. The instinct of kin was so strong -in him that there was a certain touch of personal feeling, little as he -wished it, in his connection with the Romaynes, which made the thought -of them particularly disagreeable to him; and here, for the second time -to-day, the young man and his mother were forced upon his notice. He -pursued his way up the street, watching Julian grimly, and as he passed, -still on the opposite pavement, the corner where the two young men were -standing, Julian happened to look across, saw him, and made a ready, -courteous gesture of salutation. Falconer returned it stiffly enough, -and walked on.</p> - -<p>Julian turned to Loring with a laugh.</p> - -<p>“Old bear!” he said; “I wish he’d take himself off to Africa or -somewhere. He’s a regular wet blanket to have about! Well, old fellow, -and what’s the news?”</p> - -<p>Julian was looking very fresh, vigorous, and full of life. There was a -curious suggestion about him of alertness which was not without a -certain excitement; and his tone<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_067" id="page_067"></a>{67}</span> and manner as he spoke were almost -superabundantly frank and loquacious.</p> - -<p>Ten days before, Loring had received a note from Mrs. Romayne telling -him that Julian was going for a week’s holiday to Brighton, and that the -alteration in his room must be completed if possible in his absence. “It -is a sudden idea with him, apparently,” she had written; “but do let us -take advantage of it.”</p> - -<p>If Loring had had his own private notion on the subject of this sudden -idea on Julian’s part he had made no sign to Julian’s mother; he had -paid, in silence, his cynical tribute to the maternal wisdom which had -presumably recognised the fact that if freedom is not granted it will be -snatched.</p> - -<p>Three days had now passed since Julian’s return, but it had happened—he -himself could perhaps have told how—that until this Saturday afternoon -he and Loring had not met. There was nothing in his face and manner at -this moment, however, but the most lively, even demonstrative -satisfaction; and without giving Loring time to answer his question he -went on, with an ease and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_068" id="page_068"></a>{68}</span> gaiety which were very like, and yet unlike, -his mother.</p> - -<p>“Where were you off to? The club? Come and have some lunch with me, do! -I want to tell you how first-rate I think my room. I hear you’ve taken -no end of trouble over it. It was awfully jolly of you, old man!”</p> - -<p>“Glad you like it,” returned Loring nonchalantly. “Yes, I think it’s -nice. But it was Mrs. Romayne who took the trouble.”</p> - -<p>He was studying Julian keenly, though quite imperceptibly, as he spoke. -The young man’s manner was assumed—of that Loring was quite aware. But -what, exactly, did it hide? What exactly was the secret?</p> - -<p>He debated this question calmly with himself throughout the lunch which -they took together a little later on; interposing question and remarks -the while into Julian’s flow of fluent talk and laughter. About -Brighton, in particular, Julian was full of chatter; and as he wound up -a vivacious description of his doings there, Loring commented mentally:</p> - -<p>“He hasn’t been to Brighton at all!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_069" id="page_069"></a>{69}</span></p> - -<p>Aloud he said, as genially as nature ever allowed him to speak:</p> - -<p>“Well, it’s very jolly to see you back again, my boy. Do you know we’ve -seen next to nothing of one another lately, and I vote we turn over a -new leaf, eh? What are you going to do this afternoon, now?”</p> - -<p>He was leaning back in his chair lighting a cigarette as he spoke, and -apparently his attention was wholly claimed by the process; as a matter -of fact, however, he was studying Julian’s face intently, and his sense -of annoyance was not untinged with admiration when not a muscle of that -good-looking face moved. Julian leant back and crossed his legs airily.</p> - -<p>“I promised to go to the Eastons’, I’m sorry to say!” he said. “It’s an -awful bore! We might have done a theatre together!”</p> - -<p>Now, the Eastons were mutual acquaintances of the two men, but it so -happened that they had taken irremediable offence against Loring over -some detail connected with the bazaar, and it was no longer possible for -him to call upon them. Julian was of course aware<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_070" id="page_070"></a>{70}</span> of the fact, and -Loring smiled cynically at what he recognised as a very clever move.</p> - -<p>“A pity!” he said composedly. “Better luck another time. Well, you’re -not in any hurry, anyway.”</p> - -<p>“Not a bit!” assented Julian, cheerfully disposing of himself in a most -comfortable and stationary attitude. But a moment later he sprang to his -feet. “By Jove!” he exclaimed, “I nearly forgot! I’ve got a commission -to do for my mother in Bond Street—shop closes at two. Can I do it?”</p> - -<p>A hurried reference to his watch assured him that he would just do it, -and with a hasty farewell he dashed out of the room. Loring did not -propose to accompany him. It was not worth while, he told himself; and -he smiled sardonically as Julian departed.</p> - -<p>“I shall find out,” he said to himself. “Of course I shall find out! The -question is, is it worth while to wait, or shall I play my game with -what I know? The attached friend of the boy warning his mother in -time”—he smiled again very unpleasantly—“or the sympathising friend of -the mother having made<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_071" id="page_071"></a>{71}</span> a terrible discovery! Which is the better pose? -The latter, I think. Yes, the latter! I’ll wait until I’ve made my -discovery.”</p> - -<p>He dropped the end of his cigarette into an ash-tray, sat for a moment -more in deep thought, and then rose and strolled slowly away.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_072" id="page_072"></a>{72}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Julian</span>, meanwhile, hailed a passing hansom, sprang into it, and told the -man to drive, not to Bond Street but to the Athenæum, Camden Town. There -was an air about him as of one who plumes himself on having done a -clever thing, and as he settled himself for his long drive there was a -curious excitement and radiance in his face. When the cab reached its -destination at last he jumped out and walked rapidly and eagerly away.</p> - -<p>It was not a neighbourhood likely to be familiar to a young man about -town, but Julian pursued his way with the certainty of a man who had -followed it several times before. In about ten minutes he turned into a -neat and respectable little street, consisting of two short rows of -small houses<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_073" id="page_073"></a>{73}</span> with diminutive bow windows to the first-floor rooms. -About half-way down he stopped at a house on the right-hand side and -knocked with a quick, decided touch. He was an object of the deepest -interest as he stood upon the little doorstep to a brisk, -curious-looking woman who was standing in the ground-floor window of the -house opposite, but her opportunity for observation was brief. The door -was opened almost immediately, and with a pleasant greeting to the -woman, who stood aside, he passed her and ran upstairs—a course of -action evidently expected of him. He opened the door of the front room -on the first floor and went eagerly in.</p> - -<p>“Here I am!” he cried. “Did you expect me so soon?”</p> - -<p>Standing in the middle of the room, as though she had suddenly started -from her chair, with her hands outstretched towards him, was Clemence; -and on the third finger of that thin, left hand there shone a bright -gold ring.</p> - -<p>Her face was a delicate rosy red, as though with sudden joy just touched -with<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_074" id="page_074"></a>{74}</span> shyness, and all the beauty which had been latent in her tired, -work-worn face seemed to have been touched into vivid, almost startling -life, by the hand of a great magician. By contrast with the face she -turned to Julian now, the large eyes deep and glowing, the mouth -trembling a little with tenderness, the face of a month ago, pure and -sweet as it had been, would have looked like the inanimate mask of a -dormant soul. The soul was awake now, quivering with consciousness; -womanhood had come with a purity and beauty beyond any possibility of -girlhood. Looking at her face now, it was easy to see by what means -alone the latent strength of her character might be developed.</p> - -<p>He drew her into his arms with an eager, confident touch, and she -yielded to him completely, clinging to him with the colour deepening in -her face as he kissed it boyishly again and again. It was a fortnight -only since he had kissed her first.</p> - -<p>“I was watching for you,” she said softly. “I heard your step.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_075" id="page_075"></a>{75}</span></p> - -<p>He laughed exultantly and kissed her again.</p> - -<p>“I thought you’d be watching!” he said. “Though I’m earlier than I told -you, do you know? Much earlier! I say, Clemence, how jolly the room -looks!”</p> - -<p>It was a small room, furnished and decorated in the simplest and -cheapest style; as great a contrast as could well be imagined to the -rooms to which he was accustomed. But it was very clean and very -comfortable-looking; and there was a homelike, restful atmosphere about -it which might well have radiated from the slender figure in the plain -dress, with that shining wedding-ring and lovely, flushing face. She -smiled, a very sweet, pleased little smile.</p> - -<p>“Do you think so really?” she said. “I am so glad. It is that beautiful -basket-chair you sent, and the flowers.” She glanced as she spoke at a -pot of chrysanthemums standing on a little table in the window. Then she -turned to him again, her eyes a little deprecating. “Do you think you -ought to spend so much money?” she said shyly.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_076" id="page_076"></a>{76}</span></p> - -<p>Julian laughed, and flung his arm round her, as he surveyed the little -room with a vivid air of proprietorship. Here he was master. Here his -word was law. Here he was in a world of his own making, and his only -fellow-creature was his subject.</p> - -<p>“It looks jolly!” he pronounced again as a final dictum. “Now, come and -sit down, Clemence, and tell me what you’ve been doing since yesterday!” -He settled himself into the arm-chair by the fire with a lordly air as -he spoke, adding: “Come and sit on this stool by me, like the sweetest -girl in the world.”</p> - -<p>Clemence hesitated, hardly perceptibly. Hers was a nature to which -trivial endearments came strangely, almost painfully. She had not yet -learned to caress in play; and there was an innate, unconscious, -personal dignity about her to which trivial self-abasement was -unnatural. But almost before she was conscious of her reluctance there -swept over her, like a great wave of hot sweetness, the remembrance that -she was his wife! It was her duty to do as he wished. She came softly -across the room,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_077" id="page_077"></a>{77}</span> sat down on the stool he had drawn out, and laid her -cheek against his arm.</p> - -<p>It was a trivial action, very quietly performed, but it was instinct -with the beauty of absolute self-abnegation; and as if, as her physical -presence touched him, something of her spirit touched him too, a sudden -quiet fell upon the exultant, self-satisfied boy at whose feet she sat. -Not for the first time, by any means, there stole over Julian a vague -uneasiness; a vague realisation of something beyond his ken; something -in the light of which he shrank, unaccountably, from himself. His hand -closed round the woman’s hand lying in his with a touch very different -from the boyish passion of his previous caresses, and for a moment he -did not speak. Then he said slowly and in a low, dreamy voice:</p> - -<p>“Clemence, I can’t think why you should ever have loved me!”</p> - -<p>The hand in his thrilled slightly, and the head on his shoulder was just -shaken. Clemence could not tell him why she loved him. The bald outline -she could trace as most women can trace it. She could look<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_078" id="page_078"></a>{78}</span> back upon -her first sense of reliance, her pity, her admiration, her sense of -strange, delightful companionship; but the why and wherefore of it, the -mystery which had given to this young man and no other the key of her -soul, this was to her as a miracle; as, indeed, there is always -something miraculous in it, even when it seems most natural. To account -for love; to say that in this case it is natural, in this case it is -unnatural; is to confess ignorance of the first great attribute of -love—that it is supernatural and divine.</p> - -<p>There was another silence, a longer one this time, and the strange spell -sank deeper into Julian’s spirit. He said nothing. It would have been a -relief to him to speak; to reduce to words, or, indeed, to definite -consciousness, the vague trouble that oppressed him; but its outlines -were too large and too vague for him. It was in truth a sense of total -moral insolvency, but he could not understand it as such, having no -moral standpoint. Clemence neither moved nor spoke; her hand lay -motionless in his; her cheek rested against him; her beautiful eyes<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_079" id="page_079"></a>{79}</span> -looked straight before them with a dreamy, almost awestruck gaze.</p> - -<p>At last, with a desperate determination to thrust away so unusual an -oppression, Julian moved slightly and began to talk. He wanted to get -back his sense of superiority, and his voice accordingly took its most -boyish and masterful tone.</p> - -<p>“You haven’t told me what you’ve been doing, Clemence?” he said. “Have -you given notice at your bonnet shop as I told you?”</p> - -<p>Clemence lifted her head and sat up, clasping her hands lightly on the -arm of his chair.</p> - -<p>“No!” she said gently. “I thought I would ask you to think about it -again. I would so much rather go on if you didn’t mind. For one thing, -what could I do all day?” She looked up into his face as she spoke with -deprecating, pleading eyes, which were full of submission, too; and the -submission was very pleasant to Julian.</p> - -<p>“I do mind,” he said authoritatively. “I can’t have it, Clemence. I -can’t always see you home, don’t you see, and I won’t<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_080" id="page_080"></a>{80}</span> have you about at -night alone. Besides, I don’t choose that you should work.”</p> - -<p>“But I do so want to!” she said, laying her hand timidly and -beseechingly on his. “It will be so difficult for you to keep us both; -you will overwork yourself, I’m so afraid. Oh, won’t you let me help? -I’ve always worked, you know; it doesn’t hurt me. You don’t want to -forget that you’ve married a work-girl, do you?”</p> - -<p>She smiled at him as she spoke, one of her sweet, rare smiles, and he -kissed her impetuously.</p> - -<p>“Don’t talk nonsense!” he said imperiously. “I can’t allow it, and -that’s all about it. How do you suppose I could attend to my work when -I’m kept at the hospital in the evening, if I were thinking all the time -of you alone in the streets! No, you must give notice on Monday!”</p> - -<p>She looked at him wistfully for a moment. He was condemning her to long -days of idleness, to constant uneasiness and self-reproach on his -behalf, to a certain loss of self-respect. But self-sacrifice was -instinctive with her.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_081" id="page_081"></a>{81}</span></p> - -<p>“Very well!” she said simply.</p> - -<p>The little victory, the assertion of authority restored Julian’s spirits -completely, and he plunged into discursive talk; more or less -egotistical. It was all, necessarily, founded on falsehood, and it would -have been a delicate question to decide when his talk ceased to be -consciously untruthful, and became the expression of a fictitious Julian -in whom the real Julian absolutely believed.</p> - -<p>The afternoon wore on; the winter twilight fell, bringing with it a -slight return of the fog of the morning; two hours had passed before -Julian moved reluctantly, and said that he must go.</p> - -<p>“I shall come to-morrow!” he said, taking her face between his hands and -kissing it. “We’ll go out into the country if it’s fine. I wish it were -summer-time! Have you ever seen the river, Clemence?”</p> - -<p>“Not in the country,” she said. “It must be nice! How much you’ve seen! -Do you know I often think that you must wish sometimes I was a lady! I -don’t know anything and I haven’t seen anything, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_082" id="page_082"></a>{82}</span>——” she faltered, -and he rose, laughing and drawing her up into his arms.</p> - -<p>“Any one can know things,” he said lightly, “and any one can see things. -But no one but you can be Clemence! Do you see? Oh, what a bore it is to -have to go!”</p> - -<p>He was lingering, undecidedly, as though a little pressure would have -scattered his resolution to the winds, and seated him once more in the -chair he had just quitted. But, since he had said that he must go, it -never occurred to Clemence to ask him to stay. If it were not his duty -he would never leave her. If it was his duty now, how could she hold him -back!</p> - -<p>“To-morrow will come!” she said, looking into his face with a brave -smile.</p> - -<p>“I don’t believe you want me to stay!” he returned, half laughing, half -vexed.</p> - -<p>“Don’t I?” she said simply, and he caught her in his arms again.</p> - -<p>“What a shame!” he said. “There, good-bye! Are you coming to the door?”</p> - -<p>She shook her head.</p> - -<p>“I’ll stay here,” she said, “and watch<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_083" id="page_083"></a>{83}</span> you from the window. I see you -farther so. Ah, it’s rather foggy! I’m so sorry! You’ll look up? -Good-bye!”</p> - -<p>She lifted her face to his and kissed him tenderly and shyly, and he -left her standing by the window.</p> - -<p>Julian ran downstairs, let himself out, and stood for a moment on the -doorstep as he realised the disagreeable nature of the atmosphere. At -the same instant the door of the house opposite opened, and a man came -out, attended to the threshold by a woman. She caught sight of Julian -instantly, and said something to the man, as he stood in the shadow, in -a deferential whisper. Julian shook himself, confounded the fog, and -then glanced up at the window from which the light streamed on his face. -He waved his hand, turned away, and walked rapidly down the street, -pulling up his coat collar as he went.</p> - -<p>As he went, Dennis Falconer slowly descended the two steps of that -opposite house, and slowly—very slowly—followed him.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_084" id="page_084"></a>{84}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap"></span>>“Good-bye! So glad to have seen you! What, dear Mrs. Ponsonby, are you -going to run away too? So kind of you to come out on such an afternoon! -Good-bye!”</p> - -<p>It was a Friday afternoon, and Friday was Mrs. Romayne’s “day.” This -particular Friday had been about as unpleasant, atmospherically, as it -is possible for even a November day to be, short of actual dense fog; it -had been very dark, and a drizzling rain—a dirty rain too—had fallen -unceasingly. Under these circumstances it was rather surprising that any -one should have ventured out, even in the most luxurious brougham, than -that Mrs. Romayne’s visitors should have been comparatively few in -number.</p> - -<p>The departure of the ladies to whom her<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_085" id="page_085"></a>{85}</span> farewells had been spoken, and -with whom she had been exchanging social commonplaces for the last -quarter of an hour, left her alone; and as she returned to her chair by -the dainty tea-table and poured herself out a cup of tea, she had -apparently very little expectation of further callers, though it was -only just past five o’clock; for when the door-bell rang a few minutes -later she paused, and a look of surprise crossed her face. She put down -her cup with a little sigh, which was more a concession made to the -dictum of conventionality that callers are a bore than an expression of -real feeling; and then, as the door opened, she rose with a touch of -genuine satisfaction.</p> - -<p>“My dear Mrs. Pomeroy!” she exclaimed. “How sweet of you to come out on -such a shocking day! Really, you must have had an intuition of my -forlorn condition, I think! Maud, dear, how are you?”</p> - -<p>She had given her left hand to the girl in a familiar, caressing way as -she retained Mrs. Pomeroy’s right hand, and now she drew the elder lady -with charming insistence towards a large, inviting-looking chair, -indicating to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_086" id="page_086"></a>{86}</span> daughter with a pretty gesture that she was to take a -low seat near the table.</p> - -<p>“It is an ill wind that blows no one any good!” she continued gaily, as -Mrs. Pomeroy greeted her placidly. “It is really too delightful to get -you all to myself like this! How seldom one gets the chance of a cosy -chat! And how very seldom it comes with the people of all others with -whom one would thoroughly enjoy it! You’ll have some tea, won’t you—oh, -yes, you really must; it is so much more friendly!” She laughed as she -spoke, and turned to the girl sitting demurely on the low seat near her -with a tacit claim on her sympathy and comprehension which was very -fascinating. Miss Pomeroy’s pretty, expressionless lips smiled sweetly, -and her mother, who was always ready to yield to pressure where a cup of -tea was concerned—that soothing beverage being forbidden her by her -medical authorities—answered contentedly:</p> - -<p>“Well, thanks, yes! I think I will! One really wants a cup of tea on a -day like this, doesn’t one?” Mrs. Pomeroy had rarely been known to leave -a statement unqualified<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_087" id="page_087"></a>{87}</span> by a question. “It is really very disagreeable -weather, isn’t it? Not that it seems to trouble you at all.” Mrs. -Pomeroy smiled one of her slow, amiable smiles as she spoke. “I am so -glad to see you looking so much better!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne laughed.</p> - -<p>“I am very well indeed, thanks,” she said. “But I’ve not been ill that I -know of, dear Mrs. Pomeroy.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Pomeroy shook her head gently.</p> - -<p>“I thought, do you know, when I first came home, that you looked as -though your holiday had been a little too much for you—so many people’s -holiday is a little too much for them, don’t you think? And how is your -boy? Very hard at work, we hear.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne smiled.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Pomeroy’s opinion as to her looks had been quite correct; and it -was only within the last fortnight that they had altered for the better. -Within that fortnight her brightness and vivacity had ceased to be—as -they had been for weeks before—wholly artificial; something of the look -of nervous strain had gone out of her eyes, and her face was altogether -less sharpened. Her smile now was<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_088" id="page_088"></a>{88}</span> genuine; and her voice was strangely -tender and contented.</p> - -<p>“Very hard,” she said. “I have had to get used to a great deal of -absence on his part. He has gone down to Brighton to-day, until Monday; -he needs a little fresh air, of course. It is so long since he has been -shut up as he is now.”</p> - -<p>“You must miss him very much,” said Mrs. Pomeroy placidly.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne did not answer directly, except with a laugh.</p> - -<p>“I am almost inclined to envy mothers with daughters,” she said, smiling -at Miss Pomeroy again. “I wonder, now”—a sudden idea had apparently -struck Mrs. Romayne—“I wonder whether you would lend me your daughter -now and then, and I wonder whether she would consent to be lent.”</p> - -<p>“I should be delighted,” said Mrs. Pomeroy, with vague amiability, and -an equally vague glance at her daughter. “And I’m sure Maud will be -delighted, too, won’t you, Maud?”</p> - -<p>“Delighted!” assented Maud, with pretty promptitude.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_089" id="page_089"></a>{89}</span></p> - -<p>“Well, then, we must arrange it some time or other,” declared Mrs. -Romayne gaily. “Perhaps you would come and spend a week with me, -Maud—that would be charming!”</p> - -<p>But she did not press the point, letting the subject drop with apparent -carelessness, and talking about other things, always keeping the girl in -the conversation; turning to her now and then with a pleasant, familiar -word, or a gesture which was lightly affectionate. The mother and -daughter had risen to take leave when she said carelessly:</p> - -<p>“Oh, by-the-bye, Maud, dear, have you anything to do to-morrow -afternoon? I’ve been bothered into taking two tickets for a matinée, a -charity affair, you know, but they say it will be rather good. It would -be so nice of you to come with me!”</p> - -<p>“It will be very nice of you to take me!” was the response. “Thank you -very much!”</p> - -<p>A minute or two more passed in the arrangement of the place and hour for -meeting, and then Mrs. Pomeroy drifted blandly out of the room, followed -by her daughter, and Mrs. Romayne was again alone.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_090" id="page_090"></a>{90}</span></p> - -<p>She walked to the fireplace this time, and putting one foot on the -fender, stood looking down, her face intent and satisfied.</p> - -<p>“Just the right sort of girl!” she said to herself. “Just the right sort -of girl!”</p> - -<p>She was wearing the little gold bangle which Julian had given her on her -birthday—the one which Miss Pomeroy had helped him to choose—and she -was turning it on her wrist with tender, contemplative touches. She was -so absorbed in her reflection that she did not hear the servant come -into the room, or notice for the moment that the girl was standing -beside her with a letter. She started at last, and looked up; took the -letter, and opened it carelessly, without looking at it, as the woman -took away the tea-table.</p> - -<div class="blockquot"><p class="nind"> -“<span class="smcap">Dear Cousin Hermia</span>,<br /> -</p> - -<p>“Unless I hear from you to the contrary, I propose to call on you -to-morrow (Saturday), at three o’clock, on a matter of grave -importance.</p> - -<p class="r"> -<span style="margin-right: 4em;">“Faithfully yours,</span><br /> -“<span class="smcap">Dennis Falconer</span>.”<br /> -</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="page_091" id="page_091"></a>{91}</span></p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne’s face had changed slightly as she began to read—changed -and hardened—and as she finished she drew the letter through her -fingers with a gesture of mere impatience, which was somehow belied by -the look in her eyes. Something of that strained look had come back into -them. She could not see him to-morrow, she was saying to herself -briefly; she was not going to put off Maud Pomeroy; Dennis Falconer must -fix another time, and she would write him a line at once. She walked -quickly across to her writing table, sat down, drew out a sheet of paper -and took up a pen.</p> - -<p>And then she paused.</p> - -<p>Ten minutes later her note was written, and on its way to the post, but -it was not directed to Dennis Falconer. It began, “My dear Maud,” and it -told Miss Pomeroy that business had “turned up” which would make it -impossible for Mrs. Romayne to go to the theatre on the following -afternoon, and that she enclosed the tickets hoping that Maud might be -able to use them.</p> - -<p>Exactly on the stroke of three on the following afternoon the door-bell -rang. Mrs.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_092" id="page_092"></a>{92}</span> Romayne was alone in the drawing-room, apparently lazily and -pleasantly enough occupied with the latest number of the latest society -paper; and as the sound reached her ear her lips hardened into a thin, -straight line, and her eyes flashed for a moment with a look of -antagonism which was almost defiant. Then the servant announced:</p> - -<p>“Mr. Falconer!”