diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'old/54988-0.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | old/54988-0.txt | 12244 |
1 files changed, 0 insertions, 12244 deletions
diff --git a/old/54988-0.txt b/old/54988-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 720eed9..0000000 --- a/old/54988-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,12244 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Gloria Mundi, by Harold Frederic - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world 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. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - -Title: Gloria Mundi - -Author: Harold Frederic - -Release Date: June 26, 2017 [EBook #54988] -Last Updated: February 5, 2018 - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GLORIA MUNDI *** - - - - -Produced by David Widger from page images generously -provided by the Internet Archive - - - - - - - - -GLORIA MUNDI - -By Harold Frederic - -Author Of “The Damnation Of Theron Ware,” “March Hares,” Etc. - -New York: International Book And Publishing Company - -1899 - - -[Illustration: 0001] - - -[Illustration: 0007] - - - -TO MY FRIEND - -THE HON. ALTON B. PARKER - -CHIEF JUDGE OF THE COURT OF APPEALS, N. Y. - - - - -PART I - - - - -CHAPTER I - -The meeting of the man and the woman--it is to this that every story in -the world goes back for its beginning. - -At noon on a day late in September the express train from Paris rested, -panting and impatient, on its brief halt in the station at Rouen. The -platform was covered with groups of passengers, pushing their way into -or out of the throng about the victualer’s table. Through the press -passed waiters, bearing above their heads trays with cups of tea and -plates of food. People were climbing the high steps to the carriages, or -beckoning to others from the open windows of compartments. Four minutes -of the allotted five had passed. The warning cries of the guards had -begun, and there was even to be heard the ominous preliminary tooting of -a horn. - -At the front of the section of first-class carriages a young woman -leaned through the broad window-frame of a coupé, and held a difficult -conversation with one of the waiters. She had sandwiches in one hand, -some loose coin in the other. Her task was to get at the meaning of a -man who spoke of sous while she was thinking in centimes, and she smiled -a little in amused vexation with herself at the embarrassment. - -“Deux sandwich: combien si vous plait, monsieur?” she repeated, with -an appealing stress of courtesy. More slowly she constructed a second -sentence: “Est un franc assez?” She proffered the silver coin to help -out her inquiry, and the waiter, nodding, put up his hand for it. - -On the instant, as the noise of slamming doors and the chorus of “Au -coupé, s’il-v’-plait!” grew peremptory, one in authority pushed the -waiter aside and pulled open the coupé door upon which she had been -leaning. “Permettez moi, madame!” he said curtly. - -Close at his back was a young man, with wraps upon his arm and a -traveling bag in his hand, who was flushed and breathing hard with the -excitement of hurry, and who drew a long sigh of relief as he put his -foot on the bottom step of the coupé. - -The young woman had grasped the door and was striving stoutly to drag -it to her. “Mais non, monsieur!” she shouted, her voice quivering with -vehemence. “Cette compartement est tout reserveé-engageé! J’ai donné -sank franc soisante, en Paris, pour moi seulement! Je proteste!” - -Sharp blasts from a horn at the rear of the train broke in upon her -earnest if uncertain remarks. The official held up one warning hand, -while with the other he wrenched the door wide open. He said something -of which the girl comprehended only its arbitrary harshness of spirit. -Brusquely thrusting a ticket into the young man’s hand, he pushed him -up the steps into the compartment, and closed the door upon him with -a clang. Arms were waving outside; the tin horn screamed; a throb of -reawakened energy thrilled backward through the train. - -“I assure you--I am so sorry,” the young man began, still standing by -the door. His voice was gentle and deprecatory. His words were English, -but the tone was of some other language. - -“But I have taken the whole compartment-I paid for it all!” she burst -out at him, her voice shaking with indignation. “It is an outrage!” - -“I am afraid you are mistaken,” he started to speak again; “you obtained -only one seat--I have a ticket for another. If there had been time, -I beg you to believe--” The train was moving, and a swift plunge into -utter darkness abruptly broke off his speech. After a few moments it -became possible to discern vague outlines in the black compartment. The -girl had huddled herself on the end cushion at the right. The young -man took his seat in the corner to the left, and for three incredibly -protracted minutes the tunnel reared its uncanny barrier of bogus -night between them. The dim suggestion of light which remained to them -revealed constrained and motionless figures drawn rigidly away from each -other, and pale averted countenances staring fixedly into the gloom. - -All at once they were blinking in a flood of sunshine, and drawing -welcome breaths of the new, sweet air which swept through from window -to window. The young man’s gaze, decorously turned to his left, was of a -sudden struck with the panorama as by a blow. He uttered a little cry of -delight to himself, and bent forward with eagerness to grasp as much as -he might of what was offered. The broad, hill-rimmed basin of the Seine; -the gray towers and shining spires of the ancient town; the blue films -of smoke drifting through the autumn haze; the tall black chimneys, the -narrow, high poplars, the splashes of vivid color with which the mighty -moving picture painted itself--all held him, rapt and trembling, with -his face out of the window. - -Summarily the darkness descended upon them again. He drew back, settled -himself in his seat and recalled the circumstance that he was not alone. -It occurred to him to pull up the window, and then instinctively he -turned to see if she had taken the same precaution on her side. Thus -when the short second tunnel unexpectedly ended, he found himself -regarding his companion with wideeyed and surprised intentness. - -There were two vacant seats between them, and across this space she -returned his scrutiny for a moment; then with a fine show of calm she -looked away, out through the broad, rounded panes which constituted the -front of the compartment. - -To the eye of the young man, she was above all things English. Her -garments, her figure, the pose of her head, the consciously competent -repose of her profile, the very angle at which the correct gray hat, -with its fawn-colored ribbon, crossed the line of the brow above--these -spoke loudly to him of the islander. From this fact alone would be -inferred a towering personal pride, and an implacable resentment toward -those who, no matter how innocently and accidentally, offered injury to -that pride. He knew the English well, and it hardly needed this partial -view of her face to tell him that she was very angry. - -Another young man, under these conditions, might have more frankly asked -himself whether the face was a beautiful one. He was conscious that the -query had taken shape in his mind, but he gave it no attention. It was -the character of the face, instead, which had powerfully impressed him. -He recalled with curious minuteness the details of his first glimpse of -it--the commanding light in the gray eyes, the tightened curves of the -lip, the mantling red on the high, smooth cheek. Was it a pretty face? -No--the question would not propound itself. Prettiness had nothing to do -with the matter. The personality which looked through the face--that was -what affected him. - -The compartment seemed filled in some subtle way with the effect of this -personality. He looked out of his window again. A beautiful deep valley -lay below him now, with densely wooded hills beyond. The delicate tints -of the waning season enriched the tracery of foliage close at hand; -still the tall chimneys, mixed with poplars, marked the course of the -enslaved river, but the factories themselves were kindly hidden here by -dark growths of thicket in the shadowed depths. - -It was surpassingly beautiful, but its contemplation left him restless. -He moved about on his seat, partially lowered the window, put it up -again and at last turned his head. - -“I am afraid that all the charming landscape is on this side,” he made -bold to say. “I will change places with pleasure, if--if you would be so -kind.” - -“No, thank you,” was her spontaneous and decisive reply. Upon reflection -she added in a more deliberate tone: “I should be obliged if you would -take the view that conversation is not necessary.” - -Some latent strain of temerity amazed the young man by rising to the -surface of his mind, under the provocation of this rebuff, and shaping -his purpose for him. - -“It is only fair to myself, first, however,” he with surprise heard -himself declaring, “that I should finish my explanation. You can satisfy -yourself readily at Dieppe that your ticket is for only one seat. It -is very, easy to make errors of that kind when one does not--that is to -say, is not--well, _entirely_ familiar with the language of the country. -As to my own part, you will remember that I came only at the last -moment. I took my coupé seat a half hour before, because I also wished -to be alone, and then I went out to see Jeanne d’Arc’s tower again, and -I was nearly too late. If there had been time, I would have found a seat -elsewhere--but you yourself saw--” - -“Really, I think no more need be said,” broke in his companion. She -looked him frankly, coldly in the face as she spoke, and her words -seemed in his ears to have metallic edges. “It is plain enough that -there was a mistake. As you have suggested, my French is very faulty -indeed, and no doubt the misunderstanding is entirely my own. So, since -it is unavoidable, there surely need be no more words about it.” - -She opened a book at this, put her feet out to the stool in front and -ostentatiously disposed herself for deep abstraction in literature. - -The young man in turn got out some pamphlets and papers from the pockets -of his great-coat, and pretended to divide his attention between these -and the scenery outside. In truth, he did not for a moment get the face -of this girl out of his thoughts. More than ever now, since she had -looked him fully in the eye, it was not a face to be pictured in the -brain as other faces of women had been. The luminous substance of the -individuality behind the face shone out at him from the pages he -stared at, and from the passing vistas of lowland meadows, streams and -mill-towns that met his gaze through the window. - -He knew so little of women that his mind was quite devoid of materials -for any comparative analysis of the effect she produced upon him. He -evolved for himself, indeed, the conviction that really this was the -first woman, in the genuine and higher meaning of the word, that he had -ever met. The recognition of this brought with it an excitement as novel -to him as the fact itself. Before ever he had seen her, clinging to -the coupé door with her gloved hands and so bravely doing hopeless and -tongue-tied battle with the guard, there had been things which had made -this the greatest day of his life. He was in truth finishing the last -stage of a journey into the unknown, the strange possibilities of which -had for a week kept his nerves on the rack. The curtain of only one more -night hung now between him and the revealed lineaments of destiny. To -be alone with his perturbed thoughts, on this culminating day of anxious -hopes and dreads, had been his controlling idea at Rouen. It was for -this that he had bought the coupé seat, upon the rumor of the station -that solitude was thus to be commanded. And now how extraordinary was -the chance! - -There had stepped into this eventful day, as from the clouds, a stranger -whose mysterious appeal to his imagination seemed more remarkable than -all else combined. - -He worked this out, painstakingly, with little sidelong glances from -time to time toward where she sat buried in her book, to check the -progression of his reasoning. When he reached the conclusion that she -was really playing this predominant part in the drama of the day, its -suggestion of hysterical folly rather frightened him. He looked with -earnestness out of the window, and even be gan to count the chimneys of -the landscape as an overture to returning sanity. Then he looked less -furtively at her and said to himself with labored plausibility that she -was but an ordinary traveling Englishwoman, scarcely to be -differentiated from the Cook’s-tourist type that he knew so well; she -had not even a governess’ knowledge of French, and there had been -nothing in her words and tone with him to indicate either mental -distinction or kindliness of temper. Why should he bestow so much as -another thought upon her? He squared his slender shoulders, and turned -with resolution to his book. - -A minute later the impossibility of the situation had mastered every -fiber of his brain. He put down the volume, feeling himself to be a fool -for doing so, yet suffering himself with an unheard-of gladness. - -“If I anger you, I shall be much pained,” he said, with a set face -turned not quite toward her, and a voice that he kept from breaking -by constant effort, “but I am going to England for the first time, and -there are some things that I am very anxious to ask about.” - -She seemed to reflect a little before she lifted her head. Now again he -was priviledged to look squarely into her face, and he added swiftly -to his store a new impression of her. The ruling characteristic of the -countenance was a certain calm and serious reasonableness. The forehead -was broad and comely; the glance of the eyes was at once alert and -steady. The other features were content to support this controlling -upper part of the face; they made a graceful and fitting frame for the -mind which revealed itself in the eyes and brow--and sought to do no -more. Studying her afresh in this moment of her silence, he recalled the -face of a young Piedmontese bishop who had come once to his school. -It had the same episcopal serenity, the same wistful pride in youth’s -conquest of the things immortal, the same suggestion of intellectuality -in its clear pallor. - -“I should dislike to seem rude,” she said, slowly. “What is it that you -want to ask?” What was it indeed? He searched confusedly about in his -mind for some one question entitled to precedence among the thousand to -which answers would come in good time. He found nothing better than a -query as to the connection between New Haven and Brighton. - -“In this little book,” he explained, “there is a time for New Haven and -for London, but I cannot find a mention of Brighton, yet I am expected -there this evening, or perhaps, early to-morrow morning.” - -“I am sure I cannot tell you,’” she answered. “However, the places are -not far apart. I should say there would certainly be trains.” - -She lifted the book again as she spoke, and adjusted her shoulders to -the cushions. He made haste to prevent the interview from lapsing. - -“I have never seen England,” he urged dolefully, “and yet I am all -English in my blood--and in my feelings, too.” - -A flicker of ironical perception played for an instant in her eye and at -the corner of her lip. “I have heard that a certain class of Americans -adopt that pose,” she remarked. “I dare say it is all right.” - -He did not grasp her meaning all at once, though the willingness to give -umbrage conveyed in her tone was clear enough. He looked doubtfully at -her, before he spoke again. “Oh,” he began, with hesitation--“yes, -I see--you thought I was American. I am not in the least--I am all -English. And it affects me very much--this thought that in a few hours -now I am to see the real England. I am so excited about it, in fact,” he -added with a deprecatory little laugh, “that I couldn’t bear it not to -talk.” - -She nodded comprehendingly. “I thought that your accent must be -American--since it certainly isn’t English.” - -“Oh, I have too facile an ear,” he answered readily, as if the subject -were by no means new to him. “I pick up every accent that I hear. I -have been much with English people, but even more with Americans and -Australians. I always talk like the last family I have been in--until -I enter another. I am by profession a private tutor--principally in -languages--and so I know my failings in this matter very well.” She -smiled at some passing retrospect. “You must have had an especially -complete sense of my shortcomings as a linguist, too. I have often -wondered what effect my French would produce upon an actual professor, -but I should never have had the courage to experiment, if I had