</p> - -<p>Dennis Falconer was looking very pale; there was little colour even in -his lips, and his face was set and stern. He took the hand Mrs. Romayne -held out to him, and replied to her greeting in the briefest possible -phrase, with no softening of a something curiously solemn and inexorable -about his demeanour, though his eyes rested on her for an instant with a -singular expression. He disliked and despised the woman before him, and -yet at that moment he pitied her.</p> - -<p>“Sit down!” she said. “I am charmed to see you, though, do you know, you -have chosen an inopportune moment. I had a very pleasant engagement for -this afternoon, and I nearly put you off. So I hope the business is -really very grave.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_093" id="page_093"></a>{93}</span></p> - -<p>Her voice was lightness itself, and that very lightness, with the almost -unusual loquacity with which she had received him, seemed to witness to -the presence in her mind of a recollection which she was determined to -ignore—the recollection of their last interview, in that very room. -There was an air about her of having entrenched herself behind a barrier -which she defied him to pass; of being resolute this time against -surprise, or against any other method of attack.</p> - -<p>“It is very grave!” said Falconer, and in contrast with her voice, his -rang with stern heaviness. “I must ask you to prepare yourself for bad -news!”</p> - -<p>“Bad news!” she echoed sharply, as her eyes, fixed on his face, grew -suddenly bright and keen. “Oh—money, I suppose?” Her voice jarred a -little, though she spoke very lightly.</p> - -<p>“No!” said Falconer.</p> - -<p>His tone was absolutely uncompromising. On his unsympathetic and -unimaginative mind the effect of her manner was to obliterate his sense -of pity beneath a consciousness<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_094" id="page_094"></a>{94}</span> of the retributive justice of the -moment before her.</p> - -<p>“Not money?” she said, with a little, unreal laugh. “Well, that’s a -comfort, at any rate.” Her hand had clenched itself suddenly round the -arm of her chair on his monosyllable, and now she paused a moment, -almost as though her breath had failed her, before she said, with -affected carelessness: “And if not—what?”</p> - -<p>Her back was towards the light, and Falconer could not see her face.</p> - -<p>“I will answer your question, if you will allow me, with another,” he -said. “Have you noticed anything unusual in the course of the past -month—or more—in the conduct of your son?”</p> - -<p>In the instant’s dead silence that followed a slight creaking sound made -itself audible and then died away. The clenched hand on the bar of Mrs. -Romayne’s chair had passed slowly round it with such intense pressure as -to produce the sound. Then she answered him, as he had previously -answered her, in a monosyllable.</p> - -<p>“No!” she said. There was a desperate<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_095" id="page_095"></a>{95}</span> effort in her voice at -carelessness, at nonchalance, at astonishment; but it was penetrated -through and through with all her past antagonism towards, and defiance -of, the man before her accentuated into fierce repudiation. Falconer’s -voice, as he answered her, seemed to confront that defiance with -inexorable fate.</p> - -<p>“That is almost unfortunate,” he said sternly. “In that case, I fear -that what I have to tell you must fall with double and treble severity, -as coming upon you unawares. Will you not think again? Has he not been -absent from home a good deal? Have his absences been satisfactorily -accounted for? Have you ever proved”—he paused, laying stress upon the -last word—“have you ever proved such accounts, as given by himself, -correct?”</p> - -<p>With a valiant effort, the power of which Falconer must have appreciated -had he been able to penetrate beyond the ghastly artificiality of the -result, Mrs. Romayne rallied her forces, and strove to throw his words -back upon him; to defend and entrench herself once and for all with the -only weapon<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_096" id="page_096"></a>{96}</span> she knew. She broke into a thin, tuneless laugh.</p> - -<p>“What an absolutely gruesome catechism!” she cried. “Really, it would -take me weeks of solitary confinement and meditation among the -tombs—isn’t there a book about that, by-the-bye?—before I could -approach it in a duly sepulchral spirit. Do you know, it would be an -absolute relief to me if you could come to the point? I am taking it for -granted, you see, that there is a point, which is no doubt a compliment -which its infinitesimal nature hardly deserves. Produce the poor little -thing, for heaven’s sake!”</p> - -<p>“The point is this,” said Falconer grimly and concisely. “Your son’s -life, as you know it, is a lie. He has a sordid version of what is known -as an ‘establishment.’ He is living with a work-girl in Camden Town.”</p> - -<p>There was a choked, strangled sound, and Mrs. Romayne’s figure seemed to -shrink together as though every muscle had contracted in one -simultaneous throb. Her face, could Falconer have seen it, was rigid and -blank, except for her eyes. For that first<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_097" id="page_097"></a>{97}</span> instant she looked as a -patient might look who, having suspected himself of a deadly disease, -having congratulated himself on the subsidence of his symptoms and known -hope, learns from his physician that that subsidence of obvious symptoms -was in itself only a more dangerous symptom still, and that he is indeed -doomed. Her eyes were the eyes of a woman who looks despair full in the -face.</p> - -<p>But with no human being who keeps hold of life and reason can the vivid -agony of such a vision endure for more than an instant. It dulls by -reason of its very insupportableness. Time is an empty word where mental -suffering is concerned, and the second-hand of the tall clock in the -corner had traversed its dial only once before a kind of film passed -over those agonised eyes, and Mrs. Romayne spoke in a thin, hoarse -voice. And the man so close to her was conscious of nothing but a short -pause, and was revolted accordingly.</p> - -<p>“How do you know?” Even in that moment the instinct of defiance of him -personally could not wholly yield, and lingered in her voice.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_098" id="page_098"></a>{98}</span></p> - -<p>“I have an old servant who lives in Camden Town. He is an invalid, and I -occasionally visit him. His wife is a garrulous woman, and thinking that -I have some claim on her gratitude, considers it necessary to inform me -as to all her own and her neighbours’ affairs. Visiting the husband last -Friday week, I found the wife greatly excited and alarmed for the -reputation of the street—in which she lets lodgings—by the appearance -in the house opposite of a couple whose relations to one another had -instantly been suspected by their landlady and her neighbours, though -they passed as newly-made man and wife!”</p> - -<p>With a sudden, low cry of inexpressible horror and dismay Mrs. Romayne -sprang to her feet, flinging out her hands as though to keep off -something intolerable to be borne.</p> - -<p>“No! no!” she cried breathlessly. “No! no! Not that! Not married? It -would be ruin! Ruin! ruin! No! no!”</p> - -<p>Dennis Falconer paused, freezing slowly into what seemed to him surely -justifiable abhorrence of the woman before him. What<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_099" id="page_099"></a>{99}</span> if he knew in his -heart that such a marriage would indeed mean ruin to a young man? So -bald a trampling down of the moral aspect of the position before the -practical was not decent! It was for a woman—and that woman the young -man’s mother—to be overwhelmed by the moral horror to the exclusion of -every other thought! And it was the practical alone that had drawn any -show of emotion from Mrs. Romayne!</p> - -<p>“I am sorry to have agitated you!” he said, and his voice was cold and -cutting as steel. “I have no doubt in my own mind that they are not -married. I had better perhaps continue to give you the facts in order. -Chance led to my seeing the young man in question as he was leaving the -house. I recognised your son. I proceeded to make enquiries. He passes -as a medical student, under the name of Roden. The girl is—or was—a -hand at one of the big millinery establishments. From her affectation of -innocence and simplicity, the woman who has most opportunity of -observing her is inclined to think the very worst of her!”</p> - -<p>A quick, hissing breath—an unmistakeable<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_100" id="page_100"></a>{100}</span> breath of relief—parted Mrs. -Romayne’s white lips. She had sunk down again in her chair and was -grasping it now with both hands as she leant a little forward, trembling -in every limb.</p> - -<p>“Then it is not likely—it is not likely that he has married her,” she -said, in a low, rapid tone to herself rather than to Falconer, as it -seemed. “Go on!”</p> - -<p>“There is very little more to be said,” returned Falconer icily. “They -have occupied the rooms—that is to say, the girl has occupied them, -visited every day by your son—for three weeks now. The woman has -discovered that they had been somewhere in the country together for a -week previously. You will, of course, be able to recall his absence from -home. Yesterday he took her away into the country again; they are to -return on Monday!”</p> - -<p>He stopped; and as though she were no longer conscious of his presence, -Mrs. Romayne’s head was bowed slowly lower, as if under some -irresistible weight, until her forehead rested on her hand, stretched -out still upon the arm of her wide chair.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_101" id="page_101"></a>{101}</span></p> - -<p>She lifted her face at last, white and haggard as twenty added years of -life should not have made it, and rose, helping herself feebly with the -arm of her chair, like a woman whose physical strength is broken. -Falconer rose also. He was utterly alienated from her; he was conscious -of only the most distant pity, but he felt that it was incumbent on him -to say something.</p> - -<p>“I regret very much that it should have fallen to my lot to break this -to you!” he said, stiffly and awkwardly. “I fear that coming from -me——” He hesitated and paused.</p> - -<p>From out the past, confusing, almost numbing him, a vague and ghastly -influence had risen suddenly upon him to strain that strange, -intangible, and awful cord of common knowledge by which he and the woman -before him were bound together, revolt against it or deny its presence -as they might. Under the touch of that influence his last words had come -from him almost involuntarily. He had not known whither they tended; he -could bring them to no conclusion.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne looked him in the eyes,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_102" id="page_102"></a>{102}</span> holding now to a table by which -she stood, but with no weakness in her ashen face. She seemed to be -concentrating all her force into one final repudiation of him. She -ignored his words as though he had not spoken.</p> - -<p>“I will ask you to leave me now!” she said. And her voice, thin and -toneless though it was, left her completely mistress of the situation.</p> - -<p>She made no movement to shake hands; he hesitated a moment, then bowed -and left the room.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_103" id="page_103"></a>{103}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI</h2> - -<p class="nind">“<span class="smcap">It’s</span> a jolly little place enough!”</p> - -<p>“I think it’s lovely.”</p> - -<p>There was a certain tone of regret, of lingering, reluctant farewell, in -both voices; though in Julian’s case it was light and patronising; in -Clemence’s, dreamy and tender. As Julian spoke he shifted his position -slightly as he leant against the iron railing by which they stood, and -let his eyes wander over the scene before them with condescending -approval.</p> - -<p>They were standing on the somewhat embryonic “sea-front” of what a few -years before had been a fishing village, and was now struggling, rather -inefficiently, to become a watering-place. Such season as the place -could boast was entirely confined to the summer months; to the -frequenters of winter resorts<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_104" id="page_104"></a>{104}</span> it was absolutely unknown; consequently -its intrinsic charms at the moment—in all the lassitude and monotony -left by departed glory—might have been considered conspicuous by their -absence. But it was a glorious winter’s day. A slight sprinkling of snow -had been frozen on the roofs of the somewhat depressed-looking houses -and on the unsightliness of the unfinished sea-front; and brilliant -sunshine, almost warm in spite of the keen, frosty air, was glorifying -alike the deserted little town, the country beyond, and the sparkling, -dancing sea. The frosty, invigorating brightness found a responsive -chord in Julian’s heart this morning; he was not always so susceptible -to such simple, natural influences. He was in a good humour with the -place; he had spent two wholly satisfactory days there—two days, -moreover, which had had much the same influence upon his moral tone as a -change to bracing air and simple, wholesome food would have on a -physique accustomed to dissipation.</p> - -<p>His survey ended finally with Clemence’s face. She was standing at his -side looking<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_105" id="page_105"></a>{105}</span> out over the sea, her eyes intent and full of feeling, her -beautiful face flushed and still, absorbed by the mysterious charm of -the ceaseless movement and trouble of the bright water stretching away -before her.</p> - -<p>“What are you looking at, Clemence?” he said, boyishly.</p> - -<p>She lifted her eyes to his quite gravely and simply.</p> - -<p>“Only the sea,” she said. “It is so beautiful, I feel as if I never -could leave off looking at it. It makes me feel—oh, I can’t tell you, -but it is like something great and strong to take away with one!” She -looked away again. “Oh, I wish, I wish we need not go!” she said with a -little sigh.</p> - -<p>“I wish we needn’t,” returned Julian; he had been dimly conscious of -something in her eyes and voice which made her previous words, simple as -they seemed, almost unintelligible to him, and he caught at her last -sentence as containing an idea to which he could respond. “It’s an awful -nuisance, isn’t it? And do you know it is time we started? Never mind. -We’ll come down again soon!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_106" id="page_106"></a>{106}</span></p> - -<p>They stood for another moment; Clemence looking out at the sunny sea, -Julian taking another careless comprehensive view of the whole scene; -and then, as though those last looks had contained their respective -farewells, they turned with one accord and walked away in the direction -of the railway station. And as if in turning her back upon the sunlit -sea she had turned her back also upon something less definite and -tangible, a certain gravity and wistfulness crept gradually over -Clemence’s face as they went; crept over it to settle down into a -sadness most unusual to it as the train carried them quickly away -towards London. Julian, sitting opposite her, was vaguely struck by her -expression.</p> - -<p>“Are you awfully sorry to go back, Clemence?” he said.</p> - -<p>She started slightly, and looked at him with a faint smile.</p> - -<p>“I suppose I am!” she said. “We have been very happy, haven’t we?” There -was a wistful regret in her voice which touched him somehow, and he -answered her demonstratively, with a cheery and enthusiastic augury for -the future. Clemence smiled<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_107" id="page_107"></a>{107}</span> again; again rather faintly. “I know!” she -said. “I mean I hope so. Only—I don’t know what’s the matter with me! I -feel as if—something were finished!”</p> - -<p>Julian broke into a boyish laugh. Her depression was by no means -displeasing to him; it was a tribute to his importance, to her -dependence on him; and the necessity for “cheering her up” implied the -exercise of that superiority and authority in which he delighted.</p> - -<p>“Why, what a dear little goose you are, Clemence!” he said, leaning -forward to take her hands in his. “A ‘Friday to Monday’ can’t last for -ever, you know, but it can be repeated again and again. Why, I shall be -up every day—every single day, I promise you. I shouldn’t wonder if I -found I could spend the evening with you to-morrow! Won’t that console -you?”</p> - -<p>She did not answer him, but she took one of his hands in hers and -pressed it to her cheek. His consolation had hardly touched that strange -oppression which weighed upon her; and Julian, in high feather, and -quite unaware that only his voice was heard by her,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_108" id="page_108"></a>{108}</span> his words passing -her by unheeded, had been talking at great length about all the -happiness before them, when she said, in a hesitating, far-away voice:</p> - -<p>“Could you—could you come home with me this afternoon?”</p> - -<p>Julian paused a moment. The question was hardly the response his words -had demanded. Then he said decisively:</p> - -<p>“Quite impossible, I am sorry to say. I would if I could, you know, -dear, but it’s quite impossible!”</p> - -<p>She gave his hand a little quick pressure.</p> - -<p>“I know, of course!” she murmured gently. She paused a moment, and then -said in a low voice, rather irrelevantly as it seemed: “Julian”—his -name still came rather hesitatingly from her lips—“do you think—do you -like Mrs. Jackson?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Jackson was the name of the woman whose rooms Julian had taken for -her, and he started slightly at the question.</p> - -<p>“She’s not a bad sort,” he said, with rather startled consideration. “At -least, she seems all right. Isn’t she nice to you, Clemence? Don’t you -like the rooms?”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_109" id="page_109"></a>{109}</span></p> - -<p>“Oh, yes! yes!” she said quickly, almost as though she reproached -herself for saying anything that could suggest to him even a shadow of -discontent on her part. “I like them so very, very much. It is only—I -don’t know what exactly. Somehow, I don’t think Mrs. Jackson is quite a -nice woman.” She had spoken the last words hesitatingly and with -difficulty, almost as though they came from her against her will.</p> - -<p>Julian glanced at her quickly.</p> - -<p>“What makes you think that, Clemence?” he said, with judicial -masterfulness. “Have you any reason, I mean?”</p> - -<p>But Clemence was hardly able to define, even in her own pure mind, what -it was that jarred upon her in her landlady’s manner; and to Julian she -was utterly unable to put her feelings into words. Her hasty disclaimer -and her hesitating beginnings and falterings, however, served to remove -the misgiving which had stirred him lest some knowledge of his own real -life should have come to the woman’s knowledge. He was the readier to -let himself be reassured and to dismiss the subject in that the train -was slackening speed<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_110" id="page_110"></a>{110}</span> for the last time before reaching London, and he -intended to move into a first-class smoking carriage at the approaching -station. Julian was well aware of the risks of discovery involved in -these journeys with Clemence; and though he faced them nonchalantly -enough, he used wits with which no one who knew him only in his -capacities of man about town and budding barrister would have credited -him, to reduce them to a minimum. To be seen emerging from a third-class -carriage at Victoria Station was a wholly unnecessary risk to run, and -he avoided it accordingly.</p> - -<p>“You mustn’t be fanciful, Clemmie,” he said, now in a lordly and airy -fashion. “I’ve no doubt Mrs. Jackson is a very jolly woman, as a matter -of fact. Look here, dear, would you mind if I went and had a smoke now? -It isn’t much further, you know, and one mustn’t smoke in hospital, you -see!”</p> - -<p>Clemence was very pale when he joined her on the platform at -Victoria—joined her after a quick glance round to see whether he must -prepare himself for an encounter with an acquaintance; and she did not -speak, only looked up at him with a grave, steady smile which<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_111" id="page_111"></a>{111}</span> made her -face sadder than before. His announcement of his intention of putting -her into a hansom drew from her an absolutely horrified protest. She -would go in an omnibus, she told him hurriedly, or in the Underground! -She had never been in a cab! It would cost so much! But when he -overruled her, a little impatiently—it was not yet dark, and he did not -wish to remain longer than was necessary with her in Victoria -Station—she submitted timidly, with a sudden slight flushing of her -cheeks.</p> - -<p>“A four-wheeler, Julian!” she murmured pleadingly, as they emerged into -the station yard. With a lofty smile at what he supposed to be -nervousness on her part, he signified assent with a little condescending -gesture, and stopped before a waiting cab.</p> - -<p>“Here you are,” he said. “Jump in!”</p> - -<p>She got in obediently, and as he shut the door she turned to him through -the open window.</p> - -<p>“Good-bye, Julian!” she said, in a low, sweet voice.</p> - -<p>“Good-bye!” he said cheerily, smiling<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_112" id="page_112"></a>{112}</span> at her. Her face in its dingy -frame looked whiter, sweeter, and more steadfast than ever, and it made -a curiously sudden and distinct impression on Julian’s mental retina. -Then the cab turned lumberingly round, and he moved smartly away. He did -not see that as the cab turned, that sweet, white face appeared at the -other window and followed him with wide, wistful eyes until the moving -life of London parted them.</p> - -<p>Julian was on his way to the club. He had a vague disinclination to the -thought of going home; the house in Chelsea was always more or less -distasteful to him now, and he had no intention of going thither before -it was necessary. It was nearly dark by the time his destination was -reached, and as his hansom drew up a few yards from the club entrance he -could only see that the way was stopped by a carriage from which two -ladies and a gentleman had just emerged. It was the younger of the two -ladies who glanced in his direction, and said, in a pretty, uninterested -voice:</p> - -<p>“Isn’t that Mr. Romayne?”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_113" id="page_113"></a>{113}</span></p> - -<p>Marston Loring was the man addressed, and he shot a keen, considering -glance at the speaker—Miss Pomeroy. The fact that her eyes had noticed -Julian when his quick ones had not, trivial as it was, was not without -its significance to the man whose stock-in-trade, so to speak, was -founded on clever estimate and appreciation of trifles. Was Miss Pomeroy -not so entirely unobservant a nonentity as she was supposed to be, he -asked himself, not for the first time; or was there another reason for -her quickness in this instance?</p> - -<p>“So it is!” he said. “Hullo, old fellow!”</p> - -<p>Julian came eagerly up to the group as it paused for him on the club -steps, and shook hands in his pleasantest manner with Mrs. Pomeroy.</p> - -<p>“I do believe it’s a ladies’ afternoon!” he exclaimed gaily. “What luck -for me! How do you do?” shaking hands with Miss Pomeroy. “I’d actually -forgotten all about it, and I’ve only just come up from Brighton! -Loring, you must ask me to join your party, old man! Tell him so, Miss -Pomeroy, please!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_114" id="page_114"></a>{114}</span></p> - -<p>Whether strict veracity is to be imputed to a young man who professes -unbounded satisfaction at finding fashionable “ladies’ teas” in full -swing at his club when he has just come off a journey is perhaps -doubtful; but Julian threw himself into the spirit of the moment with a -frank gaiety and enthusiasm which was not to be surpassed. The greater -number of the ladies who were sipping club tea as if it were a hitherto -untasted nectar, and gazing at club furniture as though it were -provision for the comfort of some strange animal, were acquaintances of -his; and as he moved about among them his passage seemed to be marked by -merrier laughs, a quicker fire of the jokes of the moment, and brighter -faces than prevailed elsewhere. He was enjoying himself so thoroughly, -apparently, that he was unable to tear himself away, and when he left -the club at last, he sprang into a hansom, and told the driver to “put -the horse along.” He and his mother were dining out together, and he had -left himself barely sufficient time to dress.</p> - -<p>He ran up the steps, flinging the driver his fare, let himself in with -his latchkey, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_115" id="page_115"></a>{115}</span> proceeded to his room up two steps at a time. When he -emerged thence, twenty minutes later, in evening dress, he was -congratulating himself on having “done the trick capitally, and well up -to time.”</p> - -<p>He was a little surprised, therefore, as he came downstairs, to find his -mother’s maid waiting for him outside the drawing-room door with the -information that Mrs. Romayne was already in the carriage; and he ran -hastily downstairs, put on his overcoat, and proceeded to join her.</p> - -<p>“I’m awfully sorry, dear,” he said, with eager apology. “I thought it -was earlier. The fact is, I was awfully late getting in. I found -‘ladies’ teas’ going on at the club—so awfully stupid of me to -forget—you might have liked to go—and it was rather good fun. How are -you, dear?”</p> - -<p>He had let himself into the brougham as he spoke, had shut the door, and -seated himself by the figure he could only dimly see sitting rather back -in the corner so that little or no light fell on the face. He had kissed -his mother, hardly stemming the flood of his eloquence for the purpose; -and he now hardly<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_116" id="page_116"></a>{116}</span> waited for her word or two of reply before he plunged -once more into eager, amusing talk. He did not give his mother time to -do more than answer monosyllabically, and it followed that her silence -did not strike him. He sprang out, when the carriage stopped, to give -her his hand, but before he had given his instructions to the coachman, -and followed her into the house, she had disappeared into the ladies’ -cloak-room. Consequently it was not until she came to him as he waited -to follow her into the drawing-room that he really saw her. As his eyes -rested on the figure coming towards him, he suddenly saw, not it, but a -sweet, white face with wistful eyes looking at him from out of a dingy -frame.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_117" id="page_117"></a>{117}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Always</span> excellently dressed, Mrs. Romayne’s appearance at that moment was -brilliant; almost excessively brilliant it seemed for a small -dinner-party. Her frock was of the most pronounced type of full-dress, -and she wore diamonds; not many, but so disposed, as was her -reddish-brown hair, as to make the greatest possible effect. But the -detail which had caught her son’s experienced eye, and which had brought -before him by some unaccountable law of contrast that other woman’s -face, lay in the fact that to-night for the first time his mother was -slightly “made up.” The colour on her cheeks, the bright effectiveness -of her eyes, was the result of art. It made her look haggard, Julian -decided with careless, indifferent distaste; and then he was following -her into the room.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_118" id="page_118"></a>{118}</span></p> - -<p>She had hardly paused to speak to him; apparently she imagined that they -were late.</p> - -<p>They were widely separated at dinner, and were not thrown together, as -it happened, during the whole evening. But Mrs. Romayne’s personality -was a factor in the party not to be ignored that night; she was -delightful, everybody said. It was a very select little dinner, and -society romps went on afterwards; romps to which Mrs. Romayne -contributed her full share. And to Julian that newly acquired sense of -his mother’s artificiality was accentuated as the evening passed on into -something like repugnance; a repugnance which, when he was seated with -her at last in the brougham and driving home, produced in him a strong -disinclination to rouse himself to an assumption of vivacity, and made -him occupy himself with his own thoughts so exclusively that he never -noticed that his mother uttered not a single word.</p> - -<p>“Good night, mother!” he said absently, as they stood together in the -hall. He was stooping to kiss her when she stopped him with a slight, -peremptory gesture.</p> - -<p>“I want to speak to you!” she said. Her<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_119" id="page_119"></a>{119}</span> voice was tense and a little -hoarse. Without another word, without so much as glancing at him, she -passed him and led the way to his smoking-room; turned up the lamp with -a quick, hard gesture, and then turned and faced him.</p> - -<p>All the colour had faded from Julian’s face, and he had followed her -slowly. With the first sound of her voice the conviction had come to him -that he was discovered. There were certain weaknesses in him hitherto -undeveloped by the circumstances of his life, but radical factors in his -character. Morally speaking he was a coward. His hour had come, and he -was afraid to meet it. He came just inside the door and stood leaning -against the writing-table, confronting his mother, but neither looking -at her nor speaking.</p> - -<p>“Tell me where you have been since Friday!” she said, low and -peremptorily; and then she stopped herself abruptly, putting out her -hand as though to prevent him from speaking, as a spasm of pain -distorted her face. “No!” she said in a hoarse, breathless way. “No, -don’t! You’ll tell me a lie. Don’t! I know!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_120" id="page_120"></a>{120}</span></p> - -<p>She had put out her hand and was steadying herself by the high oak -mantelpiece—part of her recent present to Julian—but her face was -rigid and set, and her eyes, full of a strange, indefinable agony, which -she seemed to be all the while holding desperately at bay, never left -the pale, downcast, almost sullen face opposite her.</p> - -<p>With a determined wrench and setting in motion of all his faculties, -Julian pulled himself together so far as to take refuge in that sure -resort of the deficient in moral courage—an assumption of jaunty and -light-hearted non-comprehension. Perhaps he had never in his life been -more like his mother than he was at that moment as he threw back his -head and answered, with an affected gaiety which was somewhat hollow and -unsuccessful:</p> - -<p>“What do you know, dear? You’re coming it rather strong, aren’t you?”</p> - -<p>“I know that you have been living with a common work-girl somewhere in -Camden Town for a month or more!”</p> - -<p>The words were spoken in the same hoarse voice which rang now, low as it -was, with an intolerable disgust. But its expression<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_121" id="page_121"></a>{121}</span> seemed to affect -Julian not at all. The words themselves were occupying all his -perception. A quick frown of consideration appeared on his forehead, as -though some relief or reprieve had come to him, bringing with it -possibilities the skilful turning to account of which called into play -his mental faculties, and in so doing strung up his nerve. He dropped -his artificiality of manner, and seemed to brace himself to meet the -emergency in which he found himself. The situation had evidently -suddenly altered its character for him. He was no longer cowed by it.</p> - -<p>There was a pause—a pause in which Mrs. Romayne’s eyes seemed to dilate -and contract, and dilate again under the suffering to which she allowed -expression in neither tone nor gesture; and then there came from Julian -four awkward, hardly audible words, jerked out rather than spoken, with -long pauses intervening:</p> - -<p>“How do you know?”</p> - -<p>A short, sharp breath came from Mrs. Romayne, and then she said, with -cold decisiveness, though it seemed that nothing would take that -hoarseness from her voice:</p> - -<p>“It matters very little how I know. That<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_122" id="page_122"></a>{122}</span> I know by one chance; that -some one else may know by another; some one else again by another—the -details in each case, when the chances are innumerable, are nothing! -Have you lived all this time in London not to know that discovery is -inevitable—to wonder ‘how’ when it comes?”</p> - -<p>There was a bitterness, a keenness of scorn in her voice which stung him -like a lash, and he answered hotly:</p> - -<p>“After all, mother, we are not living in Arcadia! We don’t talk about -these things, and I’m awfully sorry, I’m sure, that this should have -come to your knowledge; I’m awfully sorry to offend you. But, hang it -all, I’m not worse than lots of fellows about!”</p> - -<p>His tone had gathered confidence and defiance as he went on, and it -seemed to shake her a little. Her hold on the mantelpiece tightened, and -she spoke quickly and rather nervously.</p> - -<p>“It’s very likely,” she said. “I don’t want to argue the principle with -you. Young men have their own ideas, I know; but how many young -men—drop out? How many young men, with good positions, good chances,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_123" id="page_123"></a>{123}</span> -somehow or other get into bad odour; get to be not received—or, if they -are received, it is with certain reservations—through this kind of -thing? Oh, of course I don’t say it’s inevitable. There are lots of men -about, as you say! But it’s an awful risk. In the case of a young man -like you, with no title to the position you hold in society but -your—your personality, don’t you see, it is a double and treble risk. -It is playing with edged tools; it is holding a knife to your own -throat. You would go under so horribly easily.”</p> - -<p>She paused abruptly, as though the image before her eyes were too -terrible to her to be pursued further, and tried to moisten her dry -lips, on which the touch of paint had cracked now, showing how white -they were beneath. The ghastliness of the incongruity between her manner -and the superficialities of which she spoke was indescribable. Julian -did not speak; he was moving one foot to and fro slowly over the carpet, -at which he gazed immovably, and his mother went on almost immediately:</p> - -<p>“You must give it up, Julian,” she said incisively. “I will do anything -that is<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_124" id="page_124"></a>{124}</span> necessary in the way of money; I don’t want to be hard upon -you. Anything the girl wants you shall have; but you must break with her -at once.”</p> - -<p>She paused again, but still Julian did not speak; still he did not raise -his eyes. She went on with a growing insistence in her voice which went -hand in hand with a growing agony of appeal:</p> - -<p>“If you don’t see the necessity now, you must believe me when I tell you -that you will—you will. Look, dear! your life is surely not so dull -that you need run after such distraction as that! You shall marry if you -want to. You shall marry any one you like. But you must—you must give -this up. Julian——” She stopped for a moment, and her voice grew thin, -almost faint, as she pressed so heavily on the carving by which she held -that her hand was bruised and blackened. “Julian, I am not telling you -what it has been to me to know that you have deceived me. I am not going -to try and make you feel—I don’t want you to feel it, dear—what it has -been to me to go over your home-life of the last few weeks and know -that<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_125" id="page_125"></a>{125}</span> you have lied to me at every turn—to me, who have only wanted to -make you happy. I won’t reproach you. Perhaps young men think it a kind -of right—a kind of right——” She repeated the sentence, unfinished as -it was, as though it contained an idea to which she clung. “It is not -for my sake—to spare my feelings, that I tell you you must give it up. -It is for your own. Julian, my boy, you must believe me.”</p> - -<p>Her words, quivering with entreaty, died away; her eyes, full of -supplication, were fixed on his; and Julian spoke—spoke without lifting -his eyes from the ground.</p> - -<p>“Suppose I married her?” he said in a low, shamefaced voice.</p> - -<p>“What!” The monosyllable rang out sharp and vibrating, and Mrs. Romayne, -all softness or relaxation struck from her face and figure in one sudden -bracing of every muscle, stood staring at him out of eyes alive with -horror.</p> - -<p>“Suppose—I married—her!”</p> - -<p>“Supposing that—I will tell you! You would have to keep her and -yourself! You would have no more of my money, and you<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_126" id="page_126"></a>{126}</span> would never be -acknowledged in my house again!” Her low voice was like fine, cold -steel, and she paused. Then quite suddenly, as though the horror kept at -bay in her eyes had leapt up and mastered her in an instant, she flung -out her hands wildly, crying: “Julian, Julian! You are not married? Tell -me, tell me you are not married?”</p> - -<p>And Julian, white to the very lips, said low and hurriedly:</p> - -<p>“No!”</p> - -<p>There was a long silence. With a choked, hysterical cry, Mrs. Romayne -dropped into a chair near her, and covered her face with her hands. -Julian drew out his pocket-handkerchief and mechanically wiped his -forehead. At last he began, in a nervous, uneven voice:</p> - -<p>“Mother, look here, I—you don’t quite understand me! I—she—it’s—it’s -not the kind of girl you think!” He stopped and drew his hand -desperately before his eyes. That innocent, white face, in its dingy -frame, what did it want before his eyes now? How could he get on if he -kept looking at it? “She—we—it was my fault! Mother, look here, I -ought!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_127" id="page_127"></a>{127}</span></p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne took her hands away from her face and clenched them -together.</p> - -<p>“You shall not,” she said in a low, steady voice.</p> - -<p>“She—she—was an awfully good girl, don’t you know. She’s not—of -course she’s not one of our sort, but—she would learn. Mother, after -all, why not? Nothing else can—can make it right!”</p> - -<p>“Nothing else can ruin you completely!” was the steady answer. “You -shall never do it if I can prevent it. I have told you what I would do; -think it well over. Think what it would mean to you to have not one -farthing but what you can earn! To be cut by every one who knows you! To -be without a chance of any kind! I told you that if you married I would -disown you! Now I tell you something else! Break off this miserable -connection and you shall have, as I said, anything in reason to give the -girl in compensation once and for all. Refuse to do so and I will cut -off your allowance until you come to your senses!”</p> - -<p>“Mother!” he cried fiercely. “By Heaven, mother!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_128" id="page_128"></a>{128}</span></p> - -<p>“You can take your choice!” was the unmoved answer.</p> - -<p>Her face was sharp and haggard; the artificial colour stood out on it in -great patches, throwing into relief the vivid pallor beneath. She had -thrown aside her cloak as though the physical oppression was unbearable -to her, and the contrast between her face and her gorgeous dress with -its glittering ornaments was horrible.</p> - -<p>A smothered oath broke from the young man, and lifting his right hand, -he began to rub it slowly up and down the back of his head as an -expression of heavy, fierce cogitation settled down upon his face. To -his unutterable surprise, as he made the gesture, there stole over his -mother’s face an expression of such deadly terror as he had never before -seen. He stopped involuntarily, and she staggered to her feet, holding -out two quivering, imploring hands. For the first time in his life -Julian was using a gesture habitual in his dead father; for the first -time in his life, looking into her son’s face, Mrs. Romayne saw there -the face of William Romayne.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_129" id="page_129"></a>{129}</span></p> - -<p>“My boy!” she gasped. “My boy. Don’t do that! Don’t look like that, for -Heaven’s sake! For Heaven’s sake!”</p> - -<p>She swayed for a moment to and fro, and then fell heavily forward into -his arms.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_130" id="page_130"></a>{130}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">A bitter</span> east wind, which was taking sufficiently depressing effect upon -all London, was dealing with peculiar grimness with Redburn Street, -Camden Town. The neat little houses in that dreary grey dryness looked -sordidly wretched; there was something deserted and hopeless about them. -No one was to be seen, except that at a first-floor window about -half-way down a woman’s figure was standing; and as Dennis Falconer -turned into the street his footsteps rang with heavy distinctness on the -glaring pavement. He strode slowly and steadily along, and his solitary -figure, as it stood out with that peculiar sharpness of outline which is -a characteristic production of east wind, harmonised absolutely with the -sombreness of the background. His face was full of sombre purpose, grave -and stern.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_131" id="page_131"></a>{131}</span></p> - -<p>It was about three o’clock in the afternoon of Wednesday—two days after -Julian’s return home. On the morning of the preceding day Julian and his -mother had had a second interview, which had ended in his giving a -sullen and reluctant assent to her demands; and in the evening Dennis -Falconer had received from Mrs. Romayne a brief, almost peremptory note, -begging him to come to her. He had gone to Queen Anne Street -accordingly, severely unsympathetic, but also severely reliable, early -on Wednesday morning.</p> - -<p>He had found Mrs. Romayne in a feverish agony of agitation beyond even -the power of her will to conceal or wholly to control. Her voice, -painfully thin and sharp; her gestures restless, nervous, irritable; her -utterance hard and rapid; had all testified to a strained, tense -excitement before which all her artificiality was utterly submerged, and -in which Falconer himself was obviously regarded by her solely as the -one instrument at hand to her necessity. Her whole soul seemed to be set -upon the immediate termination of “the affair,” as she called it. It -affected her<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_132" id="page_132"></a>{132}</span> evidently in only one way, she looked at it from only one -point of view: as something to be finished up, put away, buried out of -sight. It was the thought of delay in the doing of this, only, that -appeared to torture her; of the affair itself with all its terrible -significance, its inevitable consequences, she had, as far as Falconer -could divine, no adequate conception. The girl must be bought off; must -be sent away; must be sent right out of the country, in case—and here -came the one agonised sense of a possible consequence which Falconer -could detect—in case Julian should marry her after all!</p> - -<p>It was evidently the haunting terror of such a contingency which had -driven her to send for Falconer. It was obvious, though she seemed to be -striving hard to conceal it even from herself, that she could not trust -her son; that she could find no rest in the promise she had wrung from -him. What she had to say to Falconer was, in effect, that some one else -must see the girl; the arrangement to be surely effected must be brought -about by a third person who would set about the business promptly and -act decidedly. It<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_133" id="page_133"></a>{133}</span> was this service which she wanted of Falconer, and -Falconer, after a moment’s grave self-communing, agreed to render it. He -was as far removed from sympathy with her in this her hard, agonised -reality as he had been from the artificial woman of the previous months, -or from the real woman of eighteen years before. He considered her point -of view in the present instance absolutely revolting in her. But no man -could question the practical sense of what she said, or the advisability -of the course she proposed, and his conception of his obligations as her -sole male relative and trustee was too intimately intertwined with his -sense of duty and self-respect to allow him to entertain, even for a -moment, the possibility of refusing to act for her. He had stood by her -side, impelled by that sense of duty, gravely reliable, and -unsympathetic, eighteen years before. The irony of fate decreed that it -was for him, and for him only, to act for her now. To him it was simply -the stern dictate of moral necessity to be obeyed as such.</p> - -<p>Accordingly he had received her instructions, offering now and again a -grim, practical<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_134" id="page_134"></a>{134}</span> suggestion, with a stern air of businesslike reserve; -had undertaken—being at the bottom of her opinion as to the -desirability of instant measures—to see “the girl” that same afternoon; -and he was walking down Redburn Street now, in the pitiless east wind, -to carry that undertaking into effect.</p> - -<p>He reached the house, knocked, and asked briefly for Mrs. Roden. The -landlady, whose sentiments towards her lodgers had developed rapidly in -consequence of the enquiries which Falconer had felt it his duty to -make, received his words with a sniff expressive of contempt; and then -informed him, with a stare of insolent curiosity, that “she” was -“hupstairs,” and led the way thither; evidently urged to that act of -civility solely by a hope of finding out something. She was a coarse, -vulgar-looking woman, with small red eyes, which glittered expectantly -as she flung the door open and announced, in a loud and denunciatory -voice, “<span class="lftspc">’</span>Ere’s a gentleman!”</p> - -<p>But if she had hoped for startling revelations she was disappointed. -Dennis Falconer advanced into the room with stern composure; the figure -in the window turned quickly but<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_135" id="page_135"></a>{135}</span> quietly to meet him; and Mrs. Jackson -was obliged to shut the door upon the two.</p> - -<p>Clemence was looking very pale. The vague shadow which had fallen upon -her as she journeyed up to London two days before had deepened into a -wistful, questioning sadness. She had not seen Julian since she parted -from him at Victoria Station. On the previous day she had received a -note from him which told her that “work” kept him from her for that day, -but that he would come as soon as he was able. There was nothing to -distress or alarm her in the fact itself; more than once before a -similar disappointment had come to her; and even though the second day -brought her no letter, the blank merely meant, as she assured herself -hour by hour, that she would see him before the day was done. But strive -against it as she might, and did, she had spent the past twenty-four -hours weighed down by a sense of trouble utterly undefined; utterly, as -it seemed to her, without reason. She had borne her burden with mute -patience, reproaching herself as for ingratitude and an inordinate -desire for active happiness, and struggling bravely to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_136" id="page_136"></a>{136}</span> conquer it; but -neither arguing about it nor denying it, as a less simple and -straightforward nature would have done. And now the appearance of -Falconer seemed suddenly to focus and define her vague distress. The -sudden conviction that Julian was ill, and that this gentleman had come -from him to tell her so, held her still and silent in a pang of cruel -realisation and anticipation.</p> - -<p>The light, as she moved, had fallen full upon her face, and as he saw it -a certain shock passed through Dennis Falconer. He had seen her figure, -and even her face in the distance more than once, but he had never -before seen it with any distinctness, and for the first instant the -simplicity and purity of its beauty, with the expression deepened by the -strange shadow through which the past two days had led her, clashed -almost painfully with that idea of “the girl” which had grown, during -his conversation with Mrs. Romayne, into a kind of fact for him. The -next moment, however, he had reconciled appearances and realities, as he -conceived them, with the grim reflection that there is no vice so -vicious as that which wears an innocent face; and in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_137" id="page_137"></a>{137}</span> doing so had -quenched what might have been perception beneath a weight of narrow -truism.</p> - -<p>No greeting of any kind passed between them. All Clemence’s faculties -were absorbed in her dread. Falconer was busied with the process of -reconciliation. The strange little silence was broken eventually by -Falconer, and he spoke with the unbending sternness and distance which -that process and its conclusion had naturally accentuated.</p> - -<p>“I am here as the representative of Julian Roden’s nearest relative and -guardian,” he said. It had been arranged between himself and Mrs. -Romayne, on the suggestion of the latter, that “the girl,” if she did -not already know it, should be kept in ignorance of Julian’s real name.</p> - -<p>The statement was slightly over-coloured, since Julian was of age, and -his mother was no longer his guardian in any legal sense; but to stern -moralists of Falconer’s type, to whom the pretty little falsenesses of -life are wholly to be condemned, a slight misstatement in such a case is -frequently permissible. The brief, uncompromising words had seemed to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_138" id="page_138"></a>{138}</span> -him to set the key of the interview beyond mistake. He was consequently -slightly taken aback by their effect.</p> - -<p>Every trace of colour died out of Clemence’s face, and two great dilated -eyes gazed at him for an instant in dumb agony before she whispered:</p> - -<p>“He’s not—dead?”</p> - -<p>Falconer made a slight, almost contemptuous, negative gesture. He had no -intention of being imposed upon by theatrical arts, and as Clemence, her -self-control shattered by the sudden relief, turned instinctively away, -and pressed her face down on the arm with which she had caught at the -curtain for support, he went on with immoveable sternness:</p> - -<p>“My business has to do with his life, not his death. The main point is -very simple, and I will put it to you at once. Absolute ruin lies before -him. Is he or is he not to embrace it?”</p> - -<p>He saw her start, and she lifted her face quickly, and turned it to him -all quivering and unstrung from her recent suffering, and quite white.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_139" id="page_139"></a>{139}</span></p> - -<p>“He is in trouble!” she cried, low and breathlessly. “Oh, what is it? -What has happened?”</p> - -<p>Dennis Falconer’s patience was approaching its limits, and he spoke -curtly and conclusively.</p> - -<p>“I think we may dispense with this kind of thing,” he said. “It can -serve no purpose, as everything is known. I come now from his mother -with full power to act for her——”</p> - -<p>He was interrupted. A burning colour, the colour of such paralysing -surprise as can take in hardly the bare statement, much less the -consequent developements and inferences, had rushed suddenly over -Clemence’s face, dyeing her very throat.</p> - -<p>“His mother!” she exclaimed. “His mother!” Her tone dropped as she -repeated the words into a strange, uncertain murmur, in which -incredulity, acceptance—as a kind of experiment—and something that was -almost fear, were inextricably blended.</p> - -<p>The fear alone caught Falconer’s ear. His lips were parted to resume his -speech with grim decisiveness in the conviction that she<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_140" id="page_140"></a>{140}</span> understood at -last that nothing was to be gained by trifling with him, when she said, -as though he had had nothing to do with her previous words:</p> - -<p>“Go on, please.”</p> - -<p>He looked at her again, and was struck by a new look in her face, as he -had been struck by a new tone in her voice. She was evidently going to -drop all theatricalities, he told himself.</p> - -<p>“Perhaps you were not aware that he is, practically, under the control -of his mother,” he said. “That is to say, he is dependent on her for -every penny he spends. It is quite out of the question that he should -make money at the bar—by his own profession, that is to say—for two or -three years at least. Consequently the cutting off of the allowance made -him by Mrs. —— Roden will mean for him absolute penury.”</p> - -<p>She was staring at him; staring at him out of two wide, intense brown -eyes; with such a helpless bewilderment in her face that she seemed to -be quite dazed. She put her hand to her head as he paused<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_141" id="page_141"></a>{141}</span> with a -feeble, uncertain gesture; but she did not speak, and Falconer went on -severely:</p> - -<p>“I conclude that he has not represented these facts to you as they -stand. They are facts, nevertheless. You will, therefore, understand -that, his allowance withdrawn, he will be entirely without the means of -supporting you. You may possibly consider that some shifty means might -be found which, by putting him in possession of small sums of money, -would enable him for a time to defy his mother. Let me point out to you -something of what such a course would involve. Julian Roden is a young -man with a good position in society—I mean he is accustomed to be made -much of by men and women who are his equals; he has chances and -opportunities of which he intends, no doubt, to avail himself. All this, -in taking such a step, he would throw away for ever. Social intercourse, -future career, would go with his income at his mother’s word. Now, I -will ask you only how long you could hope to depend on him in such -circumstances; how long it would be before his only feeling for the -woman whom he had<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_142" id="page_142"></a>{142}</span> allowed to drag him down and to destroy all his hopes -in life would degenerate into sheer repugnance; and for how long he -would care to keep her?”</p> - -<p>He paused, and after a moment’s dead silence Clemence spoke in a weak, -eager, almost desperate voice:</p> - -<p>“There must be some mistake! It—it can’t be—the same!”</p> - -<p>The words seemed to Falconer a mere miserable subterfuge, and he -answered very sternly:</p> - -<p>“There is not the faintest possibility of mistake. Julian Roden has -owned the whole affair to his mother, who taxed him with it on her -discovery——”</p> - -<p>“Oh, wait a minute! Wait a minute!”</p> - -<p>There was a ring of such intolerable pain, such shame and anguish, in -the voice, that Falconer’s attention, heavy and prejudiced as it was, -was arrested by it. Dimly and uncertainly, and for the first time, the -girl before him appeared to him, not simply as a representative of a -degraded sisterhood, but as a woman. He looked at her for a moment, as -she stood with her face buried<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_143" id="page_143"></a>{143}</span> in her hands, quivering from head to -foot, with a severe kind of pity.</p> - -<p>“I will tell you, as briefly as may be, what I am charged to say,” he -said gravely, but not ungently. “Mrs. —— Roden is determined to break -off her son’s disgraceful connection with you at the cost of any -suffering to herself or to him. She is willing to believe that her son -is to be considered in some sort as the more guilty party of the two in -having acted as the tempter, and she has no wish to deal otherwise than -generously by you. But there are conditions.”