known.” - -He waved his hand--a pale hand with veined, thin, nervous fingers, which -she looked at in its foreign gesture. “Too much importance is attached -to languages,” he declared. “It is the cheapest and most trivial of -acquirements, if it stands alone, or if it is not put to high uses. -Parents have so often angered me over this: they do not care what is in -their children’s minds and hearts, but only for the polish and form of -what is on their tongues. I have a different feeling about education.” - -She nodded again, and laid the book aside. “You are coming to a country -where everything will shock you, then,” she said. “I would rather do -scullery work, or break stones by the roadside, than be a schoolteacher -in England.” - -“Oh, it’s the same everywhere,” he urged. “I would not think that the -English were worse than the others. They are different, that is all. -Besides, I do not think I shall be a teacher in England. Of course, I -speak in the dark; for a few hours yet everything is uncertain. But as -the old American senator at Monte Carlo used to say, ‘I feel it in my -bones’ that I will not have to teach any more.” - -The expression of her face seemed somehow not to invite autobiography -at the moment. “The prospect of not having to work any more for one’s -living,” she mused at him--“how curiously fascinating it always is! We -know perfectly well that it is good for us to work, and that we should -be woefully unhappy if we did not work, and yet we are forever charming -our imagination with a vision of complete idleness.” - -“I would not be idle!” the young man broke forth, enthusiastically. He -leaned forward in his seat, and spoke with eager hands as well as words -against the noise that filled the swaying carriage. “I have that same -feeling--the longing to escape from the dull and foolish tasks I have -to do--but I never say to myself that I would be idle. There are such a -host of things to do in the world that are worth doing! But the men -who have the time and the money, who are in the position to do these -things--how is it, I ask myself, that they never think of doing them? It -is the greatest of marvels to me. Then sometimes I wonder, if the chance -and the power came to me, whether I also would sit down, and fold my -hands, and do nothing. It is hard to say; who can be sure what is in -him till he has been tested? Yet I like to think that I would prove -the exception. It is only natural,” he concluded, smilingly, “that one -should try to think as well as possible of oneself.” - -The young lady surveyed his nervous, mobile face with thoughtful -impassivity. “You seem to think, one way or another, a good deal about -yourself,” she remarked. - -He bowed to her, with a certain exaggeration in his show of quite -sincere humility which, she said to herself, had not been learned from -his English-speaking connections. - -“What you say is very true,” he admitted with candor. “It is my -fault--my failing. I know it only too well.” - -“_My_ fault is bad manners,” she replied, disarmed by his -self-abasement. “I had no business to say it at all.” - -“Oh, no,” he urged. “It is delightful to me that you did say it. I could -not begin to tell you how good your words sounded in my ears. Honest and -wise criticism is what I have not heard before in years. You do not get -it in the South; there is flattery for you, and sneering, and praise as -much too high as blame is too cruel--but no candid, quiet judgments. Oh, -I loved to hear you say that! It was like my brother--my older brother -Salvator. He is in America now. He is the only one who always said the -truth to me. And I am glad, too, because--because it makes you seem like -a friend to me, and I have been so agitated this whole week, so anxious -and upset, and all without a soul to talk to, or advise with--and the -pressure on me has been so great----” - -He let the wandering sentence lose itself in the clamor of the train, -and put the rest of his meaning into the glance with which he clung to -hers. The appeal for sympathetic kindliness of treatment glowed in his -eyes and shone upon his eager face. - -She took time for her answer, and when she spoke it was hardly in direct -reply. “Your business in England,” she said, as unconcernedly as might -be--“it is that, I take it, which causes so much anxiety. Fortunately it -is soon to be settled--to-morrow, I think you said.” - -“I wish I might tell you about it,” he responded with frank fervency. “I -wish it--you cannot imagine how much!” - -The look with which she received his words recalled to him her earlier -manner. “I’m afraid--” she began, in a measured voice, and then stopped. -Intuition helped him to read in her face the coming of a softer mood. -Finally she smiled a little. “Really, this is all very quaint,” she -said, and the smile crept into her voice. “But the train is slowing -down--there is no time now.” - -They were indeed moving through the street of a town, at a pace which -had been insensibly lowered while they talked. The irregular outlines -of docks and boat-slips, overhanging greenish water, revealed themselves -between dingy houses covered with signs and posters. At the barriers -crossing the streets were clustered groups of philosophic observers, -headed by the inevitable young soldier with his hands in the pockets of -his red trousers, and flanked by those brown old women in white caps -who seem always to be unoccupied, yet mysteriously do everything that is -done. - -“This is Dieppe, then?” he asked, with a collecting hand put out for his -wraps. - -The train had halted, and doors were being opened for tickets. - -“We sit still, here, and go on to the wharf,” she explained. - -“And then to the boat!” he cried. “How long is it?--the voyage on the -boat, I mean. Three hours and over! Excellent!” - -She laughed outright as she rose, and got together her books and papers. - -“I thought you were a Frenchman when I first saw you,” she confided -to him over her shoulder. “But no Frenchman at Dieppe ever yet shouted -‘Excellent!’ with his face turned toward the New Haven steamers.” - -The mirth in her tone was so welcome to him that he laughed in turn, -without any clear idea of her words. He gathered her handbag up along -with his own, and when she demurred he offered her gay defiance. - -“It is the terrible boldness of a timid person,” he prattled, as he -helped her down the steps, “but you must perceive that in the face of it -you are quite helpless. Since I was born, I have never really had my own -way before. But now I begin to believe in my star. After all, one is not -an Englishman for nothing.” - -“Oh, it is comparatively easy to be an Englishman in Dieppe,” she made -answer. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -The sky was dappled azure overhead, the water calm and fresh-hued -below. When the ship’s company had disposed itself, and the vessel was -making way outside, there were numerous long gaps of unpeopled space on -the windy side, and to one of these the young couple tacitly bent their -steps. They leaned against the rail, standing close together, with their -faces lifted to the strong sweet breeze. - -Viewed thus side by side, it could be seen that of the two the young man -was just perceptibly the taller, but his extreme fragility excused his -companion’s conception of him as a small man. On his head he had pulled -tight for the voyage a little turban of a cap, which accentuated the -foreign note of his features and expression. He was dark of skin and -hair, with deep-brown eyes both larger and softer than is common with -his sex, even in the South. The face, high and regular in shape, had -in repose the careworn effect of maturer years than the boyish figure -indicated. In the animation of discussion this face took on, for the -most part, the rather somber brilliancy of a strenuous earnestness. -Now, as it confronted the stiff Channel wind, it was illumined by the -unaccustomed light of a frivolous mood. The ends of his slight mustache -were lifted in a continuous smile. - -“It is my gayest day for many, many years,” he told her, after a little -pause in the talk. They had become great friends in this last half-hour. -In the reaction from the questionable restraint of the coupé to the -broad, sunlit freedom of the steamer’s deck, the girl had revealed -in generous measure a side of her temperament for which he had been -unprepared. She had a humorous talent, and, once she had gained a clew -to his perceptive capacities in this direction, it had pleased her to -make him laugh by droll accounts of her experiences and observations in -Paris. She had been there for a fortnight’s holiday, quite by herself, -she told him, and there was something in her tone which rendered it -impossible for him to ask himself if this was at all unusual among -English young ladies. His knowledge of Paris was also that of a -stranger, and he followed her whimsical narrative of blunders and odd -mistakes with a zest heightened by a recollection of his own. - -“When have I laughed so much before?” he cried now. A long sigh, as of -surprised relief, followed his words. “Well--I had looked forward to -coming in a different spirit to England. With some hopes and a good -courage--yes. But with a merry heart--how could I have foretold that? It -was my good angel who put that coupé ticket into my head, and so brought -me to you. Ah, how angry you were! I see you now, pulling at that door.” - -“Ah, well,” she said in extenuation, “how could I know? I never dreamed -that the whole coupé was not mine--and when I saw that odious guard -opening the door, to force in some wretched little Continental -creature--I mean, that was my momentary thought--and naturally I--” - -An involuntary sidelong glance of his eyes upward toward the crown of -her hat, passed mute comment on her unfinished remark. She bit her lip -in self-reproof at sight of the dusky flush on his cheek. - -“It is the only un-English thing about me,” he said, with a pathetically -proud attempt at a smile. “My father was a tall, big man, and so is my -brother Salvator.” - -A new consciousness of the susceptibility of this young man to slights -and wounds spread in the girl’s mind. It was so cruelly easy to prick -his thin skin! But it was correspondingly easy to soothe and charm -him--and that was the better part. His character and temperament mapped -themselves out before her mind’s eye. She read him as at once innocent -and complicated. He could be full of confidence in a stranger, like -herself, but his doubts about his own values were distressing. -The uneased antennæ of his self-consciousness were extended in all -directions, as if to solicit injury. She had caught in his brown eyes -the suggestion of an analogy to a friendless spaniel--the capacity for -infinite gratitude united with conviction that only kicks were to be -expected. It was more helpful to liken him to a woman. In the gentle and -timid soul of a convent-bred maiden he nourished the stormy ambitions -of a leader of men. It was a nun who boldly dreamed of commanding on the -field of battle. - -“I had a feeling,” she said to him, so softly that the tone was almost -tender, “that you must be like your mother.” - -She rightly judged him to be her elder, but for the moment her mood was -absorbingly maternal. “Let us sit down here,” she added, moving toward -the bench facing the rail. “You were going to tell me--about her, was -it?” - -He spread his rugs over their knees as they sat together in the fresh -wind. - -“No, it was not so much of her,” he said. - -“I have much to think about her--not much to put into words. She died -five years ago--nearly six now--and I was so much at school that I saw -very little of her in the latter years. Salvator was with her -always, though, to the end, although he was not her own son. We are -half-brothers, but no one could have been fonder than he was of my -mother, or a better son to her. After she died, he still kept me in -school, and this was curious too, because he hated all my teachers -bitterly. Salvator is fierce against the church, yet he kept me where -I had been put years before, with the Christian Brothers at the Bon -Rencontre, in Toulon. When at last I left them, Salvator took me with -him for a period--he is an expert and a dealer in gems--and then I -became a private tutor. Four years or so of that--and now I am here.” - He added, as upon an afterthought: “You must not think that I failed -to love my mother. She was sweet and good, and very tender to me, and I -used to weep a great deal after I left her, but it was not my fortune -to be so much with her as Salvator was. I think of her, but there is not -much to say.” - -The repetition of this formula suggested no comment to his companion, -and he went on. - -“The real memory of my childhood is my father, although I saw him only -once. Salvator says I saw him oftener, but if so all the recollections -jumble themselves together in my mind, to make a single impression. I -was five years old; it was in the early summer, in 1875. My father had -been fighting against the Prussians when I was born. By the time I was -old enough to know people, he was away in Spain with Don Carlos. He -died there, of wounds and fever, at Seo de Urgel, in August of that same -year, 1875. But first he came to see us--it would have been in June, -I think--and we were living at Cannes. He had some secret Carlist -business, Salvator says. I knew nothing of that. I know only that I saw -him, and understood very well who he was, and fixed him in my mind so -that I should never, never forget him. How strange a thing it is about -children! I have only the dimmest general idea of how my mother looked -when I was that age; I cannot remember her at all in the odd clothes -which her pictures show she wore then, though I saw them constantly. Yet -my father comes once and I carry his image till Judgment Day.” - -“Poor mothers!” sighed the girl, under her breath. “No, it was nothing. -Go on.” - -“I knew that he was a soldier, and that wherever there were wars he went -to have his share of fighting. I suppose it was this which gripped my -imagination, even as a baby. I could read when I was five, and Salvator -had told me about our father’s battles. He had been in the Mutiny in -India, and he was in Sicily against Garibaldi, and he was with the -Austrians four years before I was born, and in the French Foreign Legion -afterward. I think I knew all this when I saw him--and if I did not, -then I feel that I could have learned it from just looking at him. He -was like a statue of War. Ah, how I remember him--the tall, strong, -straight, dark, hardfaced, silent man!” - -“And you loved _him!