</p> - -<p>He paused again. Over the slender, bowed woman’s figure before him there -had gradually crept, as he spoke, a stillness like the stillness of -death; and now, as he waited for her to speak, Clemence slowly lifted -her head and looked at him; looked at him with dull, sunken eyes, which -seemed the only living points in a face out of which all life and -expression seemed to have been crushed by a rigid, haggard mask.</p> - -<p>“Conditions?” she repeated.</p> - -<p>Her voice was hollow, and had a monotonous,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_144" id="page_144"></a>{144}</span> far-away sound, and the -word seemed to have no meaning for her.</p> - -<p>A sense of vague discomfort took possession of Dennis Falconer. A dim -sense that he was not being met as he had expected—as he had a right to -expect—disturbed and annoyed him. He had no idea that what he was -chiefly discomposed by was a hazy consciousness that a touch of -unconscionable respect for the woman who, as he believed, was utterly -unworthy of respect, was mingling with his already sufficiently -unorthodox sense of pity; but he entrenched himself in a triple armour -of stiffness.</p> - -<p>“The conditions are these,” he said. “You will give your written word, -as under penalties for having obtained money by false pretences, to -leave England on a given date and by a given route, and not to return to -England within the next ten years. Mrs. —— Roden in return will pay -you the sum of five hundred pounds. If you refuse these terms, and Roden -submits to his mother, you will simply be the poorer by five hundred -pounds. If you induce him to defy his mother, the consequences I have<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_145" id="page_145"></a>{145}</span> -already described to you will inevitably ensue.”</p> - -<p>He waited for her answer, steadily fortifying himself against being -surprised at anything she might say; but no answer came. That strange, -stricken face was still turned full towards him, but he had an uneasy -sense that he was not seen by the great, dull, dark eyes. He felt, too, -that as she stood there with her hands tightly clasped together, she was -not thinking even remotely of the choice he had set before her, though -he knew that she had heard his words and understood them. It was with an -instinctive desire to rouse her, to bring back some expression to her -face, that he said, with an awkward gentleness which was quite -involuntary:</p> - -<p>“There is no need for you to decide hastily. You understand the -alternative thoroughly, no doubt. I will leave you my address, and you -can write me your answer.”</p> - -<p>He felt in his pocket for his card-case, and the movement seemed to -rouse her. She stopped him with a slight motion of her hand.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_146" id="page_146"></a>{146}</span></p> - -<p>“There’s no need,” she said. As though the act of speaking had brought -her back from somewhere far away, and as though the claims of the moment -were gradually becoming present to her, she paused as if to gather -force, and to close upon herself a certain strangely fine reserve, which -seemed at once to hedge her about and hold her aloof from the man to -whom she spoke; and then she spoke very quietly. “I don’t want any -money. If it is better that he should be free of me, he shall be free. -That’s all.”</p> - -<p>“You are making a mistake!” returned Falconer quickly. There was -something about the dignity of her manner which made him feel curiously -impotent and small, as though in the presence of an unknown power -greater than himself, and the sense increased the touch of irritation he -had already experienced. His tone was no longer coldly stern; it was -insistent and annoyed. “You should consider your future. If you accept -Mrs. Roden’s offer and leave England with a small capital you will have<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_147" id="page_147"></a>{147}</span> -a chance of beginning life again. The step you have lately taken may be -your first step on the downward path—I conclude that it is. You should -reflect how difficult it is to pause there. With a little money you may -establish yourself in a respectable business, and in the course of time -you may even redeem your unfortunate past.”</p> - -<p>Not a muscle of the still, pale face moved. It seemed to have grown -strangely older and stronger in the course of the short interview, and -it listened to him with an air of courteous patience which seemed to set -an impassable distance between them. The perfect steadiness of her voice -as she replied was the steadiness not of composure but of reserve.</p> - -<p>“It is quite impossible!” she said.</p> - -<p>“Then I am sorry to have to say that I consider you both foolish and -ungrateful!” said Falconer with increasing severity. “You put it -entirely out of our power to do anything for you. Am I to understand -that you refuse to leave England?”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_148" id="page_148"></a>{148}</span></p> - -<p>“I don’t know. I must think!” Still the same distant, unmoved patience.</p> - -<p>“You will do well to think,” was Falconer’s reply, “and to put away from -you in doing so a false pride, which is entirely misplaced. I will give -you twenty-four hours for consideration, and to-morrow afternoon I will -call and see you again.” On second thoughts it had occurred to Falconer -that it would be a false step to give her his name and address. “I shall -hope to find that you have come to a sensible decision.”</p> - -<p>He paused a moment, and she made a slight gesture of acquiescence, -rather as though his words were indifferent to her than in any token of -assent to what he said. He added a stiff, formal “Good afternoon!” and -as her lips moved mechanically as if to frame the words in answer, he -turned and left the room.</p> - -<p>As though his presence and his words had been so mere a drop in the deep -waters of suffering which held her that his withdrawal affected her not -at all, Clemence stood for the moment just as he left her, hardly -conscious, as it seemed, that he was gone. Then, as<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_149" id="page_149"></a>{149}</span> though the sense -that she was alone had come to her gradually, she dropped feebly into a -chair, and let her face fall heavily forward upon the table.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_150" id="page_150"></a>{150}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">The</span> hand crept round the clock, the swift November twilight fell, and -still she did not move; only her clasped hands stretched themselves out -as if in prayer. She was not praying though. The attitude was -instinctive and unconscious; a blind, mute appeal. She was simply -stunned. The room grew darker and darker until its only light was a ray -from the street-lamp outside falling straight across the bowed head; and -then there was a ring at the bell and a slow step upon the stairs. -Clemence knew the step well, though she had never before heard it fall -like that. As it fell upon her ear now, a strong shiver ran all through -her, and her hands were drawn sharply to cover her face. The door was -opened, and her face was pressed down still more tightly.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_151" id="page_151"></a>{151}</span></p> - -<p>“Clemence! What, all in the dark? Why, Clemence——” The masterful, -rather aggressively cheerful young voice stopped abruptly, and Julian -Romayne stood still against the door he had closed behind him, -listening; listening to a low, pitiful sound, which seemed to fill the -very air—the sound of a woman’s heart-broken crying. At the first tone -of his voice great, scalding tears had started to Clemence’s eyes -suddenly and without warning; a low, choking sob had shaken her from -head to foot, and she was crying now with the hopeless abandonment of -suddenly loosened grief.</p> - -<p>There was a moment during which the only sound in the room was the sound -of her quivering sobs. Julian stood quite still; on the first instant -there leapt into his face such a look of fierce, vindictive anger as -absolutely transformed it. The look faded slowly into a kind of bitter -background, and a hard sullenness settled itself upon it—settled with -some difficulty as it seemed, for his lips twitched a little. Then he -advanced into the room and broke the silence, and the roughness in his -tone seemed to defy something within<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_152" id="page_152"></a>{152}</span> himself. He made no attempt to -light the gas. The lamp outside made it possible to move about, and -apparently he did not care for further illumination.</p> - -<p>“Come, Clemence,” he said, “what’s the matter?”</p> - -<p>He had not approached her; on the contrary, he was on the other side of -the room looking down at her across the lodging-house table. She did not -raise her head or move as she replied; indeed, the choked, broken words -were rather the expression of the mingled shame and pity with which she -was crushed than a definite answer to his words.</p> - -<p>“Oh! Julian! Julian! Julian!”</p> - -<p>Apparently the tone of her voice affected him in spite of himself, for -his face twitched again, and he spoke more harshly still.</p> - -<p>“What’s the matter, I say?”</p> - -<p>She stretched her hands out to him across the table, still without -lifting her face, in an unconscious gesture of appeal.</p> - -<p>“Oh, don’t!” she cried beseechingly and piteously. “Don’t, dear! Don’t -pretend any more. I—I know!”</p> - -<p>The hands thrust deep down into Julian’s<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_153" id="page_153"></a>{153}</span> pockets were clenched -fiercely, and his teeth were set together, as a look rose in his eyes -which they had never held before.</p> - -<p>“My mother?” he said.</p> - -<p>She answered only with a slight shivering gesture, but it was enough. -With his young face white to the lips with passionate resentment, Julian -turned brusquely away and took two blind strides to the window, with a -muttered oath.</p> - -<p>There was a long silence. Julian stood at the window, staring blankly -out into the darkness with hard eyes. Clemence was indeed, as she -believed herself to be, his wife. How it had come about, how he had -drifted into anything so far from his vague thoughts in his first -meetings with her, he could not have said. What it was that had shaped -and moulded his intention into something so much purer and more manly -than his own nature, he only now and then felt faintly and indefinitely -when he touched it, as he could touch it rarely and densely, in the -woman from whose higher nature it emanated. He had married her with that -reckless carelessness for the future which seems almost abnormal,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_154" id="page_154"></a>{154}</span> but -which is not an uncommon characteristic of weakness; and now he was -quite incapable of facing and enduring the legitimate consequences of -his action. He had lied to his mother to save himself from the heavier -penalty with which she threatened him, and his suggestion as to the -possibility of his marrying the girl she believed him to have ruined, -had been a miserable, consciously degraded attempt at cutting the -Gordian knot. He had lied to his mother again, deliberately and without -compunction, at their second interview, giving her a promise which he -knew to be an empty form, in his word to break with the girl who was his -wife. He had come to Clemence to-day, intending to arrange for that -temporary suspension of intercourse with her, which was inevitable as a -blind to his mother, by telling her that he was obliged to go abroad -immediately for an indefinite period.</p> - -<p>Now as he stood there in the dark little room, with his eyes fixed on -the solitary gas-lamp outside, he was gradually realising that it was -all over. His mother had sent, had possibly come herself, to Clemence, -he supposed,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_155" id="page_155"></a>{155}</span> and Clemence had, of course, declared herself his wife. -His plans were all upset. His carefully made calculations were no longer -of any avail. It was all over. His brain gradually ceased to busy -itself; he was staring darkly at penury, humiliation, ostracism—not -thinking of them or feeling them, but just contemplating them with a -stupid, mental gaze.</p> - -<p>Gradually a sense of his surroundings began to return to him. He became -conscious that it was a street-lamp at which he was looking; that there -was a dark little street before him; that there was a dim room behind -him; and then from that room a low sound came to him—faint, exhausted, -long-drawn sobs, as of a woman who has wept herself into quiet. He began -to listen for them and count them involuntarily. Then they began to hurt -him; each one seemed to stick something into his heart. At last he -walked across almost mechanically, and laid his hand tentatively on her -shoulder.</p> - -<p>“It’s all right, Clemence!” he said huskily. “It’s all right, dear. -After all, you know, you are my wife all right!” He<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_156" id="page_156"></a>{156}</span> was conscious of a -vague idea that it was the supposition he had allowed that had cut her -so cruelly.</p> - -<p>There was another moment’s pause, and then Clemence slowly lifted her -head and looked at him for the first time. Her face was white and -exhausted-looking with her tears, and her eyes, luminous and -inexpressibly mournful, seemed to look through the pale, good-looking -young features above her into the poor cramped soul they hid.</p> - -<p>“I?” she said. “What does it matter about me, Julian? It’s you! Oh, my -dear, my dear, it’s you!”</p> - -<p>“It—it’s awkward!” returned Julian gloomily; his consciousness of the -prospect before him seemed to quicken and writhe at what he supposed to -be her realisation of it. “It’s loss of everything practically, of -course. One will be cut right and left, and where money is to come -from——”</p> - -<p>He was interrupted by a low cry. Clemence had drawn a little back as -though to see him better, and was looking up at him with her delicate -eyebrows drawn together in intense, painful perplexity and wonder.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_157" id="page_157"></a>{157}</span></p> - -<p>“Oh, Julian!” she said, and her low voice had for the first time a ring -of reproach in it. “Oh, Julian, it isn’t that, dear! It isn’t that! What -does that matter?”</p> - -<p>“What does it matter?” echoed Julian with an angry laugh. Her words, in -the total want of comprehension, the total incapacity for sympathy with -his position, to which they witnessed, seemed to him to throw into -sudden, glaring relief the class distinction which lay between them; and -the sense of it came upon him, jarring and overwhelming, like an earnest -of all he had done for himself. “It matters a good deal, let me tell -you, Clemence. It matters—as you can’t understand, you know! It matters -just everything!”</p> - -<p>“But—compared!” she said in a low, quick tone, a bright, pained light -in her eyes. “I know—I know, of course, that there is a great deal I -can’t understand. But—compared!”</p> - -<p>“Compared with what, in Heaven’s name?” said Julian angrily.</p> - -<p>“Compared with—yourself, Julian!” she<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_158" id="page_158"></a>{158}</span> cried, laying a tender, clinging -touch on his arm. “Compared with your own truth! Oh, don’t you know it’s -that, it’s only that that has been so dreadful to me—that made me feel -as if my heart was breaking! It’s thinking that you’ve been false, dear! -That you’ve said what’s not true, acted what’s not true! Oh, it’s that -that I can’t bear for you, my dear, my dear!”</p> - -<p>He stood looking down, not at her face, but at the worn, trembling hand -holding his in such a clasp of love and shame—shame for him as he -vaguely felt; suspended between wrath and a certain cold, creeping -feeling which he could not analyse, but which seemed to be gradually -turning him into a horrible shadow. It was an involuntary, unwilling -concession to this feeling, as one might throw a sop to an on-coming, -all-threatening monster, that he muttered awkwardly:</p> - -<p>“I—I’m sorry I deceived you, Clemence.”</p> - -<p>“Deceived me!” There was an emphasis on the pronoun which seemed to lift -her far above him in its absolute, unconscious, self-abnegation. “Me! -Oh, it isn’t that! It doesn’t matter who it is or how many people<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_159" id="page_159"></a>{159}</span> it -is! It’s the thing itself. It’s the meaning to yourself, and—and Heaven -above! Julian, dear, you believe in Heaven above, don’t you?” Clemence’s -creed was very simple; the attitude of the spirit which “Heaven above” -had given her was not an affair of many words. “You know it’s oneself -that matters. It isn’t what one has or the friends one has that make the -difference—they’re not anything really. It’s oneself!”</p> - -<p>She paused a moment, but he did not speak. He was still looking heavily -down at the hand on his arm, and she went on again, her voice trembling -with earnestness.</p> - -<p>“Julian, there’s that at the bottom of everything in all kinds of life! -It doesn’t matter whether one’s rich or poor, it doesn’t matter whether -people think well of us—we can’t always make them, and we can’t all be -rich. But we can all be good, dear. Heaven means us all to be good, -don’t you think? Oh, if it didn’t, if it wasn’t that that mattered most -of all down at the bottom, what would the world come to be like? And why -should anybody go on living!”</p> - -<p>Julian Romayne was very young. Far<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_160" id="page_160"></a>{160}</span> down in his nature; in that awful -inextricable tangle which, because it is so awful and so far beyond his -reach, man struggles so insanely to reduce to his poor little level, to -define, and label, and explain away, but which remains in spite of him a -mystery of God; there was that strange affinity for noble thoughts and -things which is the sign manual of His part in man, never wholly -withdrawn by its Creator from the earth. It is in the young that that -instinctive affinity is most easily reached and touched; and the simple, -ignorant, unworldly words—words which could have touched in Julian no -reasoning powers—were the medium which reached it now. Clemence had -reached it more than once or twice before, and its feeble stirring in -response had quickened it, and rendered it, in some poor and -infinitesimal degree, sensitive to her touch.</p> - -<p>He drew his arm sharply from those clinging, pleading hands, and turned -away, leaning his arm on the mantelpiece so that she could not see his -face. That cold, creeping feeling which seemed to sap all his reality -had stolen over his whole personality, and he was held<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_161" id="page_161"></a>{161}</span> numb and -paralysed in the clutch of an all-dominating question. Was it really as -she said? His own life, his own world had faded into shadows as of a -very dream. Strange, distorted shapes, conceptions so new to him that -they wore a weird and ghostly air of unreality, seemed to be rising -round him, pressing him into nothingness. Was it as she said? He did not -speak, and after a moment Clemence went on; very tenderly, very -delicately, as though in her intense sympathy and feeling for the -suffering she ascribed to him by intuition, she dreaded to hurt him -further; diffidently and with difficulty, because she was so little used -to clothing in words all that to her was most real and vital in life.</p> - -<p>“You—you must think of the future, dear. I know—I know that you can -hardly bear to look at the past, but it—it is past! It hasn’t been you, -really! I know it can’t have been! And—it will wear out of your life at -last, dear, by—by truth. You will tell your mother that we are -married”—a scarlet, agonising colour dyed her face for an -instant—“perhaps you have told her<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_162" id="page_162"></a>{162}</span> already? And perhaps, perhaps she -will forgive you! If not—why if not, perhaps the—the pain will help to -wear it out, my dearest.”</p> - -<p>Her voice and the expression of the sweet, white face she lifted to him -had changed subtly as she spoke. Her great pity and sorrow for him had -developed a strange, new phase in her love for him. It had become -tenderer, deeper. She had lost her reverence for him, but her love had -triumphed over the loss, and through the pain and victory it had won -higher ground, and become the love of sympathy and consolation.</p> - -<p>But Julian hardly heard her last words. His attention had stopped, as it -were, at those preceding them:</p> - -<p>“You will tell your mother that we are married!”</p> - -<p>Had Clemence not told, then? Was it possible that she had not mentioned -it; that his mother did not know even now; that there was still hope?</p> - -<p>The thought arrested the current of his thoughts in an instant. The -possibilities the thought suggested; all the tangible, definite<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_163" id="page_163"></a>{163}</span> -advantages it held; swept over those faintly quickened perceptions in a -sudden wave of excitement, numbing them on the instant. The things which -had been realities to him as long as he had had any consciousness, took -to themselves substance once again and pressed about him. Life and the -world resumed their normal complexion, and he lifted his head quickly -and turned.</p> - -<p>“Do you mean—have you seen my mother? Whom have you seen? Do you mean -that you have said nothing?”</p> - -<p>There was a pause as Clemence looked at him for a moment confused and -startled, it seemed, by his manner. There was a wonderful, unconscious -touch of dignity in her gentle manner as she answered:</p> - -<p>“I never thought of it!”</p> - -<p>“Was it my mother?”</p> - -<p>“No; a gentleman.”</p> - -<p>Julian moved abruptly with a low exclamation, and began to walk rapidly -up and down the little room absorbed in eager thought. Clemence watched -him with a puzzled, surprised look in her eyes, and a little touch of -reserve creeping over her face.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_164" id="page_164"></a>{164}</span> At last he stopped suddenly and began -to speak, looking anywhere but on her face.</p> - -<p>“Look here, Clemence, I’m afraid this sounds an awfully blackguardly -thing to suggest, but you’ll see it’s necessary. It won’t do for me to -tell my mother just yet. To tell you the truth she is frightfully set -against my marrying. I am done for all round as soon as she knows, and -it would be just cutting our own throats to tell her—yet, you know. You -see,” he went on hurriedly, evidently anxious to prevent her speaking, -“you see, as I am I’ve got very good prospects. In a few years, if all -goes well, I shall be making heaps of money at the bar—a fellow that is -well known, you know, can always get on—and then it will be all right -and simple. Meanwhile, you see, I have plenty of money, and we can be -together almost as much as we like, quietly, you know. Whereas if we -burst it all up now we shall just starve and be out of it all our lives. -Don’t you see?”</p> - -<p>He stopped awkwardly, but for the moment he had no answer. Clemence had -listened to him, the expression of her face<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_165" id="page_165"></a>{165}</span> changing from wonder to -incredulity, from incredulity to agony, from agony to the look of a -creature stricken to death. She lifted her hand in the silence slowly -and heavily to her head. Julian saw the gesture, though he could not see -her face, and its heaviness somehow increased his discomfort.</p> - -<p>“You see it’s only common sense!” he said impatiently.</p> - -<p>“You mean that you want to go on living a double life—that you don’t -want, don’t mean to try, to do right!” The voice was not like the voice -of the Clemence he knew. It was low, distinct, and stern, and she spoke -very slowly.</p> - -<p>“I mean that I don’t want to ruin myself out of hand!” he said harshly. -“Don’t be foolish, Clemence!”</p> - -<p>“Ruin!” she said in the same tone. “You don’t know what real ruin means! -I don’t know how to make you understand; I’m not clever enough. But I -can tell you just this! I would rather die than have it as you say. For -your sake, not for my own only, I would rather die. Until your mother -knows the truth I won’t even see you or speak<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_166" id="page_166"></a>{166}</span> to you again. As to -taking a penny of your money, I would starve first.”</p> - -<p>Her tone, vibrating with intensity of meaning, was quite low. She was -not declaiming or protesting. She was simply making her stand at a -proposition so terrible to her that it had carried her beyond the bounds -of emotion. For the moment Julian was startled and aghast.</p> - -<p>“You don’t mean that!” he said. “Clemence, that’s nonsense!”</p> - -<p>“It’s truth!” she said steadily. “You must choose!”</p> - -<p>She was standing facing him, her slight figure erect and straight as he -had never seen it. Her face was white as death, and set into strange, -fine lines quite new to it; all the softness about her mouth was being -gradually pressed out as the latent strength developed, as it seemed, -with every breath she drew. It was as though the crisis, in its sudden -demand upon her forces, was transforming her as she grappled with it; -transforming her into a woman before whom Julian felt himself shrink -into utter contemptibility. He took the only means he<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_167" id="page_167"></a>{167}</span> knew to reassert -himself, and lost his temper deliberately.</p> - -<p>“Well, then, I do choose!” he cried violently. “You’re a foolish girl, -who doesn’t understand, Clemence, and by-and-by you’ll own I was right! -As to not taking my money, that’s absurd, you know! You must! But I’m -not going to ruin both of us for absurd fancies!”</p> - -<p>He stopped, hoping she would answer and give him some advantage, but she -stood silent, gazing at him with stern, searching eyes, as though she -were trying in vain to reconcile the man before her with the man she -loved. Julian felt her gaze though he could not see it, and he went on -hotly, trying, as it were, to gather round him the rags of his old -authority and superiority.</p> - -<p>“You don’t suppose, Clemence,” he said, “that I propose this because I -like it? It’s not a nice thing for a man to propose to his wife, I can -tell you. I should have hoped you would have understood that. But after -all it’s only for a time, and it won’t make any real difference to -you—things will be just as they have been. And if you<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_168" id="page_168"></a>{168}</span> can’t feel about -it as I do, you must remember it’s because you’ve got a great deal to -learn still, and you must believe that what I say is right. Anyway, -you’re my wife, you know, and you’re bound to obey me!”</p> - -<p>“I’m bound to obey you in all things that it’s right you should ask. But -I’m not bound to do what would be dragging you down and me too. I can’t -make you do what’s right; it wouldn’t do you any good for me to tell -your mother; but until you do, it will be as I said.”</p> - -<p>“Then it’s you who part us,” he cried passionately. “You don’t love me, -Clemence! You can’t ever have loved me!”</p> - -<p>There was a moment’s pause, and then her answer came in a strange, still -voice.</p> - -<p>“I do love you!” she said. “I love you so that I would give my life to -blot out what you’ve said!”</p> - -<p>A dead silence—a silence in which Julian Romayne seemed to feel -something pulling and straining at his heart-strings. Then with a -reckless, desperate effort he tore himself away from its influence and -spoke.</p> - -<p>“It can’t be helped, then,” he said<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_169" id="page_169"></a>{169}</span> fiercely and defiantly. “You must -go your own way until you come to your senses! Some day, perhaps, you’ll -be grateful to me for refusing to make fools of us! I wouldn’t have -believed it of you, Clemence! You make me almost sorry that I ever saw -you. Now, look here; I’ve put it to you from every point of view; I’ve -tried as hard as ever I can to make you understand, and if you won’t, -you won’t! As to the money, of course, I can’t hear of your not taking -that. I shall send you so much regularly every month—it won’t be very -much either, but it’ll be enough to keep you—and, of course, you’ll -have to spend it. But you need not be afraid that I shall want to see -you again until you come to a more sensible frame of mind.”