_” commented his companion, with significance. - -He shook his head smilingly. The analysis in retrospect of his own -childish emotions had a pleasant interest for him. “No; there was no -question of love, at all. For example, he liked Salvator--who was then a -big boy of fifteen--and he took him off to Spain with him when he left. -I cannot remember that he so much as put his hand on my head, or paid -the slightest attention to me. He looked at me in a grave way if I put -myself in front of his eyes, just as he looked at other things, but he -would not turn his eyes to follow me if I moved aside. Do you know that -to my fancy that was superb? I was not in the least jealous of Salvator. -I only said to myself that when I was his age, I also would march to -fight in my father’s battles. And I was proud that he did not bend to -me, or put himself out to please me, this huge, cold-eyed, lion-like -father of mine. If he had ever kissed me I should have been ashamed--for -us both. But nothing was farther from his thoughts. He went away, and at -the door he spoke for the first time in my hearing of me. He twisted -his thumb toward me, where I stood in the shelter of my mother’s skirts. -Mind, he’s an Englishman! he said--and turned on his heel. I have the -words in my ears still. ‘Mind, he’s an Englishman!’” - -“There _is_ England!” she cried. - -They stood up, and his eager eye, following the guidance of her finger, -found the faint, broken, thin line of white on the distant water’s edge. -Above it, as if they were a part of it, hung in a figured curtain soft -clouds which were taking on a rosy tint from the declining sun. He gazed -at the remote prospect in silence, but with a quickened breath. - -“It is the first time that _I_ have seen it like this--coming toward it, -I mean, from somewhere else,” she remarked at last. “I had never been -outside England before.” - -He did not seem to hear her. With another lingering, clinging gaze at -the white speck, he shook himself a little, and turned. “And now I want -to tell you about this new, wonderful thing--about why I am this minute -within sight of England. You will say it is very strange.” - -They moved to their bench again, and he spread the wraps once more, but -this time they did not sit quite so close together. It was as if the -mere sight of that pale, respectable slip of land on the horizon had in -some subtle way affected their relation to each other. - -“A week ago,” he began afresh, “at Nice, a messenger from the Crédit -Lyonnais brought me a note saying they wished to see me at the bank. -They had, it seems, searched for me in several towns along the Riviera, -because I had been moving about. It was demanded that I should prove -my identity by witnesses, and when that was done I was given a sum of -money, and a sealed letter addressed to me, bearing simply my name, Mr. -Christian Tower--nothing more. I hurried outside and read its contents. -I was requested to get together all my papers--” - -He stopped short, arrested by a sharp, half-stifled exclamation from her -lips. She had continued looking at him after his mention of his name--at -first absent-mindedly, as if something in his talk had sent her thoughts -unconsciously astray; then with lifted head, and brows bent together in -evident concentration upon some new phase of what he had been saying. -Now she interrupted him with visible excitement. - -“You say Christian Tower!” She pushed the words at him hurriedly. “What -was your father’s name?” - -“He was always known as Captain Tower, but I have read it in my -papers--his first name was Ambrose.” - -She had risen to her feet, in evident agitation, and now strode across -to the rail. As he essayed to follow her, she turned, and forced the -shadow of a smile into her lips; her eyes remained frightened. “It is -all right,” she said with a gasping attempt at reassurance. “I was queer -for just an instant; it’s all right. Go on, please. You were to get -together your papers--” - -“And bring them to Brighton,” he said, much disconcerted. “That is all. -But won’t you sit down?” - -“I think I would rather stand,” she answered. Her composure was -returning, and with it the power to view altogether, and in their proper -relation to one another, the several elements of the situation his words -had revealed to her. Upon examination, it was curiosity that she felt -rather than personal concern--an astonished and most exigent curiosity. -But even before this, it grew apparent to her as she thought, came her -honorable duty to this young man who had confided in her. - -“I think I ought to tell you,” she began, beckoning him nearer where she -stood; “yes, you should be told that in all human probability I know the -story. It is impossible that I should be mistaken--two such names never -got together by accident. And I can assure you that the whole thing is -even more extraordinary and astounding than you can possibly imagine. -There are people in England who will curl up like leaves thrown on -the fire when they see you. But for the moment”--she paused, with a -perplexed face and hesitating voice--“go on; tell me a little more. -It isn’t clear to me--how much you know. Don’t be afraid; I will be -entirely frank with you, when you have finished.” - -He patted the rail nervously with his hand, and stared at her in pained -bewilderment and impatience. “How much do I know?” he faltered vaguely. -“Very little; almost nothing. There was no explanation in the letter. -The bankers said nothing, save that they were to give me a thousand -francs. But one does not get a thousand francs merely because the wind -has changed. There must be a reason for it; and what reason is possible -except that there is some inheritance for me? So I argued it out--to -myself. I have thought of nothing else, awake or asleep, for the whole -week.” - -He halted, with anxious appeal in his eyes, and his hands outspread to -beseech enlightenment from her. She nodded to show that she understood. -“In a minute or two, when I have got it into shape in my mind,” she said -soothingly. “But meantime go on. I want you to talk. What have you done -during the week?” - -Christian threw his hands outward. - -“Done?” he asked plaintively. “Murdered time some way or the other. I -was free to move an hour after I had read the letter. The money was more -than I had ever had before. It was intolerable to me--the thought of not -being in motion. In the ‘Indicateur’ I got the times of trains, and I -formed my plan. Avignon I had never seen, and then Le Puy--there was a -wonderful description of it in a magazine I had read--and then to Paris, -and next to Rouen. It was at Rouen that I slept last night. It was my -first night’s good sleep--I had tired myself out so completely. Always -walking with the map in my mind, going from one church to another, -talking to the Suisse, bending back my head to examine capitals and -arches, forcing myself to take an interest in what I saw every little -minute--so I have come somehow through the week. But now here is rich -England within plain sight, and here are you, my new friend--and all my -life I have been so poor and without friends!” - -He tightened his hand upon the rail, and abruptly turned his face away. -She saw the shine of tears in his eyes. - -“Come and sit down again,” she said, with a sisterly hand on his arm. “I -know how to tell it to you now.” - -“But you truly know nothing about the Towers--or Torrs--your father’s -family?” she continued, when they were once again seated. “It sounds -incredible! I can hardly realize how you could have lived all these -years and not--but how old are you?” - -“Twenty-six.” - -“--And not got some inkling of who--of who your father was?” - -“My mother never told me. Perhaps she did not know altogether, herself. -I cannot say as to that. And if Salvator knew--that I cannot tell, -either. He is a curious man, my brother Salvator. He talks so you would -think you saw him inside out--but he keeps many things to himself none -the less.” - -“Yes--that brother of yours,” she said abstractedly. “I have been -thinking about him. But it can’t be that he has any importance in the -game, else the Jews would have sent for him instead of you. They waste -no time,--they make no errors.” - -“The Jews!” he murmured at her, with no comprehension in his eyes. - -She smiled. “I have been arranging it in my mind. The thing was like a -black fog to me when you first spoke. I had to search about for a light -before I could make a start. But when I stumbled across the thought, ‘It -is the Jews’ work,’ then it was not very hard to make out the rest. I -could almost tell you who it is that is to meet you at Brighton. It is -Mr. Soman. Is it not?” - -He assented with an impulsive movement of head and hands. The gaze that -he fixed upon her sparkled with excitement. - -“He is Lord Julius’ man of business,” she explained to his further -mystification. “No doubt he has had one of those green eyes of his on -you ever since you were a fortnight old. It frightens one to think -of it--the merciless and unerring precision of their system. Is there -anything they _don’t_ know?” - -“I am afraid of Jews myself,” he faltered, striving to connect himself -with what he dimly perceived of her mood. “But what have they -against me? What can they do to me? I owe nothing; they can’t make me -responsible for what other people, strangers to me, have done, can they? -And why should they give me a thousand francs? It is I,” he finished -hopelessly, “I who am in the black fog. Tell me, I beg you, what is it -that they want with me?” - -She put a reassuring hand upon his arm, and the steady, genial light -in her calm eyes brought him instantaneous solace. “You have not the -slightest cause for fear,” she told him, gently. “Quite the contrary. -They are not going to hurt you. So far from it, they have taken you -up; they will wrap you in cotton-wool and nurse you as if you were the -Koh-i-noor diamond. You may rest easy, my dear sir; you may close your -eyes, and fold your hands, and lean back against Israel as heavily -as you like. It is all right so far as you are concerned. But the -others”--she paused, and looked seaward with lifted brows and a -mouth twisted to express sardonic comment upon some amazing new -outlook--“eye-ee! the others!” - -“Still you do not tell me!” For the first time she caught in his -voice the hint of a virile, and even an imperious note. Behind the -half-petulant entreaty of the tired boy, there was a man’s spirit of -dictation. She deferred to it unconsciously. - -“The Lord Julius that I spoke of is--let me see--he is your -great-uncle--your grandfather’s younger brother.” - -“But if _he_ is a Jew--” began Christian, in an awed whisper. - -“No--no; he is nothing of the sort. That is to say, he is not Jewish -in blood. But he married a great heiress of the race--whole millions -sterling came to him from the huge fortune of the Aronsons in -Holland--and he likes Jewish people--of the right sort. He is an old man -now, and his son, Emanuel, has immense influence over him. You should -see them sitting together like two love-birds on a perch. They idolize -each other, and they both worship Emanuel’s wife. If they weren’t the -two best men in the world, and if she weren’t the most remarkable woman -anywhere, they would utterly spoil her.” - -“He--this lord--is my great-uncle,” - -Christian recalled her to his subject. “He and his son are good men.” - -“They are the ones I referred to as the Jews. That is how they are -spoken of in the family--to distinguish them from the senior branch--the -sons and grandsons of your grandfather. Fix that distinction in you -mind. There is the elder group, who have titles and miles of mortgaged -estates, no money to speak of and still less brains--” - -“That is the group that I belong to?” He offered the interruption with -a little twinkle in his eyes. It was patent that his self-possession had -returned. Even this limited and tentative measure of identification with -the most desirable and deep-rooted realities in that wonderful island -that he could see coming nearer to meet him, had sufficed to quell the -restless flutter of his nerves. - -She nodded with a responsive gleam of sportiveness on her face. “Yes, -your place in it is a very curious one. But first get this clear in your -mind--that the younger group, whom they speak of as the Jews, have money -beyond counting, and have morals and intelligence moreover. Between -these two groups no love is lost. In fact, they hate each other. The -difference is the Christians go about cursing the Jews, whereas the Jews -wisely shrug their shoulders and say nothing. No one suspected that -they would _do_ anything, either--but--oh, this is going to be an awful -business!” - -He held himself down to a fine semblance of dignified calm. “Tell me -more,” he bade her, with an effect of temperate curiosity. - -“Now comes tragedy,” she went on, and the hint of sprightliness -disappeared from her face and tone. “It is really one of the most -terrible stories that could be told. There is a very aged man--he must -be nearly ninety--lying at death’s door in his great seat in Shropshire. -He is at death’s door, I said, but he has the strength and will of a -giant, and though he is half paralyzed, half blind, half everything, -still he has his weight against the door, and no one knows how long he -can hold it closed. It is your grandfather that I am speaking of. His -name also is Christian.” - -The young man nodded gravely. “My father would have fought death that -way too, if they had not shot him to pieces, and heaped fever on top of -that,” he commented. - -The girl bit her lip and flushed awkwardly for an instant “Let me go -on,” she said then, and hurried forward. “This old man had three -sons--not counting the priest, Lord David, who doesn’t come into the -thing. The first of these sons, also Christian, had three sons, and he -and they were all alive six months ago. They are all dead now, two -drowned in their yacht, one lost in the ‘Castle Drummond,’ one killed in -Matabeleland. Lord David, the priest, the next brother, died last -year--childless of course. There remained in England two sons of another -brother who died some years ago, Lord Edward, and this horrible mowing -down of human lives left them apparently nearest to the very aged man, -your grandfather. Do you follow all that?” - -“I think I do,” said Christian. “If I don’t I will pick it up afterward. -In mercy’s name, do not stop!” - -“The Jews, saying nothing, had lost sight of nothing. There was still -another brother who had lived abroad for many years, who died abroad -twenty years ago. You are getting to the climax now. The Jews must have -kept an eye on this wandering cousin of theirs; it is evident they knew -he left a son capable of inheriting, and that they did not let this son -escape from view. Because Lord Ambrose Torr was older than Lord Edward, -his brother, it happens now that the son of that Ambrose--” - -The young man abruptly rose, and moved along to the rail. He had -signified by a rapid backward gesture of the hand his momentary craving -for solitude; he stretched this hand now slowly, as if unconsciously, -toward the sunset glow on sky and sea, in the heart of which lay -imbedded a thick line of cream-colored cliffs, escalloped under a close -covering of soft olive-hued verdure. The profile of his uplifted face, -as he gazed thus before him into the light, seemed to the eyes of the -girl transfigured. - -He stood thus, rapt and motionless, for minutes, until her mind had time -to formulate the suspicion that this was all intolerable play-acting, -and to dismiss it again as unworthy. Then he returned all at once to her -side, apparently with a shamefaced kind of perception of her thoughts. -He was flushed and uneasy, and shuffled his hands in and out of the -pockets of his great-coat. He did not seat himself, but stood looking -down at her. - -“What is my grandfather?” he asked, with a husky, difficult voice. - -“The Duke of Glastonbury.” - -“I do not understand,” he began, hesitatingly; “it is not clear to me -about my father. Why should he--” - -She rose in turn, with swift decision, as if she had been alertly -watching for the question. “That is what you must not ask me,” she said, -hurriedly. “I think I will move about a little. The wind is colder here. -I am getting chilled.” - -They strolled about together, conducting a fitful conversation, but -as often gazing in silence at the bulk of the headlands they were -approaching, gray and massive now in the evening light. She answered -freely enough the queries he put, but between these he lapsed into -an abstraction which she respected. More than once he spoke of the -extraordinary confusion into which her story had thrown his thoughts, -and she philosophically replied that she could well understand it. - -An hour later they had passed the fatuous inspection of the customs -people, and confronted the imminence of leave-taking. Constraint -enveloped them as in a mantle. - -It occurred suddenly to him to say: “How strange! You possess the most -extraordinary knowledge of me and my--my people, and yet the thought -just comes to me--I have not so much as asked your name.” - -She smiled at him with a new light in her eyes, half kind, half -ironically roguish. “If I may confess it, there have been times today -when I was annoyed with you for being so persistently and indefatigably -interested in yourself--for never dreaming of wondering, speculating, -inquiring something about me. But that was very weak of me--I see it -now--and very wise of you, because--what does it matter about a nobody -like me?--but next week the whole world will be bearing witness that you -are the most interesting young man in England.” - -He gave a swift glance down the train toward the guards noisily shutting -the doors. “No, it is too bad,” he said, nervously. “You will always be -my first friend in England--my very deeply prized friend everywhere. I -know you only to-day--but that day is more to me than all the rest of -my life--and it is full of you. They are closing the doors--but you will -tell me? The notion of not seeing you again is ridiculous. You are in -London--yes?--then how do you think I could come to London without first -of all, before everything else, wanting to call upon you?” - -“Oh, I daresay we shall meet again,” she answered, as perforce he -stepped into the compartment. Her smile had a puzzling quality in -it--something compounded, it seemed to him, of both fear and fun. “In a -remote kind of way I am mixed up with the story myself.” - -There was no time for any hope of further explanation. He put his head -out of the window, and shook hands again. “Remember!” he called out -fervently. “You are my first friend in England. Whenever--whatever I can -do--” - -“Even to the half of your kingdom!” she laughed at him, as the movement -of the carriage drew him past her. - -The tone of these last words, which he bore away with him, had been -gay--almost jovial. But the girl, when she had watched him pass out of -sight, turned and walked slowly off in the direction of her own train -with a white and troubled face. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -Many builders in their day have put a hand to the making of Caermere -Hall. Though there were wide differences of race and language among -them and though the long chain of time which binds them together has -generations and even centuries for its links, they seem to have had thus -much in common: they were all at feud with the sunlight. - -On the very pick of summer days, when the densest thickets of Clune -Forest are alive to the core with moving green reflections of the outer -radiance, and hints of the glory up above pierce their way to the bottom -of the narrowest ravine through which the black Devon churns and frets, -somehow Caermere remains wrapped in its ancient shadows. - -The first men, in some forgotten time, laid its foundations with no -thought save of the pass at the foot to be defended. Later artificers -reared thick walls upon these foundations, pushed out towered curtains, -sank wells, lifted the keep, cut slits of corner windows or crowned the -fabric with new turrets for watchmen, each after the need or fashion of -his age, but all with minds single to the idea of blocking the path -that Caermere overhung. In due time came the breath of the king’s peace, -blowing equably over the vexed marches, albeit loaded with the scent of -gunpowder, and my lords slowly put aside their iron harness for silken -jackets, and unslung the herses in their gateways. Men of skill set now -about the task of expanding the turfed spaces within the inclosure, of -spreading terraces and forming gardens, of turning stone chambers into -dames’ apartments, and sullen guard-rooms into banquet-halls. Their -grandsons, in turn, pulled down even more than they erected; where the -mightiest walls had shouldered their huge bulk, these men of Elizabeth -and James left thin façades of brickwork, and beams of oak set in a -trivial plaster casing. The old barbican was not broad enough to span -their new roadway, stretching to the valley below over the track of the -former military path, and they blew it up; the pleasure-ground, which -they extended by moving far backward the wall of the tilting yard, was -bare of aspect to their eye, and they planted it with yews and, later, -with cedars from the Lebanon. - -Through all these changes, Caermere remained upon its three sides -shadowed by great hills, and the thought of making wide windows in -the walls on the open fourth side came to no one. When at last, in the -earlier Georgian time, the venerable piles of bastioned masonry here -were replaced by a feebly polite front of lath and stucco, windows were -indeed cut to the very floor, in the French style, but meanwhile the -trees had grown into a high screen against the sky, and it was not in -the Torr blood to level timber. - -When a house and family have lived together for a thousand years, it is -but reasonable that they should have come to an understanding with each -other. Was Caermere dark because the mood of the Torrs, its makers and -masters, had from the dawn of things been saturnine? Or did the Torrs -owe their historic gloom and dourness of temperament to the influence -of this somber cradle of their race? There is record of the query having -been put, in a spirit of banter, by a gentleman who rode over Clune -bridge in the train of King John. Of convincing answer there is none -to this latest day. The Torrs are a dark folk, and Caermere is a dark -house. They belong to one another and that is all. - -Thus, on the first morning of October, a gray and overcast morning even -on the hilltops, and though it was past the half-hour towards nine, -there was barely light enough to see one’s way about by in the big -breakfast-room. - -A tall young man in rough, light-brown clothes stood at one of the -windows, drumming idly on the glass and staring at the black cedars -beyond the lawn. At intervals he whistled under his breath, in a sulky -fashion, some primitive snatches of an unknown tune. Once or twice he -yawned, and then struck a vicious ring from the panes with his hard -nails, in protesting comment upon his boredom. - -About the large fireplace behind him were dishes huddled for heat, and -their metallic gleam in the flicker of the flames was repeated farther -away in the points of red on the plate and glass of the long breakfast -table spread in the center of the room. From time to time a white-faced -youngster in livery entered the room, performed some mysterious service -at the hearth or the table in the dim twilight and went out again. - -The man at the window paid no heed to the goings and comings of the -servant, but when the door opened presently and another tweed-clad -figure entered, his ear told him the difference on the instant, and he -half turned his head. - -“In God’s name, what are you all doing?” he growled angrily. “I said -eight--you heard me!--sharp eight!” - -“What _does_ it matter?” protested the newcomer, stooping at the -fire-place to lift the covers from the dishes in a languid inspection of -their contents. He yawned as he spoke. “If you won’t let fellows go to -bed till four, how the devil do you expect them to be down at eight?” - -“Oh, is that you, Pirie?” said the man at the window. “I thought it was -my brother.” The other stood for a moment, with his back to the fire. -Then he lounged to the window, stretching his arms as he moved. He also -was tall, but with a scattering of gray in his hair. - -“Beastly black morning,” he commented in drowsy tones, after a prolonged -observation of the prospect. “Might as well stopped in bed.” - -“Well, go back then!” snapped the other. “I didn’t make the rotten -weather, did I?” This was wanton ill-temper. The elder man also -began drumming with his nails on the window. “Turn it up, Eddy,” he -remonstrated, smoothly enough, but with a latent snarl in his tone. “I -don’t like it.” - -The younger man moved his head, as if he would have looked his companion -in the face. Then he stared away again, out of the window. - -“Beaters been waitin’ half an hour already,” he grumbled, sulkily. -“What’s the good of makin’ a time if you don’t keep it?” - -“I didn’t make any time,” responded Major Pirie with curtness. Upon -reflection, he added: “What does it matter about the beaters?” - -There seemed no answer to this, and for several minutes nothing was -said. Finally the younger man thought of something. “I say,” he began, -and after an instant’s pause went on: “It’d suit me better not to be -called ‘Eddy’ among the men, d’ye see? That fellow Burlington began it -last night--he got it from you--and I don’t like it. When we’re alone, -of course, that’s different.” - -Major Pirie laughed--a dry, brief, harsh laugh--and swung around on his -heels. “Your man didn’t get those sausages I asked for, after all,” he -remarked, going back to the dishes at the fender. - -“Probably couldn’t,” said Mr. Edward, “or else,” he added, “wouldn’t. I -never saw such a houseful of brutes and duffers. I’m keen to shunt the -lot of ‘em, and they know it, the beggars. You’d think they’d try to -suck up to me, but they don’t, they haven’t got brains enough.” - -The major had brought a plate from the table, and was filling it from -under the covers on the hearth. “Shall I ring for the tea?” he asked. - -Mr. Edward moved across to the chimney corner and pulled the cord -himself. “Do you know what that old ass, Barlow--the butler, you -know--had the face to say to me yesterday? ‘I’--God, you couldn’t -believe it! ‘I ’ope, sir,’ he says, ‘you’ll think better of shootin’ -on the First, for His Grace’ll hear the guns in the covers, and it won’t -do His Grace no good.’ Fancy the beggar’s cheek!” - -“Well, do you know, Torr,” said Major Pirie, slowly, speaking with his -mouth full but contriving to give a significantly nice emphasis to the -name, “I was thinkin’ much the same myself. For that matter, several -of the fellows were mentionin’ it. It doesn’t look quite the thing, you -know.” - -The entrance of the servant created an interval of silence, during which -Mr. Edward in his turn rummaged among the dishes before the fire. - -“It’s Gus, is it?” he demanded, from where he knelt on one knee, plate -in hand. - -“He thought it would be funny to queer my game, eh?” - -“Your brother hasn’t said a word, so far’s I know,” replied the major, -pouring his tea. “It was merely some of the fellows, talkin’.” - -“God Almighty!” cried Mr. Edward, springing to his feet. “Here’s a -precious outfit of pals for you! You come down here, so help me--” - -“Don’t say ‘you’; say ‘they,’ if you’ve got to say anything,” interposed -the major, quietly. - -“Well, they, then,” the other went on, in loud heat. “They come down -here, and take my mounts, by God; they drink my wine, they win my money, -they drain me dry--and then they go behind my back and whisper to one -another that I’m an outsider. And you too, Pirie,” he continued, with -defiance and deprecation mingled in his tone, “you admit yourself that -you talked with them.” - -“My dear Torr,” replied the major, “it’s a mistake for you to turn out -so early. You’ve tried to quarrel before breakfast every day I’ve been -here. It’s the worst morning temper I ever heard of in my life. You -ought to have tea and eggs and things brought to you in your room, and -not show yourself for at least two hours afterward--you really ought. It -isn’t fair to your friends.” - -The door opened and still another tall man came in. He nodded to Pirie -as he passed him, with a tolerant “Well, major,” and went straight to -the dishes by the fire. - -“Pirie’s got it into his head we oughtn’t to shoot to-day, Gus,” said -Mr. Edward. - -The other rose with a dish in his hands. - -“It _is_ dark,” he assented, glancing toward the window. “Afraid of -pottin’ a beater, major?” - -“No--it’s about the duke,” explained Edward. “It seems some of the -fellows funk the thing--they think he’ll hear the guns--they want to go -to church instead, or something of that sort.” - -Augustine Torr, M.P., looked at his brother inquiringly. The tie of -blood between them was obvious enough. They were both slender as well -as tall; their small round heads merging indistinguishably behind into -flat, broad necks, seemed identical in contour; they had the same -light coarse hair, the same florid skins, even the same little yellow -mustaches. The differences were harder to seek. Edward, though he had -borne Her Majesty’s commission for some years, was not so well set up -about the shoulders as his younger and civilian brother. Augustine, on -the other hand, despite his confident carriage of himself, produced the -effect of being Edward’s inferior in simple force of character. It was -at once to his credit and his disparagement that he had the more amiable -nature of the two. - -“How do you mean--the duke?” he asked. “Is there a change?” - -Edward put out his closed lips a little, and shook his head. Major Pirie -sprinkled salt on his muffin while he explained. - -“All there is of it is this,” he said. “There was just an idea that with -the--with your grandfather--dyin’ in the house--it might look a little -better to give the first the go-by. Nobody’d have a word to say against -shootin’ to-morrow.” - -“Well, but what the hell”--Augustine groped his way with hesitancy--“I -don’t understand--we’ve been shootin’ partridges for a month, and how -are pheasants any different? And as for the duke--why, of course one’s -sorry and all that--but he’s been dyin’ since June, and the birds have -some rights--or rather, I should say--what I mean is--” - -“That’s what I said,” put in Edward, to cover the collapse of his -brother’s argument. - -Major Pirie frowned a little. “Partridges are another matter,” he said -testily. - -“Damned if I know what you’re driving at,” avowed Augustine. He -paused with fork in air at his own words. “Drivin’ at,” he repeated -painstakingly. “Drivin’ at pheasants, eh? Not bad, you know. Pass the -mustard, Pirie.” - -“God!” said the major, with gloom. “You know well enough what I mean. -To work through fields miles off--that’s one thing. To shoot the covers -here under the duke’s nose, with the beaters messin’ about--that’s quite -another. However that’s your affair, not mine.” - -“But don’t you see,” urged Augustine, “what difference does a day -make? There’ll be just as much racket to-morrow as to-day. It isn’t -reasonable, you know.” - -“It was merely what you might call a sentiment,” said the major, in -the half apologetic tone of a man admitting defeat. He looked the least -sentimental of warriors as he went on with his breakfast--a longfaced, -weather-beaten, dull-eyed man of the late forties. - -Four other men who came in now at brief intervals, with few or no words -of salutation to the company, and who lounged about helping themselves -to what caught their fancy in the breakfast, were equally removed from -the suspicion of adding a sentimental element to the atmosphere. They -made little talk of any kind, and no mention whatever of that absurd -qualm about the First which had been reported to have germinated among -them. - -Edward had reached the stage of filling his pipe. Walking to the mantel -for a light, it occurred to him to ring the bell first. “Her ladyship -breakfastin’ in her room?” he asked the youngster who answered the -summons. - -“Her ladyship’s woman has just gone up with it, sir,” he replied. - -“_That’s_ all right,” said Edward, and forthwith struck the match. “Send -in Davis and Morton to me, and ask Barlow for those Brazilian cigars -of mine--the small huntin’ ones. What wheels were those I heard on the -gravel? If it’s the traps we shan’t want them to-day. We’re walkin’ -across.” - -“I will make inquiries, sir,” said the domestic, and went out. - -The room had brightened perceptibly, and Captain Edward was in a better -temper. He moved over to the sideboard and filled a pocket-flask from -one of the decanters in the old-fashioned case. As an afterthought, he -also filled a small glass, and gulped its contents neat. “We’re off in -ten minutes now,” he called out to the men about the table, some of whom -had already lit their pipes. “What do you fellows want to take with you? -My tip is this rum.” - -“Hardly cold enough for rum, is it?” asked one, drifting languidly -toward the sideboard. Most of the others had risen to their feet. - -A slender, sad-faced, gentlemanly-looking old man in evening clothes had -entered the room, and stood now at Captain Edward’s elbow and touched it -with his hand. “I--beg--your--pardon--sir,” he said, in the conventional -phrase. - -Edward, listening to what a companion was saying, turned absent-mindedly -to the butler. Then he happened to remember something. “Damn you, -Barlow, you get duller every day!” he snapped. “You know perfectly well -what cigars I take out of doors!” - -“I--beg--your--pardon--sir,” repeated the elderly person. He spoke in a -confidential murmur. “I thought you would like to know, sir--Lord Julius -has come.” - -The young man looked at him, silently revolving the intelligence, -a puzzled frown between his pale brows. A furtive something in the -butler’s composed expression struck him. “What of it?” he demanded, -angrily. “What are you whispering for? He’s old enough to take care of -himself, isn’t he?” - -The butler thrust out his dry underlip a trifle. “I thought you would -like to know, sir,” he reiterated. - -“Well, you’re wrong. I don’t like to know!” The man’s tone--an -indefinable, lurking suggestiveness in his face and eyes and -voice--vexed Mr. Edward exceedingly. It annoyed him still more to note -that his companions had tacitly turned their backs, and were affecting -great preoccupation in something else. - -He kept a wrathful eye on Barlow, as the latter bowed, turned, moved -to the door and opened it. Of course, a man musn’t slang servants, his -irritated thought ran, but the covert impertinence in this old menial’s -manner was something no longer to be borne. The impulse to call the -elderly fool back and send him packing on the instant, tingled hotly in -the young man’s blood. He even opened his lips to speak, but reflection -checked his tongue. It would be bad form, for one thing; for another, -perhaps he was not quite in the position to dismiss his grandfather’s -servants. He would speak to Welldon, the estate steward, instead--a -sensible and civil man, by the way, who seemed to know which side his -bread was buttered on. At the merest hint from the heir, Welldon would -give Barlow the sack, and that would teach the rest a lesson. But -all this would keep until Lord Julius had gone. Being an aged duffer -himself, he would probably side with Barlow--and there was no point in -offending Lord Julius. Very much to the contrary, indeed. - -Mr. Edward’s meditations, unwontedly facile in their movements for him, -had reached this point, when his mind reverted to the fact that he was -still regarding the back of Barlow, who, instead of going out, stood -holding the door open, his lean figure poised in ceremonious expectancy. -Even as the surprised Edward continued looking, the butler made a staid -obeisance. - -A stalwart, erect, burly old gentleman came in, and halted just over -the threshold to look about him. He had the carriage, dress and general -aspect of a prosperous and opinionated farmer. The suggestion of acres -and crops was peculiarly marked in the broad, low soft hat on his -head, and in the great white beard which spread fan-wise over his -ample breast. He had the face of one who had spent a life in commanding -others, and had learned meanwhile to master himself--a frank, -high-featured, ruddy face, with a conspicuously prominent and -well-curved nose, and steady, confident eyes. He folded his hands over -his stick and, holding his head well back, glanced about the room at his -ease. It was a glance from which the various eyes that it encountered -somehow turned away. - -“How-do, Eddy? How-do, Gus?” the newcomer said impassively to the two -young men who, with palpable constraint, came up to greet him. He shook -hands with each, but seemed more interested in viewing the company at -large. His appearance had produced a visible effect of numbness upon the -group of guests, but he seemed not to mind this. - -“Quite a party!” he observed. His voice was full and robust, and not -unamiable. “All military?” - -Edward nodded. “All but Gus, here. Glad to introduce ’em, if you like,” - he murmured, with a kind of sullen deference. - -“Presently, presently,” said Lord Julius, with an effect of heartiness -at which Edward lifted his head. - -“Drive over from Clune this morning?” the young man asked. “Then you’ll -want breakfast. Ring the bell, Gus. We’re just starting for the Mere -copse. Glad to have you make an eighth gun, if you’ll come to us after -you’ve eaten. You still shoot, don’t you?” - -“Oh, yes, I still shoot,” said the other. - -Edward had a sense of embarrassment at his great-uncle’s immobility in -the doorway. “Well, we’ll get along to the gun-room now,” he said to -the others. Then to Lord Julius he remarked with an air of making -conversation, “I always say to the fellows that I ask nothing better in -this world than to be as fit as you are when I’m your age. Let’s see, -seventy-six, isn’t it?” - -The elder man nodded. “I’m sure that’s a modest enough ambition,” he -observed. His steady gray eyes dallied with the young man’s countenance -for a moment. “I’m relieved to learn that you want nothing more than -that.” - -Edward looked up swiftly, and braved an instant’s piercing scrutiny of -the other’s face. Then he laughed, uneasily. “Oh, I want a few other -things, too.” - -Lord Julius lowered his voice. “I would put among your wants a trifling -matter of good taste, Eddy,” he said, not unkindly. - -Captain Edward flushed. “If I could see that it really made any -difference between the First and the Second,” he answered with dogged -civility, “I wouldn’t shoot until tomorrow. If you’re keen about it now, -I’ll--” - -“Oh, damn your First and Second,” broke in the old man, keeping his -voice down below the hearing of the others, but letting impatience glow -in his eyes; “you had no business bringing these men here at all. No--I -see that you don’t understand me. You needn’t explain. It’s entirely a -question of feeling.” - -“I’m sorry you take that view of it, sir,” said Edward, gloomily. -“You know that I’m willing enough to meet your views--if only--if -only because I’m going to need your help.” Lord Julius gave a snort of -contemptuous laughter, and nodded to himself with lifted brows. “Really -something in the way of consideration is due to such frankness as that,” - he said, with a pretense of reverie. “Send your friends out of the room, -Eddy,” he went on, more gently--“make what excuse you like--or take them -out and come back to me--that’s better. I did intend to have no secrets -from them, but I’ve relented. And yes--by the way--instead of coming -here--you’ll find me in the small morning room I will breakfast there. -You’ve filled this room with smoke.” - -“Would you--would you mind my bringing Gus?” Edward asked, doubtfully. - -The other thought for an instant. “Oh, yes, Gus may come,” he said, and -with that left the room. - -“Rum old beggar, isn’t he?” said Augustine to the company, with the -sense that something had to be said. - -“Gad! he seemed to think he was in a synagogue!” laughed Captain -Burlington. “Kept his hat on, you know,” he explained in the next breath -to the surprised and attentive faces about him. - -“But he isn’t a Jew,” said one of the others with gravity. “He married -one, but that doesn’t make him one, you know.” - -“It was a joke! Can’t you see a joke?” protested Burlington. - -“Well, I don’t think much of it,” growled Edward, sourly. “Come along to -the gunroom.” - -***** - -“What’s up?” asked Mr. Augustine, in an anxious murmur, a few minutes -later, as the two brothers walked along the wide central hallway toward -the appointed place. - -“Can’t think for the life of me,” replied Edward. “Unless Craven babbled -about the baccarat when he got up to town. He’s rather that sort, you -know. He kicked about the stakes at the time.” - -“Yes--after he’d been hit,” said Augustine. “But if it’s only that, -you’ll be an ass to let the old man rot you about it. Just stand up to -him, and let him see you feel your position.” - -“That’s all right,” rejoined Edward, dubiously, “but what’s the -position without money? If anybody could have foreseen what was going to -happen--damn it all, I could have married as much as I needed. But as it -is, I’ve got Cora on my back, and the kid, and--my God! fancy doing the -duke on four thou, a year net! Welldon tells me it can’t be screwed a -bit above that. Well, then, how can I afford to cheek Julius? When you -come to that he isn’t half a bad sort, you know. He stood my marriage -awfully well. Gad, you know, we couldn’t have lived if he hadn’t drawn a -check.” - -“Let us hope he’ll draw another,” said Augustine. “It’s bad enough to be -a pauper duke, but it’s a bailey sight worse to be his brother.” - -“What rot!” said Edward. “My kid’s a girl, and you’re free to marry.” - -They had come to the door of the morning room. It stood ajar, and Edward -pushed it open. Before the fireplace was visible the expected bulk and -vast beard of Lord Julius, but the eyes of the brothers intuitively -wandered to the window beyond, against which was outlined the figure of -a much smaller man. - -“Secretary,” whispered the quicker-minded Augustine out of the corner of -his mouth as they advanced. The thought brought them a tempered kind -of comfort. The same instinct which had prompted Edward to crave his -brother’s support led them both to welcome the presence of a fourth -party. - -They looked again toward the stranger, and Lord Julius, as he caught -their returning glance, smiled and nodded significantly. “Come here, -Christian!” he said, and the brothers saw now that it was a slender -young man with a dark, fine face and foreign-looking eyes who moved -toward them. - -Lord Julius put a hand on the young man’s shoulder. “Christian,” he -said, and gave his full voice a new note of gravity, “these are your two -cousins, Mr. Edward Torr, a captain in the Hussars until recently, and -Mr. Augustine Torr, a member of Parliament. Your coming will make some -difference in their affairs, but I know that you will be good to them.” - -The brothers had shaken hands with the new-comer automatically, while -their minds were in the first stage of wonderment as to what the words -being spoken about him meant. Now that silence fell, they stared slowly -at him, at their great-uncle, at each other. - -“How--cousin?” Edward managed to ask. He spoke as if his tongue filled -his mouth. - -“The son of your uncle, Lord Ambrose Torr,” the old man made quiet, -carefully distinct answer. - -Another period of silence ensued, until Christian turned abruptly. “It -is very painful to me,” he said hurriedly to the old man, and walked to -the window. - -“It is painful to everybody,” said Lord Julius. - -“Not so damned particularly painful to you, sir, I should say,” put in -Edward, looking his great-uncle in the face. The young man had slowly -pulled himself together, and one could see the muscles of his neck being -stiffened to keep his chin well in the air. His blue eyes had the effect -of summoning all their resources of pride to gaze with dignity into the -muzzle of a machine-gun. - -Augustine was less secure in the control of his nerves. He stood a -little behind his brother, and the elbow which he braced against him for -support trembled. His eyes wandered about the room, and he moistened -his lips with his tongue several times before he contrived to whisper -something into Edward’s ear. The latter received the suggestion, -whatever it was, with an impatient shake of the head. - -“You scarcely do me justice,” said Lord Julius, quietly, “but that’s -not worth mentioning at the moment. I must say you are taking it very -well--much better than I expected.” - -Edward squared his shoulders still more. “I wouldn’t say that we’re -takin’ it at all,” he replied, with studied deliberation. “You offer it, -d’ye see--but it doesn’t follow that we take it. You come and bring this -young fellow--this young gentleman, and you tell me that he is Ambrose’s -son. What good is that to me? Maybe he is, maybe he isn’t. Ambrose may -have had twenty sons, for all I know. I should be sorry to be one of -them--but they’re not to blame for that. I don’t mind being civil to -them--if they come to me in the right spirit--” He stopped abruptly, and -listened with a frown to more whispering from Augustine. - -“You don’t seem to understand, Eddy--” began Lord Julius. - -“Oh, perfectly!” broke in the young man. “I had an uncle who had to -leave England before I was born. His name couldn’t even be mentioned in -the family--but I know all about him. God knows I’ve had him flung in my -face often enough.” - -“Don’t let us go into that,” urged Lord Julius, softly, and with -a sidelong nod toward the window. “It’s needless cruelty to other -people--and surely we can discuss this like gentlemen. You are really -behaving splendidly, Eddy.” - -“God! he thought we were cads!” cried Edward, in husky indignation. - -“No--no--no--no,” murmured the older man, soothingly. “I only want you -to grasp the thing as it is. You know me. You do not regard me as a -foolish person who goes off half-cock. Well, I tell you that Christian -here is the son of my nephew Ambrose, born in lawful wedlock, and that -there is not a shadow of doubt about it. The proofs are all open to your -inspection; there is not a flaw in them. And so I say to you, in all -kindness--take it calmly and sensibly and like a gentleman. It is to -your own interest to do so, as well. If you think, you will see that.” - -“That’s what I’ve been telling him,” said Augustine, strenuously, from -behind his brother’s shoulder. - -A faint smile fluttered about the old man’s eyelids. “It was the advice -of a born statesman,” he said, dryly. “You are the political hope of the -family.” - -The stiffening had melted from Edward’s neck and shoulders. He turned -irresolutely now, and looked at the floor. “Of course I admit nothing; -I reserve all my rights, till my lawyers have satisfied themselves,” he -said in a worn, depressed mutter. - -“Why, naturally,” responded Lord Julius, with relieved cordiality. “And -now please me--do it all handsomely to the end--come and shake hands -again with Christian, both of you.” - -The brothers stood for a hesitating instant, then turned toward the -window and began a movement of reluctant assent. - -To the surprise of all three, Christian forestalled their approach by -wrenching open one half of the tall window, and putting a foot over the -sill to the lawn outside. - -“If you will excuse me,” he said, in his nervous, high voice, “I am -taking a little walk.” - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -Upon the garden side of Caermere is a very large conservatory, built -nearly fifty years ago, at the close of the life of the last duchess. -The poor lady left no other mark of her meek existence upon the -buildings, and it was thought at the time that she would never have -ventured upon even this, had it not been that every one was mad for -the moment about the wonderful palace of glass reared in London for the -First Exhibition. - -In area and height, and in the spacious pretensions of its dome, the -structure still suggests irresistibly the period of its inception. It is -as ambitious as it is self-conscious; its shining respectability remains -superior to all the wiles of climbers and creeping vines. The older -servants cherish traditions of “Her Grace’s glass,” as it used to be -called. She had the work begun on her fortieth birthday, and precisely -a year later it happened that she was wheeled in from the big morning -room, and left at her own desire to recline in solitude under the palms -beneath the dome, and that when they went to her at last she was dead. -The circumstance that Shakespeare is supposed also to have died on the -anniversary of his birth, has somehow come to be an integral part of -the story, as it is kept alive now in the humbler parts of the Caermere -household, but the duchess had nothing else in common with the poet. -The very face of her, in her maturer years, is but dimly remembered. The -portrait in the library is of a young Lady Clarissa, with pale ringlets -and a childishly sweet countenance, and clad in the formal quaintness of -the last year of King George the Fourth. She became the duchess, but in -turn the duchess, seemed to become somebody else. That was the way with -the brides brought home to Caermere. The pictures in the library -show them all girlish, and innocently pretty, and for the most part -fair-haired. Happily there is no painted record of what they were -like when, still in middle life, they bade a last goodbye to the -dark-skinned, big-shouldered sons they had borne, and perhaps made a -little moan that no daughters were ever given to mothers at Caermere, -and turned their sad faces to the wall. - -The crystal house had memories of another and more recent mistress, the -countess. She had come six years after the other went, she had lived -for twelve years--a silent, colorless, gently unhappy life--and then -had faded away out of sight. It was this Lady Porlock who had caused the -orchid houses to be built at the inner side of the conservatory, and it -was in her time, too, that the gifted Cheltnam was fetched from her own -father’s house in Berkshire to be head gardener at Caermere. Her fame -is indeed irrevocably linked with his, for the tea-rose of his breeding, -bearing her maiden-name of the Hon. Florence Denson, is scarcely less -well known than this hybrid sweet-briar the Countess of Porlock. - -And now, in the third generation, still another lady had for some years -enjoyed special property rights in this great glass apartment. - -Lady Cressage came into the conservatory from the large morning room, -with a large volume in her hand, and an irresolute look on her face. She -glanced about at the several couches piled with cushions and furs, at an -easy-chair beyond--and yawned slightly. Then she wandered over to a row -of early chrysanthemums, and, putting the book under her arm, occupied -herself with the destruction of a few tiny beginnings of buds in the -lower foliage. In this she employed as pincers the delicately tinted -nails of a very shapely finger and thumb, and at the sign of some slight -discoloration of these she stopped the work. From a glance at the nails, -she went to a musing scrutiny of this whole right hand of hers, holding -it up, and turning it from one composition of graceful curves to -another. It had been called the most beautiful hand in England, but this -morning its owner, upon a brief and rather listless inspection of its -charms, yawned again. Finally she seated herself in the chair and, after -a languid search for the place in her book, began to read. - -Half reclining thus, with the equable and shadowless light of the glass -house about her, the young widow made a picture curiously different from -any in the library within. All the dead and gone brides of the Torrs had -been painted in bright attire; Lady Cressage wore a belted gown of black -cloth, unrelieved save by a softened line of white at the throat and -wrists. The others, without exception, had signified by elaborate -hair-dressing not less than by dutifully vacuous facial expressions, -their comprehension of the requirements of the place they had been -called upon to fill; Lady Cressage’s bistre hair was gathered in -careless fashion to a loose knot at the back of the head, and in her -exquisitely modeled face there was no hint whatever of docility or awed -submission to any external claims. The profile of this countenance, -outlined for the moment against a cluster of vividly purple pleroma -blossoms, had the delicacy of a rare flower, but it conveyed also the -impression of resolute and enduring force. If the dome above could have -generated voices of its own, these would have murmured to one another -that here at last was a woman whom Caermere could not break or even -easily bend. - -In the season of 1892, London had heard a good deal of this lady. She -was unknown before, and of her belongings people to this day knew and -cared very little. There