</p> - -<p>He waited, but again there was no answer, and again some influence from -her still presence discomfited him, and made him hurry on.</p> - -<p>“I’m going now!” he said roughly. “Good-bye, Clemence!” He made a -movement as though to go, without a tenderer farewell, but quite -suddenly his heart failed<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_170" id="page_170"></a>{170}</span> him. He turned again and took her into his -arms impulsively and tenderly. “Clemmie!” he said brokenly. “I -say—Clemmie!”</p> - -<p>Her arms were round his neck pressing him closely and more closely, with -a desperate, agonised pressure, and a long, clinging kiss was on his -cheek.</p> - -<p>“Don’t keep me waiting long,” she whispered hoarsely. “You will do it at -last. I know, I know you will. But—don’t keep me waiting long!”</p> - -<p>She released him and drew herself gently out of his arms, and Julian -turned and stumbled out of the room and down the stairs, the most -consciously contemptible young man in London, and with no strength to -act upon his consciousness.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_171" id="page_171"></a>{171}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X</h2> - -<p class="nind">“<span class="smcap">You</span> admire it, Mrs. Romayne? It strikes you as true? Ah, but that is -very charming of you!”</p> - -<p>A confused babel of voices—that curious, indefinable sound which is -shrill, though its shrillness would be most difficult to trace; harsh, -though it arises from the voices of well-bred men and women; and -absolutely unmeaning—was filling the two rooms from end to end; and the -soft light diffused by cleverly arranged lamps fell upon groups of -smartly dressed women and men equally correct in their attire on male -lines. It was about five o’clock, not a pleasant time on a gusty, sleety -November afternoon if Nature is allowed to have her own way; but inside -these rooms it was impossible to do anything but ignore nature; the air -was so soft and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_172" id="page_172"></a>{172}</span> warm—faintly scented, too, with flowers—and the -colour so rich and delicate. The rooms themselves were a curious hybrid -between the fashionable and the artistic; that is to say, they were not -arranged according to any conventional tenets, and there were various -really beautiful hangings, “bits” of old brass, “bits” of old oak, and -“bits” of old china about. But all these, though very cleverly arranged, -were distinctly “posed.” The larger of the two rooms was obviously a -studio; rather too obviously, perhaps, since the fact was impressed by a -certain superabundance of artistic prettinesses. Charming little -arrangements in hangings, palms, or what not, “composed” at every turn -with the constantly shifting groups. The unconventionalism, in short, -was as carefully arranged as was the attitude of the host of the hour as -he stood leaning against a large easel, mysteriously curtained, talking -to Mrs. Romayne. He was a painter, and a clever painter; he had married -a clever wife, and as a result of the working of their respective brains -towards the same goal he<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_173" id="page_173"></a>{173}</span> had become the fashion. “Everybody” went to -“the Stormont-Eades’ affairs,” whether the affair in question was a -little dinner, a little “evening,” or a little tea-party—Mrs. -Stormont-Eade always affixed the diminutive; consequently everybody was -obliged to go; a fact which if carefully thought out, will lead to some -rather curious conclusions. And the little tea-parties, particularly in -the winter, were considered particularly desirable functions. One of -these tea-parties was going on now.</p> - -<p>Mr. Stormont-Eade himself was a tall, good-looking man who had nearly -succeeded, by dint of careful attention to his good points, in conveying -the impression that he was a handsome man. He had fine eyes, really -remarkably fine, as he was well aware, when they were earnest, and they -were looking now with a deep intensity of meaning, which was their -normal expression, into Mrs. Romayne’s face; his mouth was not so -admirable except when he smiled, and consequently his thin lips were -slightly curved; his figure was too thin, and the touch of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_174" id="page_174"></a>{174}</span> -picturesqueness about his pose and about his velvet coat redeemed it; -but his closely-curling hair was cut short and trim, and showed the -excellent shape of his head to the best advantage. He had come up to -Mrs. Romayne only a minute or two before at the conclusion of a song; a -very little very fashionable music was always a feature of the -Stormont-Eades’ entertainments, and “good people”—the phrase in this -connection representing clever professionals possessed of the social -ambition of the day—were glad to sing or play for them; and she had -begun to speak of a little picture of his which was one of the themes of -the moment.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne was dressed from head to foot in carefully harmonised -shades of green—green was the colour of the season—with a good deal of -soft black fur about it. Her bonnet became her to perfection; her face -was so animated that in the soft light a certain haggard sharpness of -contour was hardly perceptible. Her smiles and laughs as she exchanged -greetings and chat were always ready; if they left her eyes quite<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_175" id="page_175"></a>{175}</span> -untouched, her attention was apparently as free and disengaged as were -the gay little gestures with which she emphasized her talk. There was -absolutely nothing about her which could have suggested to the ordinary -observer anything beyond the surface of finished society woman which she -was presenting so brightly to the world. But on the previous evening she -had had a note from Falconer, written immediately after his interview -with “the girl,” telling her only that he was to have a second -interview, and would see her on the following day. That day was now -drawing to a close, and she had as yet heard nothing further.</p> - -<p>“It enchanted me!” she said now. “But then your things always do enchant -me, you know! By-the-bye, people say that you are going to do a big -picture. I hope that is not so? Little bits are so much more -fascinating.”</p> - -<p>Mr. Stormont-Eade smiled—the tender, comprehending smile that was one -of his charms.</p> - -<p>“No, it is not true,” he said. “One is<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_176" id="page_176"></a>{176}</span> so fettered with a large work, -but little things represent the inspiration, the feeling of the moment. -If they have any value, it lies in that.” They had a distinct financial -value, though it is doubtful whether the dealers would have recognised -the source.</p> - -<p>“Ah, the feeling of the moment!” said Mrs. Romayne with pretty fervour. -“That is what one so seldom gets, isn’t it? And it is so delightful!”</p> - -<p>Then she broke off with a charming smile to shake hands with Mrs. Halse, -brought by the constant shifting of the groups into her vicinity. Mrs. -Romayne was an excellent listener, and reputed a good talker, though she -had probably never said a witty or a clever thing in her life; but she -was never exclusive; she was always, so to speak, more or less in touch -with the whole room, and ready to extend her circle.</p> - -<p>“I’ve been making for you for hours,” she said gaily. “Ah!” The word was -an exclamation of pleased surprise as she suddenly became aware of a -girl’s figure behind Mrs. Halse; a girl’s figure much better dressed<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_177" id="page_177"></a>{177}</span> -than had been its wont, and very erect, with a latent touch of triumph -and excitement on the pretty face. It was Miss Hilda Newton.</p> - -<p>“I did not know you were in London,” went on Mrs. Romayne, holding out -her hand with gracious cordiality.</p> - -<p>“She is staying with me on most important business,” said Mrs. Halse. -Mrs. Halse had accommodated herself to her increasing portliness by this -time, and had apparently thought it necessary to increase the exuberance -of her manner proportionately. Her voice, and the laugh with which she -spoke, were equally loud. “Trousseau, you must know. She is to be -married directly after Christmas. And when I heard it I wrote and said -she’d better come straight to me, and then I could see that she got the -right things. Of course, as she’s to live in town, she must have the -right things, you know.”</p> - -<p>“Of course,” assented Mrs. Romayne gaily and airily. “And you are very -busy?”</p> - -<p>The last words were addressed to Hilda Newton, whose hand Mrs. Romayne -still held.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_178" id="page_178"></a>{178}</span> There was a curious mixture of resentment, defiance, and -triumph in the girl’s face as she confronted the suave, smiling -countenance of the elder woman, which just touched her voice as she -answered:</p> - -<p>“Very busy indeed!”</p> - -<p>She was conscious of a desire so to frame her answer as to suggest the -position in society which was to be hers on her marriage, but she could -think of no words in which to do it.</p> - -<p>“And where is Master Julian?” broke in Mrs. Halse. Delicacy and tact had -never been more than names with her; as her fibre, mental and physical, -coarsened, she was beginning to think it quite unnecessary to maintain -even a bowing acquaintance with these qualities; and her strident voice -expressed a great deal that Hilda Newton would like to have expressed. -“He must be made to come and offer his congratulations—or perhaps Hilda -will compound with him for a particularly handsome wedding-present. He -knows Talbot Compton, of course? Otherwise, they must be introduced.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_179" id="page_179"></a>{179}</span></p> - -<p>“He is not here this afternoon, I’m sorry to say,” returned his mother, -smiling. Mr. Stormont-Eade, if he could have recognised “the feeling of -the moment” in this particular crisis, might have learnt a lesson on -several points. “He has turned into a tremendously hard worker, you -know. An astonishing fact, isn’t it? I tell him he has secret intentions -of taking the bench by storm.”</p> - -<p>She was laughing and looking idly away across the room, when quite -suddenly she stopped. Just inside the doorway, shaking hands with Mrs. -Stormont-Eade, and having evidently just arrived, was Dennis Falconer, -and as she caught sight of him there flashed into her eyes, through all -the superficial brightness of her face, something which was like nothing -but a sheer agony of hunger. It came in an instant, and it was gone in -an instant. As he turned away from his hostess and caught her eye, she -made him a light gesture and smile of greeting, and turned again to Mrs. -Halse; and Mrs. Halse was not even conscious of a pause.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_180" id="page_180"></a>{180}</span></p> - -<p>“It’s almost too astonishing, don’t you know!” said that vociferous lady -with a laugh. “I don’t half believe in these sudden transformations. If -I were you I should make him produce his work every night for -inspection. It’s my belief he is getting into mischief. These -hard-working young men are such frauds!”</p> - -<p>She laughed loudly, and at that moment accident brought Falconer, on his -way across the room, to a standstill a few paces from her. He had -evidently intended to pass the little group, but Mrs. Halse frustrated -his intention. With a peremptory gesture she claimed his attention, and -as he drew nearer, she said boisterously:</p> - -<p>“Now, don’t you agree with me, Mr. Falconer? Aren’t these good, -hard-working boys the greatest scamps going?”</p> - -<p>Falconer was looking very severe and impassive; he shook hands with Mrs. -Halse, and then turned perforce to Mrs. Romayne, taking her hand with an -almost solemn gravity, which contrasted sharply with the careless gaiety -with which she extended it.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_181" id="page_181"></a>{181}</span></p> - -<p>“I didn’t expect to see you this afternoon,” she said lightly. “Stupid -of me, though; every one comes to the Stormont-Eades’.”</p> - -<p>“I did not expect to meet you,” he answered sternly. “I have called at -Queen Anne Street.”</p> - -<p>He had been astounded at not finding her at home. He was distinctly of -opinion that afternoon teas were not for a woman who should be sitting -in sackcloth and ashes, and the sight of her had shocked not only his -sense of propriety, but some deeper sense of the reality of the crisis -at which he was assisting. Perhaps Mrs. Romayne understood that her -presence at the “little tea-party” scandalised him, for there was a -strange, bitter smile on her lips before she turned to Mrs. Halse, and -said, with a rather hard, strained ring in her gay voice:</p> - -<p>“You’ll get no support from my cousin, I assure you, Mrs. Halse. He was -a most praiseworthy——”</p> - -<p>Her voice was drowned in a ringing chord on the piano, and as the -prelude to a song filled the room, she made a mocking<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_182" id="page_182"></a>{182}</span> gesture -expressive of the impossibility of making herself heard; and turning her -face towards the singer, as she stood by Falconer’s side, she composed -herself to listen. Her face grew rather set and fixed in its lines of -animated attention as the song went on, and when it ceased, her comments -were of the indefinitely delighted order. She made them very easily and -brightly, however, and then she turned carelessly to Falconer.</p> - -<p>“Are you thinking of staying long?” she said lightly. “I rather want to -talk to you, do you know—this unfortunate man is my man of business, -you must know, Mrs. Halse—and I thought perhaps that I could drive you -somewhere.”</p> - -<p>“I shall be happy to go whenever you like,” was the grave answer.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne laughed lightly.</p> - -<p>“Oh, I don’t want to take you away immediately!” she said. “You’ve only -just come, I’m afraid. In a little while!”</p> - -<p>She smiled and nodded to him, and to Mrs. Halse and Miss Newton, and -moved away to speak to some other people.</p> - -<p>About a quarter of an hour later Falconer,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_183" id="page_183"></a>{183}</span> who was a somewhat grim -ornament to society in the interval, saw her coming smiling towards him.</p> - -<p>“Ready?” she said. “That’s very nice of you! Suppose we go, then?”</p> - -<p>He followed her out of the room and down the stairs, her flow of -comments and laughter never ceasing; put her into her carriage, and got -in himself.</p> - -<p>“Home!” she said sharply to the coachman. The door banged, they rolled -away into the darkness and the wet, and her voice stopped suddenly.</p> - -<p>They rolled along for a few minutes in total silence. Shut up alone with -her like that, the isolation and quiet following so suddenly on the -crowd and noise of a moment before, Falconer’s only conscious feeling -was one of almost stupid discomfort. Her sudden silence, too, had an -indefinable but very unpleasant effect upon him. At last he said with -awkward displeasure:</p> - -<p>“I was going to write to you! I——”</p> - -<p>She lifted her hand quickly and stopped him.</p> - -<p>“When we get in!” she said in a quick,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_184" id="page_184"></a>{184}</span> tense voice. “You can come in? -It is just six. It need not take long.”</p> - -<p>“I am quite at your service.”</p> - -<p>She leant back in her corner with a sharp breath of relief, and neither -moved nor spoke again until the carriage drew up at her own door.</p> - -<p>She opened the door with a latchkey, and moved quickly across the hall -to the foot of the stairs, motioning to Falconer to follow her. Then she -stopped abruptly and turned. A servant was just crossing the hall to the -dining-room, where the preliminary preparation for a dinner-party could -be seen.</p> - -<p>“Is Mr. Julian in?” said Mrs. Romayne sharply.</p> - -<p>“Not yet, ma’am.”</p> - -<p>“If he should come in before I go to dress, tell him that I am engaged.”</p> - -<p>She turned again and went on to the drawing-room.</p> - -<p>“Now!” she said in a breathless peremptory monosyllable, facing Falconer -as he shut the door. She did not attempt to sit down herself or to -invite Falconer to do so. All<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_185" id="page_185"></a>{185}</span> her senses seemed to be absorbed in the -desperate anxiety with which her face was sharp and haggard. She looked -ten years older than she had looked in Mr. Stormont-Eade’s studio. -Falconer answered her directly with no preliminary formalities.</p> - -<p>“I saw the—the young woman yesterday,” he began; “but I was unable to -bring about any arrangement. I gave her twenty-four hours for -consideration, and this afternoon I called to see her again.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, yes!”</p> - -<p>“I found that she had left the house this morning, leaving no address.”</p> - -<p>“Left!” The erect, tense figure confronting him staggered back a step as -though a heavy blow had fallen upon it, and Mrs. Romayne caught -desperately at the back of a chair. “Left—and you don’t know where she -is? You’ve settled nothing? We’ve no hold over her!”</p> - -<p>The words had come from her in hoarse, gasping sentences, each one -growing in intensity until the last vibrated with an agony of very -despair, but Falconer’s face grew<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_186" id="page_186"></a>{186}</span> grimmer as he listened. How it was he -could not have told, but a strange, uncomfortable remembrance of the -girl he had seen on the previous day, which had haunted him at more or -less inopportune moments ever since, seemed to rise now and accentuate -all his usual antagonism to the woman who was talking of her.</p> - -<p>“I think you need not distress yourself,” he said stiffly. “Perhaps I -had better tell you at once that your son knows no more of her -whereabouts than we do.”</p> - -<p>The drawn look of despair relaxed on Mrs. Romayne’s face; relaxed into -an agony of questioning doubt.</p> - -<p>“Doesn’t know?” she said sharply. “Julian doesn’t know?”</p> - -<p>“The landlady of the house,” continued Falconer, “a very unpleasant and -loquacious woman, was eager to inform me that on the arrival of your son -yesterday afternoon, about an hour after I saw the young woman, there -was a quarrel between them and that he left the house in anger. To-day, -very shortly before my arrival, he returned and was astonished to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_187" id="page_187"></a>{187}</span> find -that the young woman was gone. He demanded her address, and was furious -to find that it was not known. I think there is no room for doubt that -the young woman has left him!”</p> - -<p>The colour was coming back to Mrs. Romayne’s face slowly and in burning -patches, and her clutch on the chair was almost convulsive.</p> - -<p>“Left him!” she said under her breath. “Left him!” There was a moment’s -pause, and then she said in a harsh, high-pitched, concentrated tone: -“Do you mean—for good? Why? Why should she?”</p> - -<p>“I am sorry to have to say it to you,” said Falconer slowly, “but I fear -the case against your son is even blacker than it appears on the -surface. I think it more than possible that he deceived the young -woman.”</p> - -<p>The slowly-formed conviction—and it became conviction only as he spoke -the words—was the result of that vague and disturbing impression made -on Falconer on the preceding day by “the young woman.” It had worked -slowly and almost without consciousness on<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_188" id="page_188"></a>{188}</span> his part, but it had refused -to die out, and it had attained the only fruition possible to it in his -last words.</p> - -<p>“And you believe that she is really gone? That there is nothing more to -fear from her?”</p> - -<p>It was the same absorbed, intent tone, and her eyes, fixed eagerly on -Falconer now, were hard and glittering. The terrible significance of his -words, with all the weight of tragedy they held, seemed to have passed -her by, to have no existence for her. It was as though the sense in her -which should have responded to it was numbed or non-existent. And -Falconer, scandalised and revolted, replied sternly:</p> - -<p>“I think you need have no anxiety on that score. She has disappeared of -her own free will, and your son, upon reflection, will probably be glad -to accept so easy a solution of what he doubtless recognises by this -time as a troublesome complication.” There was a rigid and utterly -antipathetic condemnation of Julian in his voice; he had judged the -young man, and sentenced him as vicious to the core,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_189" id="page_189"></a>{189}</span> and for all his -experience, he held too rigidly to his narrow conception to consider the -possible effect upon youth and passion of so sudden and total a -thwarting. “My only fear,” he continued, “is that serious injustice has -been done. The young woman is by no means the kind of young woman I was -led to believe her. I have grave doubts as to whether it was not our -duty to enforce a marriage upon your son, instead of negativing the -suggestion.”</p> - -<p>The words were probably rather more than he would have been prepared to -stand to had they been put to a practical issue, and he had spoken them, -though he hardly knew it, more from a severe desire to arouse what he -called in his own mind “some decent feeling” in the woman to whom he -spoke, than from any other reason. From that point of view they failed -completely. It was a bright light of triumph that flashed into Mrs. -Romayne’s eyes as she said quickly, and in an eager, vibrating tone, -which seemed less an answer to him personally than to the bare fact to -which he had given words:<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_190" id="page_190"></a>{190}</span></p> - -<p>“Fortunately there is no more fear of that.”</p> - -<p>The tall clock standing in a corner of the room chimed the -three-quarters as she spoke, and she started as she heard it.</p> - -<p>“It is a quarter to seven,” she said. “And I have people to dinner. You -have nothing else to tell me, have you? Nothing to advise?”</p> - -<p>“Nothing,” was the grim answer.</p> - -<p>“You do not think—would it be a good thing, do you think, to have the -girl traced so that we could always be sure?”</p> - -<p>“You need take no further trouble in the matter, in my opinion. If you -should observe anything in your son’s conduct to revive your uneasiness, -the question must, of course, be reconsidered. You will observe him -closely, no doubt.”</p> - -<p>There was a moment’s curiously dead silence, and then it was broken by a -strange half-laugh.</p> - -<p>“No doubt!” said Mrs. Romayne. “No doubt!”</p> - -<p>Another pause, and then she turned and glanced at the clock.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_191" id="page_191"></a>{191}</span></p> - -<p>“I must go,” she said. “Thank you.”</p> - -<p>She held out her hand, and he just touched it as though conventionality -alone compelled him.</p> - -<p>“I have considered myself bound in duty in the matter,” he said stiffly. -“Good night!”</p> - -<p>No touch of artificiality returned to her manner even in dismissing him. -It remained hard and practical. Her intense absorption in the subject of -their interview did not yield by so much as a hair’s breadth, and she -remained absolutely impervious to any thought of the man before her. His -slight, cold touch of her hand, the sternness of his obvious -condemnation of her, were evidently absolutely unobserved by her.</p> - -<p>“Good night!” she returned; and as he left her without another word, she -crossed the room rapidly and went upstairs to dress for dinner.</p> - -<p>The dinner-party of that evening was unanimously declared by the guests -to be quite the most delightful Mrs. Romayne had ever given. The dinner, -the flowers, all the arrangements, were perfection, of course; but<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_192" id="page_192"></a>{192}</span> even -when this is the case the “go” of a dinner-party may be a variable or -even a non-existent quality; and it was the “go” of this particular -occasion that was so remarkable. All the component parts of the party -seemed to be animated and fused into one harmonious whole by the spirits -of the hostess and host. Mrs. Romayne was so charming, so bright, so -full of vivacity; Julian, who put in his appearance only just before the -announcement of dinner, was so boyish, so lively, so ingenuous. He was a -little pale when he first appeared, and the lady he took down to dinner -reproached him with working too hard; but as the evening wore on he -gained colour. The relations between himself and his mother had always -been quite one of the features of Mrs. Romayne’s entertainments, but -those relations had never been more charmingly accentuated than they -were to-night.</p> - -<p>Until he came gaily in among her guests that evening, Julian and his -mother had not met since that second interview which had prompted her -summons to Falconer. Julian had dined out on both the intervening -evenings, and it was easily to be arranged under<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_193" id="page_193"></a>{193}</span> these circumstances, -if either of the pair so willed it, that forty-eight hours should go by -without their coming in contact with one another. And an onlooker aware -of the circumstances of their last meeting, and watching the mother and -son through the evening now, might have reflected that the laws of -heredity seldom operate exclusively through one parent.</p> - -<p>“Good night, dear Mrs. Romayne! Such a delightful evening! How I do envy -you that dear boy of yours! It’s the greatest pleasure to see you two -together.”</p> - -<p>The speaker was a good-natured old lady, and she had thought it no harm -to put into words what her fellow-guests had only thought. She was the -last departure, and Mrs. Romayne followed her to the top of the stairs, -with a laughing deprecation of the words which was very fascinating, and -then turned back into the drawing-room with another “good night,” as -Julian prepared to attend the old lady to her carriage.</p> - -<p>The hall door shut with a bang, and then there was a moment’s pause. The -mother in<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_194" id="page_194"></a>{194}</span> the drawing-room above, and the son in the hall below, stood -for an instant motionless. A subtle change had come over Mrs. Romayne’s -face the instant she found herself alone. It had sharpened slightly, and -an eager, haggard anticipation was striving to express itself in her -eyes, only to be resolutely veiled. But to Julian’s face as he stood -with his hand still resting on the hall door there came a great and -sudden alteration. All the light and gaiety died out of it before a -wild, fierce expression of rebellion and distaste, repressed almost -instantly by a pale, sullen look of determination. He moved, and Mrs. -Romayne, hearing his step, moved slightly also; he came up the stairs, -and as he came he seemed to force back into his face the easy smile it -had worn all the evening.</p> - -<p>“It’s been a great success, hasn’t it, dear?” he said lightly as he -crossed the drawing-room threshold.</p> - -<p>“A great success!” she said in the same tone—though in her case it rang -a little thin.</p> - -<p>An instant’s silence followed, and then she<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_195" id="page_195"></a>{195}</span> laid her hand airily on his -arm. Her lips were white and dry with agitation, and she knew it; she -wondered desperately whether her voice rang as unnaturally in Julian’s -ears as it did in her own, as she said with what she meant for perfect -ease:</p> - -<p>“Dear boy, let us say our final words upon that wretched business -to-night and wake up clear of it to-morrow. May I be happy about you? -That’s all there is to be said, isn’t it?”</p> - -<p>She tried to smile, but she knew the effort was a ghastly failure, and -again she wondered whether Julian saw. She need not have feared! Julian -was busy with his own histrionic difficulties, and had neither sight nor -hearing for her.</p> - -<p>“You may be quite happy, little mother!” he said, and the frank -tenderness of his tone and manner were only very slightly -over-accentuated. “I’ve made up my mind to do as you wish, and I won’t -make such a fool of myself again!”</p> - -<p>They were standing close together, looking each into the other’s face, -and he patted her hand as it lay on his arm as he finished.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_196" id="page_196"></a>{196}</span> Yet between -them, parting them as seas of ice could not have parted them, there lay -a shadow beneath which love itself survives only as the cruellest form -of torture; the shadow of the unspoken with its chill, unmoveable dead -weight against which no man or woman can prevail.</p> - -<p>The hand on Julian’s arm trembled a little. The terrible presence, which -is never recognised except by those to whom its chill is as the chill of -death, was making itself vaguely felt about his mother’s heart. She let -her eyes stray from his face with a painful, tremulous movement, and her -fingers tightened round his arm.</p> - -<p>“It is all over?” she murmured in a low voice. “It is all over, really?”</p> - -<p>As her self-command failed her his seemed to strengthen. He patted her -hand again reassuringly, and said, confidently:</p> - -<p>“Yes, dear, indeed! I’ve only got to beg your pardon, and I do that with -all my heart.”</p> - -<p>He stooped and kissed her tenderly, and as he did so she seemed to rally -her forces with a tremendous effort. She returned his<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_197" id="page_197"></a>{197}</span> kiss with a -pretty, effusive embrace, though her lips were as cold as ice.</p> - -<p>“I grant it freely,” she said. “And if I’ve felt obliged to be—well, -shall we say rather autocratic?—for once in a way, you must forgive me, -too, eh?”</p> - -<p>But the unspoken, terrible reality as it is, was to be touched by no -such ghastly travesty. Julian’s laugh was only a firmer echo of his -mother’s gay artificiality of tone, but as she heard it her lips turned -whiter still.</p> - -<p>“That’s of course,” he said. “Of course.”</p> - -<p>“Then it’s all settled!” she responded gaily. “We’ll draw a veil over -the past from to-night, and behave better in the future. Good night, -dear boy!” She kissed him again, patted him lightly on the shoulder and -moved away. On the threshold she stopped, turned, and blew him a kiss -over her shoulder. “Forgiveness and oblivion from to-night,” she said; -and there was a strange, defiant gaiety in her voice.</p> - -<p>With another smile and a nod she went upstairs, and as she went her face -grew<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_198" id="page_198"></a>{198}</span> lined and drawn, like the face of an old woman, and the defiance -that had lurked in her voice stared out of her eyes, half-wild and -reckless.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_199" id="page_199"></a>{199}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">It</span> was a bright spring day; one of those days on which the freshness and -renewal of life which only spring knows, and for the sake of which even -the cold monotony of winter is endurable, seem to be in the very air, -and to radiate with the light itself. Even in London, where nature’s -broadest effects, only, can be felt, there was a sense of exuberance -which was almost excitement. The sun shone with a brightness which -seemed to shed oblivion over past darkness. The air was quickening and -stirring with vague and limitless possibilities.</p> - -<p>It is rather a notable arrangement which makes the quickening of life in -one of the least natural systems in the world, London society, -simultaneous with nature’s great awakening. It presents a suggestion of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_200" id="page_200"></a>{200}</span> -combined travesty, patronage, and unconscious testimony to that affinity -between man and nature which nothing can wholly destroy, which, if -worked out with a certain amount of latitude to a fantastic imagination, -will have a rather bewildering effect upon the focus of things in -general. But it is nevertheless a fact that on this particular day in -May very many of the impulses stirring in nature had their strangely -distorted counterparts in the impulses of society. Society, like nature, -had discarded its winter garments, its winter habits; society, like -nature, was restless with fresh beginnings, fresh hopes, fresh -tendencies. The resemblance lay on the surface; the contrast was farther -to seek.</p> - -<p>It was about three o’clock in the afternoon, and a certain section of -society—a gathering, at least, very fairly representative of a certain -section—was surging in a good-tempered, aimless, demoralised way in a -very fashionable church in Kensington. Some of the demoralisation was -due to the occasion—a smart wedding—but the gaiety and the general air -of readiness to be pleased which<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_201" id="page_201"></a>{201}</span> prevailed were as certainly the -outcome of the wider spirit of the hour as were the smart spring gowns -and the quantities of spring flowers carried or worn by the women. The -bridal party had left the church and a general exodus was in progress; -progress rendered rather slow by reason of the difficulties attendant on -the bringing together of carriages and owners, and involving a -considerable crush inside the church door. In the middle of this crush, -allowing himself to be pushed and drifted along towards the door, was a -man who was apparently too fully occupied in casting keen, comprehensive -and reconnoitring looks about him, and in returning the gestures of -greeting and welcome which returned his glances on all sides, to take -much heed as to the manner or direction of the movement imposed upon him -by the moving crowd. It was Marston Loring, and as he finally emerged -into the air he was lightly clapped on the shoulder by Lord Garstin, -who, a few yards in front of him during their compressed passage out of -the building, had waited for him on the pavement.</p> - -<p>“Glad to see you back, Loring!” he said.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_202" id="page_202"></a>{202}</span> “Heard last night of your -arrival. How are you?”</p> - -<p>“Not sorry to be back,” returned Loring nonchalantly, as he shook hands. -“I’ve come to the conclusion, though, in the course of the last -half-hour, that six months is a mere nothing!”</p> - -<p>“Are you walking round to the house?” asked Lord Garstin. “So am I. Let -me have your news as we go.”</p> - -<p>Marston Loring had spent the winter at the Cape. His departure had been -alluded to among his smart acquaintances as “a sudden affair” more or -less indefinitely connected in their minds with that “business” of which -Loring was understood to be a devotee. To Loring himself it had been by -no means a sudden thing. That is to say, the necessity for it had been -gradually growing up about him in his professional life much against his -will, though it had reached a crisis somewhat unexpectedly. He had been -absent six months, and this was, practically, his social reappearance; -but looking at him as he turned into the street with Lord Garstin, it -would have been difficult to believe that he had<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_203" id="page_203"></a>{203}</span> been away at all; far -less that he had passed through any striking experiences of men and -life. His keen, cynical, unpleasant face was entirely unaltered; his -manner was perfectly calm and unmoved. If he had his observations to -make on his return, if the result of those observations was rather -exciting than indifferent to him, interest and emotion were still -entirely outside his pose.</p> - -<p>The talk between the two men, however, as they passed along the streets -was such talk as passes when one of the two is occupied in picking up -dropped threads, and the other is well calculated, and well satisfied, -to help him in the process. In his heart of hearts—if such a spot could -have been reached in him—Lord Garstin would probably have confessed to -little personal liking for Loring; his cordiality was the result of -considerably involved workings of social politics. Just at this moment -in particular, with the prestige fresh upon him of sundry smart magazine -articles on Cape affairs which he had sent home from time to time, and -which had been a good deal talked about,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_204" id="page_204"></a>{204}</span> Marston Loring was distinctly -a man to be noticed and encouraged.</p> - -<p>Details connected with the wedding at which they had just assisted were -naturally the first topics that presented themselves. It was Hilda -Newton’s wedding; she had been married with much circumstance from Mrs. -Halse’s house; and, before Loring left England, it had been said that -she was to be married at Christmas at her own home in Yorkshire. About a -month before the day fixed for the wedding, however, the aunt with whom -she lived had died; the wedding had perforce been postponed, and when it -became possible to consider another date, Mrs. Halse—in the absence of -any near relation to the bride-elect—had taken the matter in hand.</p> - -<p>“A very nice affair she’s made of it!” commented the elder man, as he -finished his explanation, interspersed with discursive items of news of -all sorts appertaining to society and its doings. “A little loud, of -course; that goes without saying; and, really, nowadays it’s rather the -thing! A pretty girl in her way, Mrs. Compton. And talking<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_205" id="page_205"></a>{205}</span> of pretty -girls, Maud Pomeroy looked well. They’ve been at Cannes since the end of -January; only just back, like yourself.”</p> - -<p>“So I heard,” answered Loring indifferently. “By-the-bye, I didn’t see -the Romaynes. Aren’t they in town? I’ve not had time to look any one up -yet, of course, but I thought I should see Julian to-day.”</p> - -<p>Lord Garstin paused a moment before he answered.</p> - -<p>“They were there,” he said. “I saw them come in. You’ll see them at the -house, no doubt. The little woman’s been invisible for two or three -days; ill—rather bad, somebody said.”</p> - -<p>“Ill!” echoed Loring; and there was a genuine surprise in his tone which -no information yet bestowed upon him had evoked. “Really!” He paused a -moment, and then said, with his own peculiar smile: “And how is Julian? -Does the hard-working line hold out?”</p> - -<p>Lord Garstin smiled, more pleasantly than Loring had done, and shrugged -his shoulders.</p> - -<p>“Pretty well, I suppose,” he said. “I<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_206" id="page_206"></a>{206}</span> met his chief the other night, -and he was not enthusiastic. He’s a nice boy, though. You’re a great -chum of his, aren’t you, Loring?” Loring nodded. “Then let me give you a -hint to have an eye to his proceedings at the club. Cards are all very -well, you know, but a boy like that should be moderate. You might be -able to talk to him about it. I gave his mother a hint a few weeks ago. -She’s a nice little woman. See what you can do, will you? I’ve got an -idea that the foolish fellow doesn’t play only at the club.”</p> - -<p>They were close to Mrs. Halse’s house as Lord Garstin finished, and his -last words were spoken quickly and significantly. Loring answered only -by a slight movement of his eyebrows, and then they were in the hall, -being swept on by a seething crowd to pay their respects to the hostess -and the bride.</p> - -<p>“Loring, old man! How are you?”</p> - -<p>Loring and Lord Garstin had been thrown together again after offering -their congratulations, and they were standing side by side. Julian -Romayne was close beside them, having come up from behind through the -crowd unperceived,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_207" id="page_207"></a>{207}</span> his hand eagerly, even demonstratively, -outstretched.</p> - -<p>Thinking things over in private later on, Marston Loring thought with a -cynical smile that if he had not previously realised his six months’ -absence, he might have done so when young Romayne’s voice fell on his -ear. The change in it, though subtle, was so marked—to the man who had -not heard it in course of transition—that it seemed to place years -rather than months between their last meeting and the present, and it -amply prepared Loring for what he saw when he turned round.</p> - -<p>All alteration in manner and appearance consists rather in the -accentuation or modification of original characteristics than in the -developement of fresh ones; consequently it is very seldom noticed by a -casual observer when intercourse is unbroken. To Lord Garstin and to -dozens of his other acquaintances, Julian Romayne was still a “nice -boy,” just as his good-looking features were still the young features of -a year ago. To Loring the difference in face was as perceptible as was -the difference in the young man’s whole<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_208" id="page_208"></a>{208}</span> personality, and the key-note -of the difference lay in the absence of genuineness in both; in the -deliberate assumption in the present of what had been natural and -uncalculated in the past. Julian’s face had grown thinner and harder, -and the boyish smile which was in consequence no longer perfectly -harmonious was a trifle over-accentuated; while the bright, ingenuous -glance of his eyes had grown extraordinarily like his mother. His manner -was the gay, young manner which had gained him so many friends, with -just that touch of exaggeration added to it which artificiality gives.</p> - -<p>His cordiality as he wrung Loring’s hand was rather—like the -demonstrative welcome in his voice—admirably adjusted to meet the -requirements of the moment than an expression of the man himself. He was -very carefully dressed, with a particularly dainty flower in his -buttonhole.</p> - -<p>“Back again at last, old fellow!” he said buoyantly. “By Jove, what an -age it is since you went! And have you had a good time? When did you -reach home? Tell us all about it! You’ve no idea how glad I am<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_209" id="page_209"></a>{209}</span> to have -him back, Lord Garstin!” he added, greeting the elder man with a boyish, -half-laughing apology for his exuberance which was very effective. His -manner to Lord Garstin was as charming as ever; rather more so, indeed, -as its frank deference had acquired a polish derived from sundry little -artistic touches such as only calculation and intention can bestow.</p> - -<p>“You seem to have managed very well without me!” returned Loring, with -good-humoured satire. “The world seems to have used you pretty fairly, -I’m glad to see! I’ve only been back about forty-eight hours or I should -have looked you up, of course. I hope Mrs. Romayne is here?”</p> - -<p>“I hope she is better?” said Lord Garstin, with genuine concern. “We -have all been desolated over her illness!”</p> - -<p>Julian, who had nodded lightly to Loring, turned to Lord Garstin with a -bright, affectionate laugh—also very like his mother’s—and to Loring’s -quick and alert perception an added touch of artificiality became -apparent in his manner as he said:</p> - -<p>“It has been desolating, hasn’t it? It’s<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_210" id="page_210"></a>{210}</span> very good of you to say so, -though! Thanks, I am delighted to say she is all right again. We had a -terrific encounter as to whether she should or should not come to the -affair, and she carried the day.”</p> - -<p>“Being perfectly restored to health she didn’t see the force of allowing -herself to be shut up and coddled by a silly boy.”</p> - -<p>The light, high-pitched voice, somewhat thin, as was the characteristic -laugh with which the words were spoken, came from directly behind -Julian, and as Loring, who had seen her coming, stepped forward to meet -her, Mrs. Romayne, with a passing shake of her son’s arm, stretched out -her hand with graceful cordiality.</p> - -<p>“Welcome back, Mr. Loring,” she said. “I thought your first visit would -have been to this good-for-nothing boy, but I am very glad to meet you -here all the same. Lord Garstin,” she continued, as she turned to shake -hands, “I believe you were enquiring after my health? I can’t allow good -breath to be wasted in that way! I assure you it has been much ado about -nothing, and I am perfectly, ridiculously well!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_211" id="page_211"></a>{211}</span></p> - -<p>She laughed as she finished, but a certain strained insistence had grown -in her tone as she spoke, as though her desire to impress the fact she -stated was strong enough to undermine her control of her voice.</p> - -<p>But Loring, looking at her, was too fully occupied in criticising her -appearance to notice the tone of her voice. There must have been some -society fraud at the bottom of her reported illness, he decided, and -that was why she was so anxious to pass it over; for certainly he had -never seen her look better. She was admirably dressed, and she was very -slightly and skilfully “made up”; a condition new to him in her, and one -of which Marston Loring emphatically approved in women past their first -youth. He told himself, moreover, that either his impression of her had -been fainter than the reality, or else she had actually gained in what -he could only define to himself—and define roughly and inadequately as -he was well aware—as “grip.” There was the faintest flavour of nerve -and concentration behind her admirable society manner, which gave it a -wonderful piquancy in the eyes of her observer; a flavour which<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_212" id="page_212"></a>{212}</span> was -evidently quite unconscious and involuntary, and had its origin in -ingrain character. Loring admired power—of a certain class—in women.</p> - -<p>In his interest in her expression, and his mental comments on -it—determined, as they could not fail to be, by his own character—he -was deceived by her cleverly arranged colouring into ignoring the almost -painful thinness of her face; nor did he understand how hollow and -sunken those glittering eyes would have been less cleverly treated.</p> - -<p>She replied gaily to Lord Garstin’s gallant reception of her assurance, -and then turned again to Loring with an easy interested question on his -voyage.</p> - -<p>“You are not the only returned traveller to-day!” she said, as he -answered her. “By-the-bye, Julian, I was on the way to send you into the -other room. There is some one there you will like to see!”</p> - -<p>She smiled significantly up at him, patting his arm as she spoke, and -Julian answered with boyish eagerness.</p> - -<p>“In the other room?” he said. “Well, perhaps I ought just to say how do -you do,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_213" id="page_213"></a>{213}</span> you know, oughtn’t I? Loring, old fellow, we shall meet again, -of course? What are you going to do afterwards? We might go down to the -club together? And he must come and dine with us, mustn’t he, mother? -Suppose you arrange it!” And with a comprehensive gesture and another, -“I’ll just say how do you do, I think!” he disappeared in the crowd.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne turned with a shrug of her shoulders and a pretty -expressive grimace to the two men.</p> - -<p>“Poor boy!” she laughed. “What a thing it is to be young! And what a -tantalising spectacle a wedding must be under the circumstances! A -pretty wedding, wasn’t it?”</p> - -<p>“An ugly wedding would be rather a refreshing change, don’t you think?” -suggested Loring. “One has seen a good many pretty ones, if you come to -think of it!”</p> - -<p>“You’re not in the least changed by six months in Africa,” returned Mrs. -Romayne, shaking her head at him prettily. “Now, tell me, really, have -you had a good time out there?”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_214" id="page_214"></a>{214}</span></p> - -<p>The question was friendly and interested after a society fashion, but -the interest was entirely on the surface, and the little talk that -followed about Loring’s experiences was joined in as a matter of course -by Lord Garstin. It lasted until Mrs. Romayne said lightly:</p> - -<p>“And now, I suppose, I ought to follow Julian’s example and ‘just say -how do you do, don’t you know!’ I have only seen Mrs. Pomeroy in the -distance as yet.”</p> - -<p>She nodded, and moved away, stopping constantly on her way through the -rooms to exchange scraps of conversation until she came to where Mrs. -Pomeroy, amiable, inert, and smiling as though she had been sitting -there for the last three months, was holding a small court. She welcomed -Mrs. Romayne as she had welcomed all comers.</p> - -<p>“So glad to see you,” she said placidly. “Such a long time! And how are -you?”</p> - -<p>“So immensely pleased to have you back again,” said Mrs. Romayne -enthusiastically; there was a ring of genuineness in her voice which the -fashionable exaggeration of her speech hardly warranted. “And you -really<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_215" id="page_215"></a>{215}</span> only arrived yesterday? Miss Newton—Mrs. Compton, I mean—was -in a dreadful state of mind the other day lest her bridesmaid should -fail her. And how is Maud? How sweet she looked! Quite the prettiest of -the six. Where is she?”</p> - -<p>“She was here just now,” returned Maud’s mother, as though that were -quite a satisfactory answer to the question, and then as an afterthought -she added vaguely: “I think she went to have an ice; your son took her.”</p> - -<p>“Ah!” said Mrs. Romayne, smiling. “Then there is one perfectly happy -person in the house!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Pomeroy only smiled with vague blandness; evidently the relations -between the Romaynes and the Pomeroys had developed extensively before -the departure of the latter for Cannes; and as evidently they were quite -undisturbing to Miss Pomeroy’s mother.</p> - -<p>“The bridesmaids’ dresses were very nice, I think,” she said, with -amiable irrelevancy. “I was afraid they sounded trying. But it has been -very pleasant altogether, hasn’t it?<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_216" id="page_216"></a>{216}</span> I wish we were going to stay in -town. We had a shocking crossing.”</p> - -<p>A keen attention had sprung into Mrs. Romayne’s eyes, and for an instant -it seemed as though all the society gaiety died from her face, leaving -exposed the hard, almost fiercely determined, foundation on which it was -imposed. Then the foundation disappeared again.</p> - -<p>“To stay in town!” she echoed lightly. “Why, are you not going to stay -in town, dear Mrs. Pomeroy?”</p> - -<p>“Unfortunately not,” was the answer. “My sister who lives in -Devonshire—I think you have heard me speak of her?—is ill, and has -begged me to go and see her. So we are going for a week or ten days, I -am sorry to say.”</p> - -<p>“I am sorry to hear,” said Mrs. Romayne, with pretty concern. “Just at -the beginning of the season, too. It’s rather hard on poor Maud, isn’t -it?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, it is hard on poor Maud, isn’t it?” was the undisturbed response.</p> - -<p>There was a moment’s pause, and then under her paint a burning colour -crept up<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_217" id="page_217"></a>{217}</span> to the very roots of Mrs. Romayne’s hair, and her eyes shone.</p> - -<p>“My dear Mrs. Pomeroy,” she began gaily, but speaking rather quickly, -too, and in a higher pitch than was usual with her, “don’t you remember, -months ago, promising to lend me Maud for a little while? This is the -very opportunity. Of course,” she lowered her voice a little, “I -wouldn’t propose it if you did not know quite as well as I do how the -land lies. But, as I think we two old mothers are of one mind on that -point, I shan’t scruple. Let Maud come to me, if she will, while you are -in Devonshire. Oh, of course it needn’t mean anything—it’s an old -promise, you know, and she and I are great friends on our own account. -Talk of the angels!” she went on gaily, nodding towards a slim, white -figure coming towards them with Julian in its immediate wake.</p> - -<p>Maud Pomeroy was looking as pretty and as proper as she had looked every -day since she had emerged from the school-room, but there was a little -flush on her face which was not habitual to her. She returned Mrs. -Romayne’s greeting with the grateful<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_218" id="page_218"></a>{218}</span> cordiality so pretty from a girl -to an older woman, evinced as was her wont more by manner than by -speech; and indeed Mrs. Romayne gave her little time for speech.</p> - -<p>“Your mother has been telling me of this dreadful Devonshire business!” -she said. “And I’ve had what I flatter myself is a happy thought! I want -you to come to me, Maud, dear, while your mother is away. You know you -promised ages ago to let yourself be lent to me for a little while, and -this is the very opportunity, isn’t it?”</p> - -<p>It would not have been “the thing” under the circumstances that any one -of the trio should glance at Julian; consequently no one noticed the -curious flash of expression that passed across his face as his mother -spoke. Maud Pomeroy hesitated and looked dutifully at her mother.</p> - -<p>“It’s very kind of Mrs. Romayne, Maud, dear, isn’t it?” said Mrs. -Pomeroy with noncommittal amiability.</p> - -<p>“It is sweet of her,” responded Maud prettily.</p> - -<p>“Well, then, do let us consider it settled.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_219" id="page_219"></a>{219}</span> I shall enjoy it of all -things. When do you go, dear Mrs. Pomeroy? To-morrow week? Oh, it will -be too tantalising to whisk Maud away when she had just begun to enjoy -herself; wouldn’t it, Maud?”</p> - -<p>Miss Pomeroy hesitated again, and the colour on her cheeks deepened by -just a shade. She did not glance at her mother this time.</p> - -<p>“Thank you very much,” she said at last. “But shan’t I be a nuisance to -you?”</p> - -<p>There was just the touch of charmingly conventional demur in her tone -which made her submission seem, as all her actions seemed, the result of -a gentle, easily influenced temperament. Mrs. Romayne assured her -merrily that she would indeed be a terrible nuisance, but that she -herself would do her best to bear it, and then rose, her eyes very -bright.</p> - -<p>“I must run away now,” she said. “I’m so delighted that we’ve settled -it. Let me know when to expect you, then, dear. Good-bye, Mrs. Pomeroy; -I’ll take every care of your child and return her when you want<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_220" id="page_220"></a>{220}</span> -her—only don’t let it be too soon! I needn’t take you away, sir,” she -continued, turning to Julian. He had been standing by ever since that -flash had passed over his face with an expression of eager interest in -the discussion. “I dare say you’re not in any hurry. No, you need not -even come downstairs with me. I see Mr. Loring. He’ll take care of me, -I’m sure.”</p> - -<p>Mr. Loring, who was within hearing, as the tone of the words -implied—indeed, they were more than half addressed to him—came up -promptly.</p> - -<p>“For how long may I have that privilege?” he said.</p> - -<p>She explained to him lightly as he shook hands with Mrs. Pomeroy and her -daughter, and then with another farewell and a pretty, affectionate “<i>Au -revoir!</i>” to Julian, she turned away with him.</p> - -<p>He put her into her carriage and she held out her hand with a gesture of -thanks and farewell.</p> - -<p>“Thanks,” she said; her tone and manner alike were very friendly and -familiar in the exaggerated style which had certainly grown<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_221" id="page_221"></a>{221}</span> on her; and -they seemed to imply something beyond the superficial interest to which -she had kept, perforce, in her society intercourse with him. “It is so -pleasant to see you again! When will you come to see me quietly? Before -you are hard at work, you know! To-morrow, now? To-morrow happens to be -a free day with me. Come to tea. Good bye!”