was a General Kervick enumerated in the retired -list, who had vegetated into promotion in some obscure corner of -India, and now led an equally inconspicuous existence somewhere in -the suburbs--or was it in West Kensington? He had never belonged to a -service club, but an occasional man encountered him once in a while -at the Oriental, where he was supposed by the waiters to have an -exceptional knowledge of peppers and chutneys. The name of his wife -had been vaguely associated with charitable committees, or subscription -committees, and here and there some one remembered having heard that she -was distantly related to somebody. The elder Kervicks never secured a -much more definite place in London’s regard--even after this remarkable -daughter had risen like a planet to dim the fixed stars of the season. - -The credit for having discovered and launched Miss Kervick came -generally to be ascribed to Lady Selton, but perhaps this turned upon -the fact that she lent her house in Park Lane for the culminating scene -in the spectacular triumph of that young person. No doubt there were -others who would have placed still bigger houses at the disposal of a -bride whose wedding was, in many respects, the most interesting of the -year, and some of these may have had as good a claim to the privilege as -Lady Selton. As matters turned out, however, they were given no cause to -repine. The marriage was not a success, and within one short year Lady -Selton herself had grown a little shy about assuming responsibility for -it. A year later she was quite prepared to repudiate all share in it, -and after that people ceased to remember about it all, until the shock -of the tragedy came to stir polite London into startled whisperings. - -Hardly within the memory of living folk had a family been dealt such -a swift succession of deadly blows as these which were rained upon the -Torrs in the first half of 1896. - -The Earl of Porlock had been the heir of dukedom since most people could -remember, and had got himself called to the House of Lords in his -own right, apparently as a kind of protest against his father’s -unconscionable longevity, at least a dozen years before his own end -came. It was not to be supposed that he desired a peerage for any -other reason, since he had never chosen to seek a seat in the House of -Commons, and indeed, save upon one occasion connected with ground game, -made no use whatever of his legislative powers after they had been -given to him. He cared nothing for politics, and read scarcely more in -newspapers than in books. Up to middle life, he had displayed a certain -tendency toward interest in fat stock and a limited number of allied -agricultural topics, but the decline in farming values had turned him -from this. In his earlier years, too, he had enjoyed being identified -with the sporting set of his class in London, and about the racing -circuit, but this association he also dropped out of as he grew older, -partly because late nights bored him, partly because he could no longer -afford to jeopardize any portion of his income. He came at last to think -of his mastership of hounds as his principal tie to existence on land. -He liked it all, from the sailing sweep over the highest barrier in an -exceptionally rough country, to the smell of the kennels of an early -morning across the frozen yards. This life with the horses and dogs, -and with the people who belonged to the horses and dogs, offered fewer -temptations to the evil temper in his blood than any other, and with -growing years his dislike for the wear and tear of getting angry had -become a controlling instinct. He continued to use bad language with an -appropriate show of fervency, when occasion required, but he had got out -of the way of scalding himself with rage inside. He even achieved a -grim sort of jocularity toward the close. In the last year of his life -a tenant-farmer, speaking to a toast, affirmed of him that “a truer -sportsman, nor yet a more humorous and affable nobleman, has never taken -the chair at a puppy-walk luncheon within my recollection,” and this -tribute to his geniality both pleased and impressed the earl. He was -then in his sixty-second year, and he might have lived into a mellowed, -and even jovial old age, under the influence of this praise, had there -been no unwritten law ending the hunting season in the early spring. - -The earl cared very little for otters and rats, and almost nothing at -all for salmon, so that when April came he usually went to his yacht, -and practically lived aboard it until November. Sometimes he made long -cruises in this substantial and comfortable vessel, which he delighted -in navigating himself. He was lying in at Bremerhaven, for example, in -May, when one of a sheaf of telegrams scattered along the line of North -Sea ports in search of him, brought the news that his youngest son -Joseph, who had drifted into Mashonaland after the collapse of the -Jameson adventure, had been killed in the native rebellion. Upon -consideration, the earl could not see that a post-haste return to -England would serve any useful end. He sailed westward, however, after -some telegraphic communication with England, and made his leisurely way -down the Channel and round Cornwall to Milford Haven, where his wont was -to winter his yacht, and where most of his crew were at home. The fact -that he and the vessel were well known in this port rendered it possible -to follow in detail subsequent events. - -It was on the 10th of June that Lord Porlock came to anchor in Milford, -and went ashore, taking the afternoon train for Shrewsbury. He returned -on the 14th, accompanied by his eldest son and heir, Lord Cressage. -This latter personage was known only from hearsay at Milford, and local -observation of him was therefore stimulated by a virgin curiosity. It -was noted that Viscount Cressage--a stalwart and rubicund young man of -more than his father’s height, but somewhat less swarthy of aspect--was -laboring under very marked depression. He hung about the hotel, during -the delay incident upon cleaning up the yacht, taking on new stores -and altering some of the sailing gear, in a plainly moping mood, saying -little to his father and never a word to any one else. A number of -witnesses were able to make it clear that at first he did not intend to -sail forth, but was merely bearing his father company while the latter -remained in harbor. - -The fact of their recent bereavement accounted in a general way for -their reticence with each other, but it was impossible not to see that -the younger man had something besides the death of a brother on his -mind. When, on the second day of their waiting, the tide began to -fill in which on its turn was to bear out the yacht, his nervous -preoccupation grew painfully manifest. He walked across many times to -the headland; he fidgeted in and out of the bar, taking drinks for -which he obviously had no relish, and looking over and over again in the -railway time-tables for information which he seemed incapable of fixing -in his memory. At last, when everything was ready, and the earl stood -with his hand out to say good-bye to his son, the latter had suddenly, -and upon the evident impulse of the moment, declared with some -excitement that he also would go. People remembered that he had said, -as if in defensive explanation of his hasty resolve: “Perhaps that will -teach her a lesson!” His father had only remarked “Rot!”--and with that -the yacht sailed off, a heaving white patch against the blackening west. - -But what followed was too grossly unreasoning to afford a lesson to -anybody. The morning newspapers of the 18th contained in one column -confirmation of the earlier report that the Hon. Anselm Torr, second son -of the earl of Porlock, had been a passenger on the ill-fated “Drummond -Castle,” and had gone down with the rest in the night off Ushant; and in -another column a telegram from Porthstinian, announcing the total loss -of a large yacht, on the rocks known as the Bishop and Clerks, with all -on board. The evening papers followed with the rumor that the lost yacht -was the “Minstrel,” with both Lord Porlock and his son, Lord Cressage, -on board; but it was not until the next afternoon that the public -possessed all the facts in this extraordinary affair. Then it happened -that the edge was rather taken off the horror of the tragic coincidence, -by the announcement that these sudden deaths brought forward as next -heir to the dukedom Captain Edward Torr, late of the --th Hussars, -who was better known, perhaps, as the husband of Miss Cora Bayard. The -thought of Cora as a prospective duchess made such a direct appeal -to the gayer side of the popular mind, that the gruesome terrors -surrounding her advancement were lost to sight. When, a few days later, -it was stated that the venerable Duke of Glastonbury had suffered a -stroke of paralysis, and lay at Caermere in a critical state, the news -only made more vivid the picture of the music-hall dancer turned into -Her Grace which the public had in its mind’s eye. Her radiant portrait -in the photographic weeklies and budgets was what remained uppermost in -the general memory. - -For a time, however, in that little fraction of the public which is -called Society, the figure of another woman concentrated interest upon -itself, in connection with the Torr tragedy. The fact that a music-hall -person was to wear a great title had no permanent hold upon the -imagination of this class. They would probably see rather less of her -then than now--and the thing had no longer the charm of the unusual. But -they had known Lady Cressage. They had admired her, followed after her, -done all sorts of nice things for her, in that season of her wonderful -triumph as the most beautiful girl, and the most envied bride, in -London. After her marriage she had been very little in evidence, it -was true; one hardly knew of any other reigning beauty who had let the -sceptre slip through her fingers so promptly and completely. What was -the secret of it all? It could not be said that she had lost her good -looks, or that she was lacking in cleverness. There was no tangible -scandal against her; to the contrary, she seemed rather surprisingly -indifferent to men’s company. Of course, it was understood that her -marriage was unhappy, but that was scarcely a reason for allowing -herself to be so wholly snuffed out of social importance. Everybody knew -what the Torrs were like as husbands, and everybody would have been -glad to be good to her. But in some unaccountable way, without quite -producing the effect of rebuffing kindness, she had contrived to lapse -from the place prepared for her. And now those last words from the lips -of poor young Cressage--“Perhaps that will teach her a lesson!”--sifted -their way from the coroner’s inquest in a Welsh village up to London, -and set people thinking once more. Who could tell? It might be that the -fault was not all on one side. According to the accounts of Milford, he -was in a state of visible excitement and mental distress. The very -fact of his going off alone in a yacht with his father, of whom he -notoriously saw as little as possible on dry land, showed that he must -have been greatly upset. And his words could mean nothing save that it -was a quarrel with his wife which had sent him off to what proved to be -his death. What was this quarrel about? And was it the woman, after all, -who was to blame? Echoes of these questions, and of their speculative -and varied answers, kept themselves alive here and there in London till -Parliament rose in August. They were lost then in the general flutter -toward the moors. - -Lady Cressage, meantime, had not quitted Caermere or disclosed any -design of doing so, and it is there we return to her, where she sat at -her ease under the palms in the glass-house, with a book open before -her. - -The spattering reports of a number of guns, not very far away, caused -her presently to lift her head, but after an instant, with a fleeting -frown, she went back to her book. The racket continued, and finally she -closed the volume, listened with a vexed face for a minute or two and -then sprang to her feet. - -“Positively this is too bad!” she declared aloud, to herself. - -Unexpectedly, as she turned, she found confronting her another young -woman, also clad in black, even to the point of long gloves, and a -broad hat heavy with funereal plumes. In her hand she held some unopened -letters, and on her round, smooth, pretty countenance there was a -doubtful look. - -“Good-mornin’, dear,” said this newcomer. Her voice, not unmusical in -tone, carried the suggestion of being produced with sedulous regard to a -system. “There were no letters for you.” - -There was a momentary pause, and then Lady Cressage, as if upon -deliberation, answered, “Good-morning--Cora.” She turned away listlessly -as she spoke. - -“Ah, so it _is_ one of my ‘Cora’ days, after all,” said the other, with -a long breath of ostentatious reassurance. “I never know in the least -where to have you, my dear, you know--and particularly this mornin’; I -made sure you’d blame me for the guns.” - -“Blame”--commented Lady Cressage, musingly--“I no longer blame anybody -for anything. I’ve long since done with my fancy for playing at being -God, and distributing judgments about among people.” - -“Oh, you’re quite right about this shootin’ the home covers,” protested -the other. “I gave Eddy a fair bit of my mind about it--but you know -what he is, when once he’s headed in a given direction. You might -as well talk soft to the east wind. And, for that matter, I was dead -against his bringin’ these men down here at all--though it may surprise -you to hear it.” - -Lady Cressage, still looking away, shook her head very slightly. “No--I -don’t find myself particularly surprised,” she said, with an effect of -languor. “Really, I can’t be said to have given the matter a thought, -one way or the other. It is neither my business nor my wish to form -opinions about your husband’s friends. We were speaking of something -else, were we not?” - -“Why, yes,” responded Mrs. Edward; “I mentioned that sometimes I’m -‘Cora,’ and sometimes it’s very much the other way about. I merely -mentioned it--don’t think I mean to complain--only I began calling _you_ -Edith from the start--from the first day I came here, after the--after -the----” - -“I know you did. It was very kind of you,” murmured Edith, but with no -affectation of gratitude in her voice. Then, slowly, she turned her eyes -toward her companion, and added in a more considerate tone: “But then -you are by nature a much kindlier person than I am.” - -“Oh, yes, you say that,” put in the other, “but it isn’t true, you know. -It’s only that I’ve seen more of the world, and am so much older than -you are. That’s what tells, my dear--it’s years that smooths the temper -down, and rubs off one’s sharp corners--of course, if one has some sense -to start with. I assure you, Edith, that when I was your age I was a -perfect tiger-cat.” - -Lady Cressage smiled in a wan fashion, as if in despite of her mood. -“You always make such a point of your seniority,” she said, not -unamiably, “but when I look at you, I can never believe you’re of any -age at all. I seem a thousand years old beside you.” Mrs. Edward showed -some dazzling teeth in her pleased appreciation of the compliment. Her -smile was as characteristic as her voice, in its studiously regular and -equable distribution. The even parting of her bright lips, with -their symmetrical inner lines of white, was supported to a nicety of -proportional value by eyelashes and eyes. - -“It’s what I’ve been saying,” she commented, with frank enjoyment. “It’s -good temper that does the trick.” - -To tell the truth, Mrs. Edward’s was a face which bore no visible -relation to years. It was of rounded oval in contour, with beautifully -chiseled small features, a faultless skin which was neither fair nor -dark and fine large eyes that seemed sometimes blue, and as often -something else. In these eyes there lay always, within touch of the -surface, a latent smile, ready to beam, to sparkle, to dance, to -languish in mellow softness or glitter in cool abstract recognition of -pleasantries afloat, all at the instant bidding of the lips below. These -lips, delicately arched and of vivid warmth of color, were as restricted -in their movements as is the mercury in a thermometer. They did not curl -sidewise upon occasion; they never pouted, or pulled themselves inward -together under the stress of sudden emotion. They did nothing but -separate, in perfectly balanced measure, sometimes by only a hair’s -breadth, again in the freest fashion, but always in painstaking harmony -with the spirit of the glance above. Students of this smile, or rather -of this range of graded smiles, ordinarily reached the conclusion that -it was the lips which gave the signal to the eyes. Certain it is that -they worked together in trained accord, and that the rest of the face -did nothing at all. The white forehead furrowed itself with no lines of -puzzled thought; there was not the shadow of a wrinkle at the corners -of the little mouth, or about the shapely brown lashes--and it seemed -incredible that time should ever bring one. - -Beside this serene and lovely mask--in the placidity of which one -found the pledge of an easy temper along with the promise of unfailing -youth--the face of Lady Cressage was still beautiful, but in a restless -and strenuous way. If she did produce the effect of being the older of -the two, it was because Mrs. Edward’s countenance had nothing to do with -any such standard of comparison. - -“When you come to think of it,” the latter went on now, “you _do_ -seem older than I do, dear--I mean you seem so to me. Of course I -know there’s a good six years’ difference between us--and as far as -appearance goes, I needn’t say that you’d be the belle of the ball in -London as easily as you were four years ago--but all the same you have -the knack of making me feel as if I were the youngster, and you the -grown-up. I’ve a sister--five years younger than me--and she does the -same thing. When she looks at me--just quietly turns her eyes full on -me, you know--it seems as if I ought to have a pinafore on, and she have -spectacles and a cap. Oh, she used to give me the jumps, that girl did. -We haven’t seen much of each other, these last few years; we didn’t hit -it off particularly well--but--why, hello! this _is_ odd, if you like!” - -“What is it?” asked the other, perfunctorily. - -Mrs. Edward had been, shuffling the envelopes in her hand the while she -spoke, and idly noting their superscriptions. She held up one of them -now, in explanation of her remark. - -“Well, talk of the devil, you know--I was speaking of my sister Frank, -and here’s a letter from her. She hasn’t written a line to me in--how -long is it?