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_222" id="page_222"></a>{222}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">Ten</span> minutes after Mrs. Romayne’s departure Julian was standing before -Mrs. Pomeroy, his whole demeanour typical of the man who lingers, -knowing that he should linger no longer.</p> - -<p>“What a nuisance appointments are!” he said, with a boyish frankness of -discontent which was irresistible. “I wish I could stay a little longer, -but I know I oughtn’t.” He laughed quite ruefully, and fixed a pair of -ardent eyes on Miss Pomeroy’s demurely averted face. “It’s been such an -awfully jolly affair, hasn’t it? And it’s so awfully jolly to have you -in town again”—this, with delightful deference, to Mrs. Pomeroy. “Well, -I really must go, you know! Good-bye! Perhaps you won’t be staying very -much longer?”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_223" id="page_223"></a>{223}</span></p> - -<p>“If you stay here bemoaning yourself very much longer we shall probably -leave before you do!” suggested Miss Pomeroy, with the rather faint -smile which was the only sign of amusement she ever gave, and which -always accompanied her own mild witticisms. Julian turned to her -eagerly.</p> - -<p>“Now, that’s awfully unkind!” he said. “You won’t bully me like that in -Queen Anne Street, will you?” The term “bullying” was so profoundly -inapplicable to Miss Pomeroy’s words that its use suggested a certain -amount of arrangement rather than absolute spontaneity about Julian’s -speech. But exaggeration was the fashion, and not to be commented on. -“Come in a very kind frame of mind, won’t you?” he went on pleadingly.</p> - -<p>“Am I a very violent person?” the girl answered, with the same smile. -“Good-bye!” She held out her hand as she spoke, and Julian took it with -laughing reluctance.</p> - -<p>“You are an absolutely heartless person,” he said daringly, “to dismiss -me like this! However, I suppose you are right. If you<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_224" id="page_224"></a>{224}</span> didn’t dismiss -me I probably shouldn’t go, and I really ought, you know!”</p> - -<p>“You’ve told us that before; now do it!” was the answer. “Good-bye!”</p> - -<p>“Good-bye!” returned Julian, with mock meekness. He shook hands again, -which seemed hardly necessary, and then he turned away.</p> - -<p>But the necessity which enforced his departure had apparently slackened -its pressure on him by the time he actually left the house. As he walked -away down the street there was no sign about him of that haste which -should characterise a man who has lingered to the risking of an -appointment, or who has, indeed, any engagement in immediate prospect. -The bride and bridegroom had already left, and people were beginning to -go, and until he reached the end of the street in which was Mrs. Halse’s -house, he was passed every instant by carriages to whose occupants his -hat had to be smilingly lifted. Then he turned into a main thoroughfare, -and hailed a hansom—still not in the least like a man in a hurry. He -gave the cabman an address in the Temple, and was driven away.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_225" id="page_225"></a>{225}</span></p> - -<p>His face as he went would have been a curious study to any onlooker -possessed of the key to its expression; to any onlooker who could have -detected the constant struggle for dominance between something that -seemed to lie behind its new artificiality and that artificiality -itself, evidently maintained under an instinctive sense of the chances -of observation. It was not until he turned his key in the lock of a set -of chambers in the Temple that the boyish vivacity died wholly out of -his face; he went into his room—he shared the chambers with another -embryo barrister—shutting the door behind him; and as he did so he -seemed to have shut in, not the light-hearted young fellow who had paid -the cabman in the street below, but another man altogether. No one -looking at him now could doubt that this was the real Julian Romayne of -to-day, as certainly as that light-hearted young fellow had been the -real Julian Romayne of a year ago. This was a man with a hard, angry -face; a face on which the anger stood revealed, not as the expression of -the moment, but as the normal expression of<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_226" id="page_226"></a>{226}</span> a mind always sore, always -at war, always fiercely implacable.</p> - -<p>The room was plainly, almost barely furnished, and there was no trace of -any of the luxury that surrounded him in Queen Anne Street. His smart, -carefully got-up figure looked absolutely incongruous among such unusual -surroundings, as he crossed to the window, and flinging himself down in -a shabby easy-chair, lighted a cigarette. He threw his cigarette-case on -the table, and then drew out of the breast-pocket of his coat a couple -of letters.</p> - -<p>He had read them before, evidently, but as evidently they had lost none -of their interest for him. He read them both through attentively, and as -he did so there came to his mouth a set which his mother, could she have -seen it, would have recognised instantly; which any one, indeed, must -have recognised who had ever seen his dead father. Both the letters -dealt with money matters; one was from a bookmaker, the other from a -broker whose name was far from bearing an unblemished character in the -City; and both referred to large sums of money recently made<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_227" id="page_227"></a>{227}</span> on the -turf and on the Stock Exchange by Julian Romayne.</p> - -<p>He flung the last on the table as he finished it, and there was an -expression in his eyes of reckless, rebellious triumph not good to see.</p> - -<p>“It’s a good haul!” he said, half aloud. “A good haul! Now, with what -I’ve got already——” He rose and went across to the writing-table, -unlocked a drawer, and taking out various papers, began to make rapid -calculations.</p> - -<p>Then—his eyes hard and intent on his work—he stretched out his hand -and felt in the drawer for another paper. He took out an envelope, and -drew out the letter it contained without glancing at it. A folded paper -fell out as he did so, and as though the slight sound had roused him, he -glanced at it quickly, and from it to the open letter in his hand. -Apparently it was not the letter to which he had intended to refer, for -his face changed suddenly and completely.</p> - -<p>“I can’t take your money. Try and understand that I can’t!—Clemence.”</p> - -<p>His fingers tightened upon the thin sheet<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_228" id="page_228"></a>{228}</span> of paper until the knuckles -whitened, and the eager calculation vanished utterly from his face, -overwhelmed as it seemed by the fierce tumult of warring passions that -struggled now in every line. Impotent anger which was the more violent -for something within itself which was not anger; reckless defiance; a -wild, raging desperation behind all, which was nearly hatred; all these -emotions were faintly shadowed forth on his face as he stared down at -the few simple words. All these emotions had been surging in his heart -during the six months that were gone, and it was their unceasing strife -and tumult which was rousing into life the new Julian Romayne, latent -for so many years.</p> - -<p>It was to that which was least broadly painted on his face that all -these passionate forces owed their life. As with a wild animal wounded -by a dart, and feeling that dart—lodged in his side—pricking and -piercing him, who plunges wildly hither and thither, chafing and -striving in blind, brute fashion to rid himself of the sensation he -cannot understand; and in his very efforts presses in the cause of his -pain, increases his sufferings,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_229" id="page_229"></a>{229}</span> and again redoubles his struggles and -his fury, not knowing that he is his own tormentor; so it had been, in a -sense, with Julian Romayne during the last six months. The dart in his -case was double-edged; its edges were the strange, weak reality of his -love for Clemence, and a stinging sense of shame. It had lodged in that -almost inanimate better part of his nature. He had left that little room -in Camden Town smarting and wincing under it, and it had never ceased to -prick him since. Scarcely less blind and ignorant under such -circumstances than “a beast having no understanding” in his total want -of all principle, except the principles of worldly wisdom, with his -utterly dormant moral perception—his morality, such as it was, being -the merest matter of habit and conventionality—the effect on him of the -smart was first the developement in him of a blind, unreasoning -resentment; and then, as anger proved of no avail, a passionate rousing -and rising of all his latent forces in repudiation of his discomfort.</p> - -<p>To charge upon some one else the difficulties which he had created for -himself, to<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_230" id="page_230"></a>{230}</span> provide some object against which his blind sense of wrath -and rebellion could pit itself, was a primary instinct with such a -nature as Julian’s, so situated, and that object was ready to his hand. -The first article in the faith of the new Julian Romayne was the belief -that he had been forced into his present position by his mother; that he -had been parted from his wife by his mother; that he had been covered -with humiliation by his mother. Every fresh stab, every movement of -revolt, as that two-edged dart pressed itself deeper into his -consciousness with every struggle he made for freedom, added something -to the account he held against her; increased the bitterness of his -resentment against her and brought it one degree nearer to hatred. His -love for her, in spite of its charm of expression, had been the merest -boyish sentiment; with no roots deeper than those afforded by easy -companionship and apparent indulgence; founded on habit and expediency -rather than on respect. Real devotion would have seemed out of place in -the atmosphere of affectation and superficiality in which he had been -reared,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_231" id="page_231"></a>{231}</span> and he had known only its travesty. On this, the first real -conflict between his will and hers, that travesty showed itself for what -it was, and shrivelled into nothingness. To free himself from her -control, became the one object and desire of his life. In doing this, -and in doing this only, to his distorted perceptions, lay release from -the stinging, goading misery of his present life, and to do this one -means only was adequate—money. With money at his command the victory, -as he conceived it, would be his. Some centre, some mainspring had -necessarily to grow up in the confused strivings and blind, desperate -impulses of a newly-awakened nature, and gradually that centre had -declared itself in an unreasoning determination to make money.</p> - -<p>But there were in Julian Romayne tendencies, latent, or nearly so, -throughout his youth and early manhood; manifested during those easy, -untempted periods only in a slight superficiality, a slight want of -perception as to the boundary line between truth and falsehood; but -radical factors in his being. In the shock and jar of the mental -struggle and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_232" id="page_232"></a>{232}</span> quickening involved in the continued presence in his -consciousness of that remorseless dart, these tendencies leapt into -over-stimulated life and grew, strengthened, and developed, with the -unnatural rapidity of such life, until his whole character seemed to be -over-shadowed by them. In Julian Romayne’s being, woven in and out with -the threads which had hitherto seemed so pliable and colourless; those -threads of all shades, from pure white to dark grey, which make up -character in every man; were sundry grim black threads—threads such as -are only to be plucked out when the very heart’s blood of the man has -spent itself in the struggle, and when in that struggle he has come very -near to God. It may be that the sins of the fathers are indeed visited -on the children in this sense; in the dictation of the form taken by -that struggle with evil which is every man’s portion; and sometimes—for -purposes of which no man may presume to judge—in the exceptional agony -of that struggle. Julian Romayne, the son of a liar and thief, and, -moreover, of a woman whose morality was the morality of conventionality<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_233" id="page_233"></a>{233}</span> -and nothing more, had an instinctive faculty for, an instinctive -inclination towards, dishonesty of word and deed. Such a twist of his -moral consciousness as had been predicted for him, a little child of -five years old, by Dr. Aston, had lain dormant among the possibilities -of his being throughout the nineteen years that intervened. It was this -inheritance which, in the sudden upheaval of his moral nature, had -awakened, asserted itself, and seized, as it were, the first place in -his nature.</p> - -<p>Throughout his boyhood, easy as it had been, untouched by any strong -passion or desire, he had lied now and again, naturally and -instinctively. He had lied to save himself trouble, to save himself some -slight reproach—as he had lied to his mother on the subject of his -visit to Alexandria, to save himself from the confession of having -forgotten her commission. He had lied to Clemence from first to last, -and the first prick of that dart, which was now his constant companion, -had touched him when he first felt shame for those lies. But there was a -reckless, calculating deception about his life<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_234" id="page_234"></a>{234}</span> now which went deeper -and meant more. He lied to his mother with every word and action, and -with the unreasoning cruelty of his mental attitude towards her—there -is nothing towards which a man can be so heartless as the object to -which he has transferred his own wrong-doing—he hugged his deception of -her, and revelled in the sense of independence and power it gave him. -The endless deception which the fundamental falsity of his present life -necessitated, radiated on every side. To please his mother, as he told -himself with an ugly smile, he had flirted with Miss Pomeroy in the -early part of the winter until—a certain distance in her manner to him -melting—he had hailed her departure for Cannes as a blessed reprieve. -He had flirted with her this afternoon at Mrs. Halse’s, excited by the -news contained in the two letters he had since re-read, reckless in the -prospect of release they brought nearer to him, and with a certain -delight in the daring defiance of consequences. He had lied to Lord -Garstin when that good-natured mentor had let fall a warning word as to -the “bad form” of gambling; he lied to his coach<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_235" id="page_235"></a>{235}</span> when his frequent -absences were commented on.</p> - -<p>In that desperate craving for money, in which all the passion of his -life was centering itself, dishonesty of deed was the natural and -inevitable corollary of dishonesty of word. The possession of money was -his one object in life; his conscience as to the means by which that -money was to be obtained he deliberately put into abeyance for the time -being. He had become possessed in the course of the last six months of -some thousands, not one of which had been earned by honest work; much of -which had come to him by more than questionable means.</p> - -<p>That two-edged dart must have been finely tempered that it never seemed -to blunt! The dormant life in that higher part of him, to which it had -penetrated, must have been life indeed, that it should throb and quiver -stronger and stronger, side by side with all that was lowest and worst -in him, making the struggle grow always fiercer, and goading him on and -on. The dart owed its edge, the life its growing<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_236" id="page_236"></a>{236}</span> sensitiveness, to a -touch which lay always on Julian’s consciousness, haunting him night and -day. Not to be driven away or obliterated; not to be crowded out of his -soul by any stress of evil passion; a white light on the soiled, tangled -web of his life, which shone steadily in the strength of a power no -struggle of his could touch; was the thought of Clemence. Clemence, who -had trusted him; Clemence, hoping, longing, loving him, as he knew in -every wretched fibre; Clemence, for whose presence he longed at times -with a heart-sickness of longing which reacted in a very orgy of -passionate bitterness. He had received a note from her a few days after -her disappearance, telling him in a few simple words that she had got -work; that she relied on him not to drive her out of it by trying to see -her, until he “was ready,” as she phrased it. Again and again a reckless -impulse to see her, and force his will upon her, had seized him, but -something had always held him back. Again and again he had sent her -money, always to have it returned to him with a little line of hope or -patience. In the reception of those notes;<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_237" id="page_237"></a>{237}</span> in the writhing love, and -longing, and shame they stirred in him, the dart went home and tortured -him indeed.</p> - -<p>He crushed the sheet of common note-paper almost fiercely in his hand -now, and thrust it away to the back of the drawer from which it had -come. He caught up the paper which had fallen from it—the cheque he had -sent her three days before—and tore it savagely into fragments. Then he -swept the papers on which he had been busy unheedingly into a drawer, -locked it sharply, and rose, white to the very lips.</p> - -<p>“It can’t be long now,” he muttered. “It shan’t be! Men make their piles -in a day—in an hour; why should not I? It shan’t be long!”</p> - -<p>He stood for a moment, his hand clenched, his features compressed, his -eyes full of a sullen fire. Then he turned sharply away and left the -room.</p> - -<p>There was no trace of any fire about him, however, except the harmless -irradiation of youth and good spirits, when he opened the door of his -mother’s drawing-room a few minutes before their dinner-hour. He had<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_238" id="page_238"></a>{238}</span> -spent the intervening hour at his club, the most lightly good-natured, -and thoroughly easy-going and irresponsible young man there, and there -was precisely the same character about him now as he crossed the room to -his mother.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_239" id="page_239"></a>{239}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">There</span> had been a slight, sudden movement as Julian opened the door, as -though Mrs. Romayne had changed her attitude quickly. She was leaning -forward now, looking at an illustrated paper, but the cushions behind -her were tumbled and crushed, as if she had been leaning back on them, -and leaning heavily. She was wearing a tea-gown, and she seemed to keep -her face rather carefully in shadow.</p> - -<p>“Rather an amusing party, wasn’t it?” she said lightly, looking up as he -came in. “Everybody goes to that woman’s. I can’t imagine why. Well, and -is there any news, sir?”</p> - -<p>“I’m afraid not,” returned Julian gaily. “I’ve spent an hour at the club -to try and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_240" id="page_240"></a>{240}</span> pick up some crumbs for you, but there was nothing going.”</p> - -<p>The manner of each to the other was precisely the same, now that they -were alone together, as it had been when they addressed one another -incidentally in the course of general conversation. The very familiarity -between them had a flavour of artificiality about it, and that flavour -was mainly given, strangely enough, by Mrs. Romayne rather than by -Julian. It was her manner, not his, that lacked ease and overdid the -spontaneity. They chatted brightly about men and things, but she never -asked him a single personal question, though at any incidental allusion -let fall by him as to his doings a faint contraction of the muscles -about her eyes gave her a hungry, concentrated look, as of a creature -catching at a crumb. It seemed to be in a great measure that tendency to -keen intentness of expression which had so greatly altered her face.</p> - -<p>“You see I’ve been lazy!” she said lightly, indicating her dress with a -slight gesture as they sat down to dinner. They were going out in the -evening, and she<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_241" id="page_241"></a>{241}</span> usually dressed before dinner on such occasions. “I -really couldn’t be bothered to dress before!”</p> - -<p>The lamplight was full on her face now, and Julian, his attention drawn -to her by the words, saw that she looked frightfully haggard and worn -under her paint and her little air of gaiety. Paint had ceased to be an -appendage of full dress with her since her three days’ illness. The -combination added a touch of repulsion to his feeling towards her. But -his tone as he answered her was the tone of affectionate concern, -over-elaborated by the merest shade only.</p> - -<p>“You’ve not over-tired yourself, I hope, dear?” he said. “I don’t -believe you ought to go out again to-night, do you know!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne’s thin fingers were tearing fiercely at the -pocket-handkerchief in her lap as he spoke, and her eyes were bright -with pain. It seemed as though her ears had caught that subtle shade of -over-elaboration, though they must have been quick indeed to do so. But -she answered, almost before he had finished speaking, in a rather -high-pitched tone of eager determination.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_242" id="page_242"></a>{242}</span></p> - -<p>“Silliest of boys,” she said; “the topic is threadbare. I am quite well! -Oh, it is very evident that my retiring to bed for a day or two is an -unparalleled event, or you would not be quite so slow in grasping the -fact that it is possible to recover after such a terrific crisis! Now, -do promise not to talk any more about what you don’t in the least -understand!”</p> - -<p>The merriment of her tone was fictitious, even to Julian’s unheeding -ear, but he took it up with a mental shrug of his shoulders. It was not -his fault, he told himself, if she would overdo herself for the sake of -a little excitement.</p> - -<p>He told himself the same thing, carelessly enough, when he put her into -her carriage two or three hours later. It was early; Mrs. Romayne had -declared the party to be insufferably dull and had stayed only half an -hour, during which time she had been as vivacious and attractive as -usual. But towards the end her eyes had become feverishly bright, and -Julian, as he took her out, could feel that she was trembling from head -to foot.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_243" id="page_243"></a>{243}</span></p> - -<p>“Are you coming home?” she said to him.</p> - -<p>“Well, if you don’t mind, dear, I was thinking of going to look up -Loring at the club.”</p> - -<p>A breath of relief parted Mrs. Romayne’s lips, and she answered hastily. -Apparently she had no desire for her son’s company on her way home.</p> - -<p>“Go, by all means!” she said. “Of course I don’t mind!”</p> - -<p>She pulled up the window almost abruptly, nodding to him with a smile, -the singular ghastliness of which was, presumably, referable to some -effect of gaslight. Then as the carriage rolled away she sank back and -let her face relax into an expression of utter weariness, with a little -gasping catch of her breath as of deadly physical exhaustion.</p> - -<p>His words about Loring had been a mere figure of speech on Julian’s -part, but he did intend to go to the club, and he carried his intention -into effect. He glanced round the smoking-room as he went in to see if -Loring was there, but the fact that he was not visible in no way -affected his serenity.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_244" id="page_244"></a>{244}</span> He was so altered from the boy of a twelvemonth -before, and his intercourse with Loring had been so completely suspended -during the period of his developement, that their friendship seemed now -to belong to some previous phase of his existence; it was his sense that -he had passed utterly out of touch with the man with whom he had once -been intimate, together with a conviction that Loring’s keen perceptions -would be by no means a desirable factor in his surroundings at the -moment, that had dictated his demonstration of delight at Loring’s -reappearance. An outward show of enthusiasm was a very effective blind, -in his opinion.</p> - -<p>His manner was regulated on the same principle on Loring’s appearance in -the smoking-room about half an hour later. He was on his way to the -card-room, and he was anything but pleased at the frustration of his -plans in that direction; but his reception of Loring indicated, rather, -that he had spent the last half-hour in watching for him.</p> - -<p>“Here you are at last, old man!” he cried. “I thought you’d turn up some -time or other! What became of you this afternoon? I never<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_245" id="page_245"></a>{245}</span> saw you after -you disappeared with my mother.”</p> - -<p>The two men had met close to the door, and they were still standing, -Loring, as <i>blasé</i> and imperturbable-looking as usual, with his -observant eyes on Julian’s face.</p> - -<p>“I didn’t care to spoil sport!” he returned with a significant smile. -“You seemed to be particularly well employed!”</p> - -<p>Julian laughed—the conscious, not ill-pleased laugh which belonged to -his part. Such contingencies were all incidental to the situation.</p> - -<p>“Oh, come, old boy,” he said deprecatingly. Then he laughed again, and -added: “I suppose my mother said something to you?”</p> - -<p>“No!” returned Loring quietly. “I happen to have eyes, you see!”</p> - -<p>“Don’t make magnifying glasses of them, then!” was the laughing retort. -“Now then, there are several fellows here who have been asking for you.”</p> - -<p>But as Julian glanced round he became aware that the room chanced to be -almost empty. Loring understood at the same time<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_246" id="page_246"></a>{246}</span> that he had wished to -make the conversation general and impersonal, and a slight smile touched -his lips.</p> - -<p>Marston Loring had various reasons of his own for not intending to allow -himself to be eluded by Julian Romayne. The change in the young man -alone would have excited his curiosity; and sundry details which had -already come to his knowledge, notably one across which he had stumbled -in the City that morning, had quickened that curiosity. His suspicions -of the preceding autumn, that there was something behind Julian’s life -as it appeared on the surface, were by no means forgotten by him. His -departure for Africa had taken him out of the way of the crisis, but he -more than half suspected that a crisis there had been. The connection -between the present and the past, and the means by which it could be -most advantageously applied to the furtherance of his own ends, were the -problems he had set himself to solve.</p> - -<p>“We’re rather in luck!” he said. “We can have a quiet chat together.”</p> - -<p>He established himself lazily and comfortably<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_247" id="page_247"></a>{247}</span> as he spoke, as Julian -with much apparent satisfaction flung himself into another chair, and -took out his cigar-case.</p> - -<p>Julian’s questions followed one another thick and fast. His interest in -his friend’s life during the last six months seemed to be inexhaustible -in its intelligence and sympathy. He had a great deal to tell, too; and -he told it so fluently and gaily as almost to disguise the fact that the -allusions to his own doings were of the most superficial type. But at -last there was a pause. Julian was pulling out his watch, and saying -something about going home, when Loring lighted a fresh cigar and opened -the proceedings—as he conceived them.</p> - -<p>“I heard of you in the City this morning!” he said nonchalantly.