--why, it must be--well, certainly not since I was married. -Funny, isn’t it? I wonder if it’s anything about the pater.” - -She continued to regard the sealed missive absent-mindedly, as if the -resource of opening it had not yet suggested itself to her. In the -meantime, something else occurred to her, and she turned to face Lady -Cressage, who had seated herself again. - -“I meant what I said about these men Eddy’s brought down,” she declared. -“I didn’t want them to be asked, and I don’t like their being here, any -more than you do. Yes, I want to have you understand,” she persisted, as -the other offered a gesture of deprecation, “I hope I’m the last person -in the world to round on old pals, but really, as I told Eddy, a man in -his position must draw the line somewhere. I don’t mind giving a leg-up -to old Pirie--in a quiet way, of course--for he’s not half a bad sort -by himself; but as for the rest, what are they? I don’t care for their -families or their commissions--I’ve seen too much of the world to be -taken in by kid of that sort--I say they’re bounders. I never was what -you might call keen about them as the right friends for Eddy, even -before--I mean in the old days, when it didn’t matter so much what -company he kept. But now, with everything so altered, he ought to see -that they’re not in his class at all. And that’s just what I can’t get -him to do in the least.” - -“Men have their own views in these matters. They are often rather -difficult to understand,” commented Edith, sententiously. - -“I should think so!” began Mrs. Edward. “Why, if I were a man, and in -Eddy’s place--” - -Her words had ended aimlessly, as her eyes followed the lines of the -letter she had at last opened and begun to read. She finished the brief -task, and then, going back to the top of the single page, went over it -again more attentively. There was something indefinably impressive about -the silence in which she did this, and Lady Cressage presently raised -an inquiring glance. Mrs. Edward’s face exhibited no marked change of -expression, but it had turned deathly pale. The unabated redness of the -lips gave this pallor a ghastliness which frightened Edith, and brought -her to her feet. - -“What in the name--” she began, but the other held up a black-gloved -hand. - -“Is this something you know about?--something you’ve been putting up?” - Cora demanded, in a harsh, ungoverned voice, moving forward as she -spoke. “Look at this. Here’s what my sister writes.” She did not offer -to show the letter, but huskily read forth its contents: - -“‘London, September 30. - -“‘My dear Cora: I don’t know whether you will thank me or not, but I -feel that some one ought to warn you, if only that you may pull yourself -together to meet what is coming. Your house is built of cards, and it is -only a question of days, perhaps of hours, when it will be pushed over. -Your husband is not the heir, after all. I am truly in great grief at -the thought of what this will mean to you, and I can only hope that you -will believe me when I sign myself, - -“‘Your sincerely affectionate sister, - -“‘Frances.’” - -The two women exchanged a tense look in which sheer astonishment -encountered terror, and mingled with it. - -“No, I know nothing of this,” faltered Edith, more in response to the -other’s wild eyes than to the half-forgotten inquiries that had prefaced -the reading of the letter. - -“No trick of a child, eh? What do they call it, posthumous?” Cora -panted, still with the rough voice which had shaken off the yoke of -tuition. - -Edith lifted her head. “That is absurd,” she answered, curtly. - -As they confronted each other thus, a moving shadow outside caught their -notice. Instinctively turning their eyes, they beheld through the glass -a stranger, a slender young man with a soft hat of foreign fashion, -striding across the lawn away from the house. He held his head high in -the air, and they could see that the hands carried stiffly outstretched -at his sides were clenched. - -“He struts across the turf as if he owned it,” said Edith, clutching -vaguely at the meaningless relief which this interruption seemed to -offer. - -But Mrs. Edward had sunk info the chair, and buried her face in her -black-gloved hands. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -Christian began his walk with swift, energetic steps, and a guiding -eye fixed resolutely on a distinguishing mark in the distant line of -tree-tops beyond, as if both speed and directness of course were -of utmost urgency to his purpose. While his body moved forward thus -automatically, however, his mind remained engrossed with what had been -said and done in the room he was leaving behind. - -His brain reproduced over and over again the appearance of the two young -brothers, their glances at each other, their sneering scowls at him. The -picture of Augustine whispering in Edward’s ear, and of Edward shaking -his sulky head, stuck in his memory as a living thing. He had continued -to see it after he had turned his back on them and gone to the window. -The infamous words which had been spoken about his father were a part -of this picture, and their inflection still rang in his ears just as the -young men still stood before his eyes, compact of hostility to him and -his blood. - -The noise of guns in the wood he approached was for a time subordinated -in his mind to those bitter echoes of Edward’s speech. When at last -these reports of firing attracted his attention, he had passed out of -sight of Caermere, and found himself on a vaguely defined path at the -end of a broad heath, much overgrown with heather and broom and low, -straggling, inhospitable-looking shrubs novel to his eye. Curious -movements among this shaggy verdure caught his wandering notice, and -he stopped to observe them more closely. A great many rabbits--or would -they be hares?--were making their frightened escape from the wood in -front of him, and darting about for cover in this undergrowth. He became -conscious now of an extraordinary tumult in the wood itself--a confused -roar of men’s voices raised in apparently meaningless cries, accompanied -by an unintelligible pounding of sticks on timber and crackling brush. -This racket almost drowned the noise of the remote firing; its effect -of consternation upon the small inhabitants of the thicket was only less -than the bewilderment that it caused in Christian’s mind. Forgetting -altogether his own concerns, he pushed cautiously forward to spy out the -cause of the commotion. - -Somewhat later, he emerged from the wood again, having obtained a -tolerable notion of what was going on. He had caught a view of one -line of beaters making their way through a copse, diagonally away from -him--rough men clad for the most part in white jackets, who shouted and -thrashed about them with staves as they went--and it was easy enough to -connect their work, and the consequent rise and whirring rush of birds -before it, with the excited fusillade of guns farther on. Christian did -not get a sight of the sportsmen themselves. Albeit with some doubts -as to the dignity of the proceeding, he made a detour of the piece of -woodland, with the idea of coming out upon the shooting party, but when -he arrived at the barrier it was to find on the spot only a couple of -men in greenish corduroys, whom he took to be underkeepers. They were at -work before a large heap of pheasants, tying the birds in pairs by the -necks, and hanging them over a long stick, stretched between two -trees, which already bent under its burden. They glanced up from their -employment at Christian, and when he stooped to pick up one of the -cartridge cases with which the ground at his feet was strewn, they -exchanged some muttered comment at which both laughed aloud. He -instinctively threw the little tube down, and looked away from the men. -The thought occurred to him that if they only knew who he was their -confusion would be pathetic, but as it was, they had the monopoly of -self-possession, and it was he who shyly withdrew. - -The whole diversion, however, had cleared and sweetened his mood. -He retraced his steps through the wood and then struck off in a new -direction across the heath, at a more leisurely pace than he had come, -his mind dwelling pleasurably upon the various picturesque phases of -what he had witnessed. The stray glimpses of _la chasse_ which had -been afforded him in the South had had nothing in common with this. -The unkempt freedom of the growths about him appealed to his senses -as cultivated parks and ordered forests had never done. It was all so -strong and simple and natural--and the memory of the beaters smashing -along in the thicket, bawling and laying about them with their clubs, -gave it a primitive note which greatly pleased his fancy. - -The heath was even finer, in his eyes, than the wood. The air stirring -across it, for one thing, had a quality which he seemed never to have -known before--and the wild, almost savage, aspect of its squat gray -and russet herbage, the sense of a splendidly unashamed idleness and -unproductiveness suggested by its stretches of waste land, charmed his -imagination. He said to himself, as he sauntered here, that he would -gallop every day across this wonderful plain, with a company of big dogs -at his horse’s heels. The thought of the motion in the saddle inspired -him to walk faster. He straightened himself, put his hands to his coat -at the breast as he had seen young Englishmen do on their pedestrian -tours, and strode briskly forward, humming to himself as he moved. The -hateful episode of the morning had not so much faded from his thoughts, -as shaken itself into a new kaleidoscopic formation. Contact with -these noble realities out of doors had had the effect, as it were, of -immeasurably increasing his stature. When he thought of those paltry -cousins of his, it was as if he looked down upon their insignificance -from a height. - -He came at last face to face with a high stone wall, the pretensions and -obvious antiquity of which told him at once that he had returned to -the vicinity of the castle. Sure enough, there were discernible at a -considerable distance down to the right some of the turrets and roofs of -Caermere, and he turned his course in that direction. It seemed to him a -long way that he walked by the side of this great wall, marveling as he -did so at its size and at the ambitious views of the persons who built -it. The reflection that they were ancestors of his own came to his mind, -and expanded therein. He also would build like a great nobleman in his -time! What was there so grand as building?--he mused as he looked about -him--unless it might be the heath and the brownish-purple hills beyond, -and these also one intuitively thought of as having been built. - -Presently a small doorway appeared in the massive wall, and Christian, -finding it unlocked, passed through it into a vast garden. The inner and -sunny side of the wall, as far as he could see in either direction, was -veined with the regularly espaliered branches of dwarf trees flattened -against it, from which still depended here and there belated specimens -of choice fruit. On the other side of the path following close this -wall, down which he proceeded, were endless rows of small trees and -staked clumps of canes, all now bereft of their season’s produce. The -spectacle did not fit with what had been mentioned to him of the poverty -of Caermere. Farther on, a tall hedge stretching at right angles from -the wall separated this orchard from what he saw now, by glimpses -through an open arch, to a be a flower garden. He quickened his pace at -the sight, for flowers were very near his heart. - -At first there was not much to move his admiration. The sunlit profusion -of his boyhood’s home had given him standards of size and glowing color -which were barely approached, and nowhere equaled, here. Suddenly he -came upon something, however, before which he perforce stopped. It was -the beginning of a long row of dahlias, rounded flowers on the one side -of him, pointed and twisted cactus varieties on the other, and he had -imagined nothing like this before in his life. Apparently no two of the -tall plants, held upright to the height of his breast by thick stakes, -were alike, and he knew not upon which to expend the greater delight, -the beauty of their individual blossoms or the perfection of skill -exhibited in the color-arrangement of the line. - -He moved slowly along, examining the more notable flowers in detail with -such ardor that a young lady in a black gown, but with a broad hat of -light straw on her pale hair, advanced up the path, paused, and stood -quite near him for some moments before he perceived her presence. Then -with a little start, he took off his hat, and held it in his hands while -he made a stiff bow. - -“You are fond of flowers?” Lady Cressage said, more as a remark than an -inquiry. She observed him meanwhile with politely calm interest. - -“These dahlias are extraordinary!” he exclaimed, very earnestly. “I have -never seen such flowers, and such variety. It surprises me a great deal. -It is a spécialité in England, n’est ce pas?” - -“I think I have heard that we have carried the dahlia further than other -countries have done,” responded the lady, courteously giving the name -the broad-voweled sound he had used. She added with a pleasant softening -of eyes and lips: “But you ought not to begrudge us one little triumph -like this--you who come from the very paradise of flowers.” - -The implication in her words caused him to straighten himself, and to -regard her with a surprised new scrutiny. He saw now that she was very -beautiful, and he strove to recall the few casual remarks Lord Julius -had dropped, concerning the two ladies at the castle, as a clue to -her identity. One had been an actress, he remembered--and this lady’s -graceful equanimity had, perhaps, something histrionic in it. But if she -happened not to be the actress, then it would no doubt anger her very -much to be taken for one. He knew so little of women--and then his own -part in the small drama occurred to him. - -“It is evident that you understand who I am,” he said, with another bow. -The further thought that in either case she was related to him, was a -part of the family of which he would soon be the head, came to give him -fresh confidence. “It is not only dahlias that are carried to unrivaled -heights of beauty in England,” he added, and bowed once more. - -She smiled outright at this. “That is somewhat too--what shall I -say?