</p> - -<p>There was no pause in the movement with which Julian returned his watch -to his pocket; nothing, absolutely, to betray the fact that the words -were a surprise to him. Yet they were a surprise, and an exceedingly -unpleasant one. His transactions in the City he had arranged to keep -secret; that their nature should become known was<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_248" id="page_248"></a>{248}</span> eminently -undesirable, and he had decided that the fact itself would be -inconsistent with his pose before the world. That Loring should be the -man to unearth them was exceptionally unfortunate.</p> - -<p>“Did you?” he said lightly; “and who was saying what of me in the -City—a vague locality, by-the-bye.”</p> - -<p>“The introduction of your name was accidental—accidents will happen, -you know, even in Adams’s office. Is that a definite locality enough to -please you?”</p> - -<p>Julian burst into a boyish laugh and flung himself back in his chair; he -carried his cigar to his lips as he did so, not noticing apparently that -it had gone out. Loring noticed it, however.</p> - -<p>“What a fellow you are, Loring!” he cried. “You’ve not been in England -three days before you unearth a poor chap’s most private little games! I -say, you’ll keep it dark, won’t you? I wouldn’t have it come round to my -mother, you know! She’s so awfully generous to me, and it might hurt her -feelings.”</p> - -<p>There was an ingenuous frankness and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_249" id="page_249"></a>{249}</span> confidence in his voice which gave -to the whole affair the aspect of a youthful escapade. Loring smiled as -he answered:</p> - -<p>“I wouldn’t have a hand in hurting Mrs. Romayne’s feelings for the -world.” He paused a moment, and then added carelessly, as if the whole -transaction was the merest matter of course: “Been doing much?”</p> - -<p>Julian shook his head.</p> - -<p>“No, of course not,” he said lightly. “Only a little occasional lark, -don’t you know. I leave the big things to clever fellows like you. -By-the-bye, Loring, I’d no idea you did anything in that way.”</p> - -<p>Loring puffed slowly at his cigar before he answered.</p> - -<p>“I’m an old hand,” he said nonchalantly. “I wait for certainties, my -boy!” He paused again. “To tell you the truth,” he said slowly, -fastening a keen, cleverly-veiled gaze on Julian’s face, “I did not ask -the question altogether idly. It occurred to me that if you had made -anything worth mentioning you might be on the look-out for a means -of—well, we’ll put it mildly and say—increasing it.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_250" id="page_250"></a>{250}</span></p> - -<p>There was considerable meaning in Loring’s voice, careless as it was. -Julian became very still, and into his eyes there crept an eager, hungry -light which harmonised ill with the fixed nonchalance of the rest of his -features as he answered with a laugh:</p> - -<p>“I don’t know the fellow who could refuse to admit that soft -impeachment! We’re all in the same boat as far as that goes, I take it. -You haven’t got a good thing up your sleeve, old man, have you?”</p> - -<p>Loring smiled ambiguously.</p> - -<p>“Most ‘good things’ would come to an untimely end if every one with a -finger in them spread them abroad, my boy!” he observed. “Since it can’t -concern you personally—if you’ve no capital—we’ll say no more about -it.”</p> - -<p>A certain amount of Loring’s practice dealt with financial affairs; he -was no mean authority on City matters, and there was something about his -manner indescribably provocative. Julian leaned forward with a movement -of irrepressible eagerness.</p> - -<p>“Is it really a good thing?” he said. He spoke with a quick, low-toned -directness<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_251" id="page_251"></a>{251}</span> which put aside the fencing of the previous dialogue, and -replied not to what Loring had said, but to what he had implied. Loring -looked him full in the face and answered laconically and significantly:</p> - -<p>“Rather!”</p> - -<p>The hungry light was burning fiercely in Julian’s eyes, and he turned -his face away from Loring and began to fidget with an ash-tray lying on -the table by him.</p> - -<p>“Capital?” he said. “What do you call capital, now?”</p> - -<p>“Oh, anything between ten thousand and five-and-twenty thousand,” said -Loring carelessly.</p> - -<p>There was a silence. Julian’s brain was working feverishly, and Loring -was well content to let it work. At last Julian began to speak in a low, -rapid tone, with the air of one who has made up his mind to frank -confidence. He had intended to keep Loring at arm’s length; he had -decided now to play a bolder game, and use him.</p> - -<p>“Look here, Loring,” he said, “I may as well make a clean breast of it! -I have gone a bit farther than I said. You see,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_252" id="page_252"></a>{252}</span> as I told you, my -mother’s most awfully generous, and I wouldn’t let a hint of this get to -her for the world; but a man doesn’t like to feel that he’s dependent on -his mother for everything, don’t you know—especially if he’s thinking -of marrying. You know what it is when one once begins to feel the money -come in! I’ve gone on, you see—as lots of fellows do—and I’ve got a -tidy little pile. Of course I’m very keen on making it more -before—well, before I propose, don’t you know! And if you can give me a -lift up I shall be eternally obliged.”</p> - -<p>He stopped, and Loring smoked for a minute or two in silence. At last he -said slowly:</p> - -<p>“I understand! It’s natural, of course. Well, I don’t stand alone in the -affair, to tell you the truth. There’s another man to be consulted. But -I’ll talk the matter over with him, and if I can manage to get you in -you may be sure I will. You shall have a line in a day or two, or I’ll -see you again.” Loring dropped the end of his cigar into the ash-tray -and rose.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_253" id="page_253"></a>{253}</span></p> - -<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV</h2> - -<p class="nind"><span class="smcap">The</span> clock in Mrs. Romayne’s drawing-room chimed the half-hour—half-past -four—and Mrs. Romayne glanced up as she heard it. She was alone, -sitting at her writing-table answering invitations. She was looking -better than she had looked on the preceding day—less haggard, and -physically stronger.</p> - -<p>She answered and put aside the last invitation-card, and then she drew -out a letter in a straight, clear, girl’s writing. It was signed: -“Affectionately yours, Maud Pomeroy,” and it bore reference to Miss -Pomeroy’s prospective visit to her. Mrs. Romayne glanced through it, the -vigour of her face seeming to accentuate as she did so, and then -proceeded to write a few cordial, affectionate lines in answer. She was -just directing the envelope when a servant came in with tea.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_254" id="page_254"></a>{254}</span></p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne rose.</p> - -<p>“Send these letters to the post,” she said.</p> - -<p>She glanced at the clock again as she spoke, and at that moment the -front-door bell rang.</p> - -<p>Left alone, Mrs. Romayne moved quickly to the looking-glass, and took an -anxious, critical look at herself; it was as though she had learnt to -distrust her appearance. The inspection, however, proved satisfactory, -apparently; and as she turned quickly away as she heard steps upon the -stairs, there was a self-dependence and sense of power in the bright, -expectant keenness of her eyes.</p> - -<p>“Mr. Loring!” announced the servant, and Mr. Loring followed his name -into the room.</p> - -<p>“I am very glad to see you,” said Mrs. Romayne, advancing to meet him. -“This is a much better way of welcoming a friend than our meeting -yesterday. I think I shall celebrate the occasion by saying not at home -to any one else. Julian will be in, perhaps, and he will like to have -you to himself. Not at home, Dawson,” she added in conclusion.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_255" id="page_255"></a>{255}</span></p> - -<p>There was a verve and brightness about her manner which was not exactly -its usual vivacity, and which faintly suggested the presence of some -kind of special excitement in her mind.</p> - -<p>Loring’s perceptions were in a state of rather abnormal acuteness; the -situation had meanings for him, which had braced up his forces not -inconsiderably. He detected that inward excitement about Mrs. Romayne -instantly, and he was convinced also, though he could hardly have given -a reason for the conviction, that there was not the smallest chance of -Julian’s appearance. Both circumstances he reckoned as points in his -favour in the game he was going to play.</p> - -<p>“It’s very charming of you,” he said. “Do you know this is the first -time I have really felt that coming back to London means—something.”</p> - -<p>He took the chair she had indicated to him on the other side of the -little tea-table as he spoke, and there was nothing lame or unfinished -about the words spoken as he spoke them. His eyes were fixed upon Mrs. -Romayne, but she was pouring out tea with<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_256" id="page_256"></a>{256}</span> so intent a look on her face -as almost to suggest preoccupation. She did not look up, nor did the -tone of his voice reach her, except superficially, apparently, for she -replied with a pleasant, friendly laugh.</p> - -<p>“I should hope it did mean ‘something,’ indeed,” she said. “Friends -should count for ‘something,’ surely, especially when they have really -taken the trouble to miss you very much. Have you had such an unusually -fascinating time in Africa, then?”</p> - -<p>She handed him a cup of tea, and as he rose to take it from her, he -answered:</p> - -<p>“Well, not exactly that. I’m afraid I don’t believe in fascinating -times, you know. Perhaps I am too much of a pessimist.”</p> - -<p>He spoke with that tone of personal revelation and confidence which is -always more or less attractive to a woman, coming from a man; and Mrs. -Romayne responded with the gentle loftiness of sympathy which the -position demanded.</p> - -<p>“I’ve often been afraid you felt like that,” she said. “And it is really -quite wrong of you, don’t you know. You ought to be such a particularly -well-satisfied person! I suppose<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_257" id="page_257"></a>{257}</span> you are horribly ambitious? Now, tell -me, has your business gone off as well as you hoped? I have been so -interested in your delightful articles!”</p> - -<p>“Does anything go off as well as one had hoped?” was the reply, spoken -with a cynical smile, indeed, but with a certain daring deprecation of -her disapproval, which was not unattractive. “No, I ought not to carp,” -he continued quickly. “I have every reason to be satisfied.”</p> - -<p>His tone implied considerably more in the way of success and latent -possibilities about his present position than the words themselves -conveyed; and Mrs. Romayne answered with cordial, delicately-expressed -congratulations, which drifted into a species of general questionings as -to his doings, less directly personal, but implying that he might count -on her sympathy if he chose to confide in her in greater detail. This -was no part of Loring’s plan, however. He led by almost imperceptible -degrees away from the subject, and before very long they were talking -London gossip as though he had never been away, the only perceptible -result of his absence<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_258" id="page_258"></a>{258}</span> evincing itself in the touch of additional -intimacy which his return seemed to have given their relations, -necessarily at Mrs. Romayne’s instigation.</p> - -<p>The talk touched here and there, and by-and-by an enquiry from Loring -after a mutual friend elicited a crisper laugh than usual, and an -expressive movement of the eyebrows, from Mrs. Romayne.</p> - -<p>“Haven’t you heard?” she said. “Oh, it’s an old story now, of course! -Well, they don’t come to town this season, I believe. Lady Ashton -suffers from—neuralgia!”</p> - -<p>She laughed again, and then in response to a cynical and incredulously -interrogative ejaculation from Loring, she clasped her hands lightly on -her knee and went on with the animation of a woman who has a good story -to tell and enjoys telling it.</p> - -<p>“She contracted the complaint, they say, in a poky little church in -Kensington into which Gladys Ashton strolled one morning and got herself -married. Oh, dear no! Her mother wasn’t there! That’s one of the points -of the affair. And Lord Rochdale wasn’t there either.”<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_259" id="page_259"></a>{259}</span></p> - -<p>“Gladys Ashton jilted Rochdale after all!”</p> - -<p>“After all!” assented Mrs. Romayne gaily. “After all that poor woman’s -trouble, after the quite pathetic way in which she has slaved to catch -him, she gets a letter from the ungrateful girl—at an afternoon tea, -too, heaps of people there—to say that she is Mrs. Bob Stewart. -Baccarat Bob you wretched men at the clubs call him, don’t you?”</p> - -<p>“That was enough to induce convulsions, let alone neuralgia,” commented -Loring.</p> - -<p>They both laughed, and the laugh was succeeded by a moment’s silence. -Then Loring said casually:</p> - -<p>“What has become of your cousin, Falconer, among other people, -by-the-bye? I don’t hear anything of him, and his grim presence was -hardly to be overlooked. Have you any little escapade of his to reveal, -now?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne laughed a little harshly.</p> - -<p>“Unfortunately not,” she said. “His absence is due to the most -characteristically orthodox causes. He was ill about three months ago. -He went into a hospital sort<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_260" id="page_260"></a>{260}</span> of place—one of those new things—and he -was rather bad. Now he’s somewhere or other recovering. I fancy he won’t -be in London again yet.”</p> - -<p>Loring received the news with a comment as indifferent as his question -had been, and then there fell a second silence. Loring’s eyes, very keen -and calculating, were fixed upon the carpet; on Mrs. Romayne’s face was -an accentuation of the intent, preoccupied look which had lain behind -all her previous gaiety. The two faces suggested curiously that the man -and woman alike felt individually and each irrespective of the other -that something in the shape of a prologue was over, and that the real -interest of the interview might begin.</p> - -<p>The silence was broken by Mrs. Romayne; she pushed the tea-table further -from her and leaned back in her chair, as she said casually:</p> - -<p>“Did you and Julian meet at the club last night?”</p> - -<p>Loring followed her example and took an easier and more careless pose.</p> - -<p>“Yes!” he said. “We had an hour’s<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_261" id="page_261"></a>{261}</span> talk together. I was very glad I had -looked in. I hardly expected to find him there!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Romayne laughed, and the sound was rather forced. “Oh,” she said -lightly, “he is a tremendous clubbist! All young men go through the -phase, don’t you think?” She paused a moment, and her voice sounded as -though her breath was coming rather quickly as she said carelessly:</p> - -<p>“You find him a good deal altered, I dare say? Six months”—she paused; -her breath was troublesome—“six months makes such a difference at his -time of life!” she finished.</p> - -<p>Loring looked at her. He had long ago decided that when a woman was -“made up” it was of very little use to direct observation to anything -but her eyes.</p> - -<p>“Yes!” he said reflectively, as though debating a question already -existing in his mind, and answering it for the first time. “He is -altered! I suppose—yes, I suppose six months must make a difference!”</p> - -<p>A sharp breath as at a sudden stab of pain had parted Mrs. Romayne’s -lips at his<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_262" id="page_262"></a>{262}</span> first words, and he saw a hard, defiant brightness come -into her eyes.</p> - -<p>“I was very glad to see—well, may one allude to what one could not help -seeing yesterday?” he went on in another and much lighter tone.</p> - -<p>“One may allude to it confidentially!” returned Mrs. Romayne, and her -tone was rather high-pitched and uneven. “Not otherwise, I am sorry to -say—at present! Did Julian say anything about it?” Her tone as she -asked the question was carelessness itself, but her fingers were tightly -clenched round her handkerchief as she waited for the answer.</p> - -<p>“A word or two!” returned Loring. “I inferred that it was only a -question of time. Has it been going on long?”</p> - -<p>“All the winter!” she answered, and again there was that little forced -laugh. “You see, unfortunately, ‘she’ has been away! I had hoped that it -would have come off before she went away, but it didn’t!”</p> - -<p>She stopped rather abruptly; and Loring, watching her keenly, said:<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_263" id="page_263"></a>{263}</span></p> - -<p>“You think it is time he should marry?”</p> - -<p>“I think—well, yes, I suppose I do! Don’t you agree with me? You young -men are so apt to get into mischief, you know!”</p> - -<p>“I suppose I can hardly deny the general principle,” answered Loring -with a slight smile, “though it is some time since I have been a young -man in any practical sense! But as to Julian, I hardly know——”</p> - -<p>“But you must know!” returned Mrs. Romayne quickly, and with an affected -laugh. “And you must know, in the first place, that I’m relying on you -for a good deal of co-operation—oh, of course, not in these delicate -affairs!”</p> - -<p>A certain shade of attention—just that attention which might become -gravely or gaily sympathetic according to the demand made upon -him—appeared in Loring’s manner. He replied to her last words with a -gesture of mock deprecation which answered the tone in which they were -spoken; but a quiet, reliable interest touched his voice as he spoke, -which seemed to respond rather to the possibilities of the situation.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_264" id="page_264"></a>{264}</span></p> - -<p>“You have only to command me!” he said.</p> - -<p>There was a hungry intentness about Mrs. Romayne’s mouth now, and about -her clenched hand, which only a tremendous effort and the sacrifice of -all reality of tone could have kept out of her voice.</p> - -<p>“To tell you the truth,” she said lightly, “there was rather a -catastrophe in the autumn; a girl, you know, silly boy—the usual thing! -I fancy it has upset him a good deal in every way, and there is nothing -like marriage for settling a young man down after such an affair!”</p> - -<p>She paused as though—while her confidence in her statement, and the -point of view from which she had presented the matter stood in no need -of confirmation—she yet craved to hear it subscribed to by another -voice. And Loring nodded with grave, attentive assent.</p> - -<p>“Quite so!” he said sententiously.</p> - -<p>“Now, of course,” she continued, “of course a woman can’t know all the -ins and outs of a young man’s life, even when she’s his mother. It’s out -of the question; and to be very frank with you”—there was something<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_265" id="page_265"></a>{265}</span> -painful now about the lightness of her tone—“his mother had to be -rather autocratic, and the boy didn’t much like it. Consequently I can’t -feel sure that—well, that she knows even as much as she might about his -affairs, now! That’s why I’m confiding in you in this expansive way! I -want you to look after him for me!”</p> - -<p>Loring changed his position, and nodded again gravely and -comprehendingly.</p> - -<p>“I understand!” he said slowly. “I understand!” The statement was true -in far wider sense than Mrs. Romayne could be aware of. There was a -moment’s silence, during which he seemed to deliberate deeply on the -facts presented to him, watched intently by Mrs. Romayne; and then he -roused himself, as it were. “I won’t say that your confidence in me -gives me great pleasure,” he said, “because I hope you know that. I will -simply say that I will do all I can!”</p> - -<p>The words were admirably spoken, with a gentleness and consideration of -tone and manner which were all the more striking from their contrast -with his usual demeanour; and they carried an impression of strength -and<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_266" id="page_266"></a>{266}</span> sympathy such as no woman could have resisted. A strange spasm as -of intense relief passed across Mrs. Romayne’s face, and for the moment -she did not speak. Then she said low and hurriedly:</p> - -<p>“I have heard that he plays, and it—it worries me! A boy will often -listen to a friend whom he respects, and—and—I rely on you.”</p> - -<p>“I consider myself honoured!”</p> - -<p>A pause followed, and then Loring continued with an easy seriousness -which was very reassuring:</p> - -<p>“I am very glad to know all this, for it gives me a key, without which I -might have blundered considerably! To return confidence for confidence, -and to assure you that I really have some power to help you, I will say -that I made a little discovery about Julian yesterday which perplexed me -a good deal. I shall know now how to act. If he must speculate——”</p> - -<p>He was interrupted. The daintily coloured face before him changed -suddenly and terribly; a ghastly reality that lay behind that expression -of carelessness seemed on the instant to crash through all veils and -masks as Mrs.<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_267" id="page_267"></a>{267}</span> Romayne rose to her feet with a hoarse cry, her face -drawn and working, her hands stretched out as though to ward off -something unendurably horrible.</p> - -<p>“No!” she gasped, and she was absolutely fighting and struggling for -breath, as though something clutched at her throat. “Not that! oh, good -heavens, not that! You must stop it! You must prevent it. He must not! -He must not! Do you hear me? He must not!”</p> - -<p>There are some natures which not even contact with throbbing, vibrating -reality can touch or thrill, and Loring, surprised, indeed, had risen -also, cynical, imperturbable, and cool-headed as usual.</p> - -<p>“By Jove!” he said to himself critically. “Who would have thought she -had it in her?” The choked, agonised voice stopped abruptly, and he met -her eyes, wild and fierce in their desperate command, and said quickly -and soothingly:</p> - -<p>“I will do anything you wish, I assure you! You have only to speak! I am -grieved beyond all words to have distressed you so! I had no idea—<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_268" id="page_268"></a>{268}</span>—”</p> - -<p>A hoarse laugh broke from Mrs. Romayne, and she turned away with a -strange gesture almost as though it were herself she derided, and Loring -was forgotten by her, clasping her hands fiercely over her face. Loring -paused a moment and then went on smoothly:</p> - -<p>“There is nothing to disturb you, I assure you, in what I was going to -say. Most young men have a turn for dabbling in speculation at some time -or other, and though I know some ladies have a horror of it, I don’t -think you would find that there is much foundation for that horror.” He -stopped somewhat abruptly. He had suddenly remembered that he was -speaking to the widow of William Romayne, of whose final collapse he -knew the outline. He looked at the woman before him with her hidden -face, her figure rigid and tense from head to foot, and thought to -himself callously how curious these survivals of emotion were. She did -not move or speak, and he went on with a tone of delicate sympathy:</p> - -<p>“No doubt, if you really think it well to stop it with a high hand, it -can be done! I ought to say that I have rather broken<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_269" id="page_269"></a>{269}</span> confidence in -revealing Julian’s doings, as he is very anxious that you should not -think him dissatisfied or ungrateful, and did not wish you to hear of -them.” A shiver shook the bowed figure from head to foot. “I’m afraid I -thought more of reassuring you than of him! I thought that if you knew -that he and I were in the same affair, and that he would act solely on -my advice, you would, perhaps, feel happier about him!”</p> - -<p>But the answer he wanted, the answer which would have enabled him to -continue his reassurances on the purely personal line, was not -forthcoming. Mrs. Romayne neither spoke nor moved. He had no intention -of risking his position by foolhardiness, so he adjusted his line of -argument to the darkness in which her silence left him.</p> - -<p>“As I said, however,” he continued gently, “if you prefer to talk to him -on the subject, and ask him to give it up, no doubt he will do so rather -than distress you! And if you lay your commands on me to that effect, I -will certainly refuse to go any further with him! But may I say that I -think you would be wiser to let things take their course? It<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_270" id="page_270"></a>{270}</span> is not a -good thing to thwart a young man in the frame of mind you have hinted at -as being Julian’s at present. If you can conquer your horror of the -idea, I am sure you will be better satisfied in the end!”</p> - -<p>There was a dead silence. At last Mrs. Romayne raised her head slowly, -not turning her face towards Loring, but looking straight before her, as -though utterly oblivious of his personal presence. There was a strange, -fleeting dignity about her drawn face, with its wide, ghastly eyes; the -dignity which comes from horror confronted.</p> - -<p>“Take their course!” she said in a still, far-away voice. She paused a -moment, and then went on in the same tone. “You think this -is—inevitable?” The last word came with a strange ring.</p> - -<p>“I think that any attempt at its prevention would be most undesirable,” -said Loring. “It might lead—of course, it is not very likely, but still -it is possible—to private speculations on Master Julian’s part!”</p> - -<p>“Very well, then!” There was a curious, hard steadiness in her tone, as -of one who perforce concedes a point to an adversary,<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_271" id="page_271"></a>{271}</span> and braces every -nerve afresh to face the new situation thus created.</p> - -<p>“That is like you!” exclaimed Loring admiringly. The tone of her voice -had passed him by. “You will be glad, I know! Now, let me say again how -awfully sorry I am to have distressed you, and then I’ll go. You’ll be -glad to get rid of me!”</p> - -<p>She did not seem to hear the words, but as his voice ceased, she turned -her face slowly towards him with a vague, uncertain look upon it, as -though her consciousness was struggling back to him, and the life he -represented, across a great gulf. She looked at him a moment, and then -that dignity, and a strange pathos which that groping look had -possessed, gave way before a ghastly smile.</p> - -<p>“I’m afraid I’ve been making myself most ridiculous!” she said, and -there was a difficult, uncertain sprightliness about her weak voice. “So -awfully sorry! I’m rather absurd about speculation. Old memories with -which I needn’t bore you! You’ll look after my boy, then? Thanks!” She -held out her hand as she spoke with a little affected gesture, but as he -placed his hand in it her fingers closed<span class="pagenum"><a name="page_272" id="page_272"></a>{272}</span> with an icy clutch. “And now, -do you know, I must send you away! Too bad, isn’t it? But there is such -a thing as dressing for dinner.”</p> - -<p>“Quite so,” returned Loring gaily. “It is very good of you to have been -bothered with me so long! Good-bye!”</p> - -<p>“Good-bye!” she answered. “You’ll report progress, of course?”</p> - -<p>“Certainly! We’re a pair of conspirators, are we not?”</p> - -<p>When Mrs. Romayne came down to dinner that night her face was as haggard -as though the interval intervening had held for her another three days’ -illness. But the hard determination in her eyes was more intense than -ever.</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. 2 of 3, by -Mary Angela Dickens - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A VALIANT IGNORANCE; VOL. 2 OF 3 *** - -***** This file should be named 54094-h.htm or 54094-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/4/0/9/54094/ - -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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