--continental for these latitudes,” she remarked. “Men don’t -say such glowing things in England. We haven’t sun enough, you know, -properly to ripen rose-hips--or compliments. I should like to introduce -myself, if I may--I am Edith Cressage--and Lord Julius has told me the -wonderful story about you.” - -She held out her hand as she spoke, with a deliberate gesture, which -afforded Christian time to note its exquisite modeling, if he had had -the eyes for it. But he took the hand in his own rather cursorily, -and began speaking with abruptness before he had finished his bow and -relinquished it. - -“It is much too wonderful,” he said, hastily. “It frightens me. I cannot -get used to it. I have the feeling that I should go away somewhere, and -live by myself, till it became all familiar to me. But then I see it -would be just as painful, wherever I went.” - -“Oh, let us hope it would be least painful here, of all places,” urged -the lady, in gentle deprecation of his tone. “Caermere is not gay, but -it can be soothing and restful--to those who stand in need of solace. It -has come to be my second home--I never thought one could grow so deeply -attached to a place. It has been to me like a tender old nurse and -confidante--in times when--when its shelter and consolation were very -welcome”--she faltered for an instant, with averted face, then raised -her moist eyes to his, and let them sparkle--“and oh, you will grow to -love Caermere with all your heart.” - -Christian felt himself much moved. He had put on his hat, and stepped -now to her side. - -“I have seen nothing of it at all,” he said. “I am going to ask that you -shall show it to me--you who love it so much. But if I shall remain here -now, that I cannot in the least tell. Nothing is arranged, so far as I -know. I am quite in Lord Julius’ hands--thus far.” - -They had tacitly begun to move down the path together, loitering to look -at plants on either side which particularly invited notice. - -“Lord Julius is a remarkable man,” she said. “If one is fortunate enough -to enlist his friendship, there is no end to what he can do for him. You -can hardly imagine what a difference it makes for you in everything--the -fact that he is warmly disposed towards you.” - -“Yes, that I have been told,” said Christian, “and I see it for myself, -too. I do not feel that I know him very well, as yet. It was only -yesterday morning that I met him for the first time at an hotel in -Brighton. We breakfasted together, we looked through papers together and -then we began a long railway journey together, which only ended a few -hours ago. We have talked a great deal in this time, but, as I have -said, the man himself is not very clear to me yet. But no one could have -been kinder--and I think he likes me.” - -“Oh, of course he does,” affirmed Lady Cressage, as if anything -else would have been incredible. “And--talking with him so much, so -continuously, you no doubt understand the entire situation. I am glad -that he at least left it to me to show you over Caermere; there is -apparently nothing else in which I can be of use.” - -Christian, though he smiled in kindly recognition of her attitude, -offered no verbal comment, and after a wandering digression about -dahlias, she returned to the subject. - -“If there _is_ anything I can tell you--about the family, the position -of affairs in general, and so on--you should not stand on ceremony with -me. Has he, for example, explained about money affairs?” - -The young man looked keenly at her for an instant, as if the question -took him by surprise. Then he answered frankly enough: “Nothing -definite. I only gather that it will be made easier for me than it would -have been for--for other members of the family, if they--had been in my -place. But perhaps that is not what I should say to you.” - -Lady Cressage smiled on him reassuringly. - -“Oh, don’t think of me in that light,” she pleaded. “I stand quite -outside the--what shall I say?--the interested family circle. I have -no ax of any description to grind. You, of course, have been told my -position in the castle--that is, so far as it can be told by others. It -is a simple enough story--I was to have been everything, and then -the wind happens to change off the Welsh coast and lo! I am -nothing--nothing! It is not even certain that I am not a beggar--living -here on alms. Legally, everything is in such confusion that no one knows -how he stands. But so far as I am concerned, it doesn’t matter. My cup -has been filled so full--so long:--that a little more or less trouble is -of no importance. Oh, I assure you, I do not desire to be considered in -the matter at all.” - -She made this last declaration with great earnestness, in immediate -response to the sympathetic look and gesture with which Christian had -interrupted her narrative. - -His gentle eyes regarded her troubled beauty with compassionate -softness. “I venture to think that you will be considered a good deal, -none the less,” he remarked, in a grave yet eager tone. The sense of -elation at being able to play the part of Providence to such a lady -spread through his mind and possessed his being. The lofty possibilities -of the powers devolving upon him had never been so apparent before. He -instinctively put out his arm toward her, in such overt fashion that she -could but take it. She did not lean upon it, but imparted to the contact -instead a kind of ceremonial reserve which directly ministered to the -patrician side of his mood. - -They walked, if possible, still more slowly now, pausing before almost -every stake; their talk was of the flowers, with occasional lapses into -the personal. - -“What you said about Lord Julius,” she remarked, in one of these -interludes, “is quite true. He has it in his power to say whether the -duke shall be a rich man or a pauper, and until yesterday he was all for -the pauper. If poor Porlock and his sons had lived, they knew very well -that Lord Julius was no friend of theirs, and would starve the -title whichever of them had it. And so with these others--Edward and -Augustine--only with them, it isn’t merely dislike but loathing that -Lord Julius has for them.” - -“I met those young gentlemen this morning,” said Christian stiffly. “It -seemed to me that Lord Julius went quite out of his way to be kind with -them. I should never have gathered that he hated them.” - -“Oh, not personally,” she explained. “I don’t think he dislikes anybody -personally. But in what you may call their representative capacity he -is furious with people if they don’t measure up to his idea of what they -should be. I never heard of any other family that had such a man in it. -I used to admire him very much--when I was newly married--I thought his -ideals for the family were so noble and fine--but I don’t know--” - -“Do you have suspicions of Julius, then?” asked Christian, hurriedly. - -“Oh, no, no!” she protested. “Nothing is farther from my thoughts. Only -I have seen it all, here. I have lived in the very heart of it--and -much as I sympathize with his feelings, I can’t help feeling that he is -unjust--not willfully, but still unjust. He and his son are men of great -intelligence and refined tastes; they would do honor to any position. -But is it quite fair of them to be so hard on cousins of theirs who -were not given great intelligence, and who had no capacity whatever for -refinement? That is what I mean. You saw those young men this morning. -They are not up to much, certainly; their uncle Porlock and his sons -averaged, perhaps, even a shade lower--you see I am speaking quite -frankly--but when it is all said and done, they were not so remarkably -worse than other men of their class. If any of the six had succeeded -to the title, he would not have been such a startling anomaly in the -peerage. I doubt if he would have attracted attention, one way or the -other. But it became a fixed idea with Lord Julius years ago to get -control of the estates, and to use this control to bully the elder -line into the paths of sweetness and light. It didn’t succeed in -the least--and I think he grew a little spiteful. That is all. And -besides--what does it matter? It is all ancient history now.” - -Christian was looking straight before him, with a meditative gaze. They -walked for some moments in silence before he spoke. “And how did he -know that he would like me?” he demanded, musingly. “How should he be -confident that I was better than the others? Perhaps--do you know?--was -he very fond of my father?” - -“I have no idea,” she responded. It was impossible not to note the -brevity of her tone. - -“No one speaks willingly of my father,” he broke forth with impulsive -bitterness. “Even Lord Julius would tell me nothing of him. And the -young lady on the boat--she too--” - -He paused, and his companion, who had been looking away, glanced -again at him. “The young lady on the boat,” she said, more by way of -suggesting to him a safe topic than as an inquiry. - -“Oh, I much want to know who she can be,” he cried, unconsciously -accepting the diversion. He described the meeting at Rouen, the -conversation and, after a fashion of his own, the girl herself. “She -said,” he went on, “that she had personally something to do with the -story--‘remotely’ was the word she used. I asked Lord Julius, but he -could not think who she might be. She earns her own living--she told -me that--and she had never been out of England before. She is not well -educated--in the school sense, I mean--her French was ridiculous. But -she spoke very beautifully her own language, and her mind filled me -with charm, but even more so her good heart. We swore friendship for all -time--or at least I did.” - -“Dear me!” said Lady Cressage. Her thoughts had not been idle, and they -brought to her now on the instant a satisfactory clue. She pondered -it for a little, before she decided to speak. “I think I know who this -remarkable young lady must be,” she observed then. “This Captain Edward -whom you met this morning--he has a wife.” - -“Yes, I know,” put in Christian abruptly--“the actress-lady; Julius told -me of her.” - -“I suppose ‘actress’ would cover the thing,” she answered, with an air -of amiable indifference. “She danced more than she acted, I believe, -but ‘actress’ is a very general term. Well, your eternal friend is, I -suspect, her younger sister. ‘I have never seen her, but by accident I -happen to know that she is aware of your coming to England.” - -Christian’s mobile face had lengthened somewhat. “Is she also an--an -‘actress’?” he asked, dolefully. - -Lady Cressage looked skyward, with halfclosed eyes, in an effort -of memory. “I really seem to have heard what she did,” she mused, -hesitatingly. “I know her sister has often spoken of her. Is it -‘barmaid’? No. ‘Telegraph’? No, it’s her father who’s in the General -Post Office. Why, now, how stupid of me! She can’t be a nurse, of -course, or there would have been her uniform. Oh, now I remember--she’s -a typewriter.” - -It was not clear to her whether Christian wholly comprehended the term, -now that she had found it. She perceived, however, that he disliked -something in what she had said, or in her manner of saying it. The -remarkable responsiveness of his countenance to passing emotions and -moods within him had already impressed her. She regarded his profile now -with a sidelong glance, and reconstructed some of her notions about him -by the help of what she saw. Nothing was said, until suddenly he paused, -gazing with kindled eye upon the prospect opened before him. - -They had come to the end of the garden, and stood at the summit of a -broad stone-kerbed path descending in terraces. Above them, the dense -foliage of the yews rising at either side of the gap in the hedge -had been trained and cut into an arched canopy. From under this green -gateway Christian looked down upon a Caermere he had not imagined to -himself before. - -The castle revealed itself for the first time, as he beheld it now, -in its character as a great medieval fortress. On his arrival in the -morning, emerging from the shadowed driveway into the immediate precinct -of the house, he had seen only its variously modernized parts; these, -as they were viewed from this altitude, shrank to their proper -proportions--an inconsiderable fraction of the mighty whole. All -about, the massive shoulders of big hills shelved downward to form the -basin-like hollow in which the castle seemed to stand, but their large -bulk, so far from dwarfing Caermere, produced the effect of emphasizing -its dimensions. Its dark-gray walls and towers, with their bulging -clumps of chimneys and turrets, and lusterless facets of many-angled -roofings, all of somber slate, were visibly the product, the very child, -of the mountains. A sensation of grim, adamantine, implacable power took -hold of the young man’s brain as he gazed. For a long time he did -not want to talk, and felt vaguely that he was signifying this by the -slight, sustained pressure of his arm against hers. At all events, she -grasped his wish, and preserved silence, holding herself a little behind -him, so that he might look down, without distraction, upon his kingdom. - -“These Torrs,” he burst forth all at once, with a nervous uncertainty in -his tones as of one out of breath, “these ancestors of mine--the family -I belong to--did they produce great men? You must know their history. -Julius says we are the most ancient family in England. I have not had -the time yet to learn anything of what we did. Were there heroes and -famous soldiers and learned scholars among us? To look at that wonderful -castle there at our feet, it seems as if none but born chiefs and rulers -of mankind could ever have come out of it.” - -“Captain Edward and his brother Augustine were both born there,” she -permitted her own over-quick tongue to comment. - -He let her arm drop from his with a swift gesture, and wheeled round to -look her in the face. The glance in his eyes said so much to her that -she hastened to anticipate his speech. - -“Forgive me!” she urged hastily. “It was silly thoughtlessness of mine. -I do not know you at all well as yet, you know, and I say the wrong -things to you. Do tell me you forgive me! And it is only fair to myself -to say, too, that I have been in a bad school these last few years. -Conversation as one practices it at Caermere is merely the art of making -everything pointed and sharp enough to pierce thick skins. I should have -remembered that you were different--it was unpardonable of me! But I -have really angered you!” - -Christian, still looking at her, found himself gently shaking his head -in reassurance. It was plain enough to him that this beautiful young -woman had suffered much, and that at the hands of his own people. What -wonder that acrid memories of them should find their way to her lips? He -also had been unhappy. He smiled gravely into her face at the softening -recollection. - -“We were speaking of different things, I think,” he commented, and -nodded approval at sight of the relieved change which his tone brought -to her countenance. “I know very well there are many disagreeable and -unpleasant matters close about us--when we are down below, there. But -now we are up above them, and we forget them all, or ignore them--and I -was asking you about the history of the family--its ancient history.” - -She put her hand lightly upon his arm again. “Lord Julius is right about -it being a very, very long history,” she said, putting into her voice a -tacit recognition of his magnanimity. “I know it, in a certain way, but -I can hardly make a good story of it, I’m afraid. The family is -Keltic, you know. That is what is always said about it, as its most -distinguishing characteristic. It is the only large English one which -managed to survive through the Saxon period, and then the Norman period, -and keep its name and its estates and its territorial power. This makes -it very interesting to historians and archaeologists. There are many -stone circles and Druidic monuments about here, some of which are said -to be connected with the introduction of Christianity into Britain. You -will see them another day, and read the legends about them. Well, it is -said that the chief who possessed this land here, and who had some kind -of a stronghold there where the castle is, at that time, was a Torr. Of -course, there were no surnames then, but it would have been his tribal -appellation, or something of the sort. The fact itself, I believe, is -generally accepted--that the family that was here in St. David’s time is -here now. It is a tradition that there should always be a David in the -family; it used to be the leading name, but now Christian is usually -the duke’s name, and the others are all saints, like Anselm, Edward, -Augustine and--and so forth.” - -The young man looked down in meditation upon the gloomy, historic pile. -“It is a very grand beginning,” he said, thoughtfully. - -“Perhaps it was too grand for mere mortals to live up to,” she ventured, -with a cautious sidelong eye on him. - -“I see your meaning,” he assented, nodding. “Yes, no doubt it is -natural. It is as if a boy were named Napoleon. He would be frightened -to think what he had done to make his name and himself fit together--and -very likely he would never do anything at all.” - -“Yes, that is it,” she answered, and drew a long, consolatory breath. - -They had begun to move down the wide winding path, and when they paused -presently at one of the steps to note a new view of the buildings, she -called his attention to something by a little exclamation and a pointing -finger. - -“Do you see the balcony there, up above and to the left of the -flat-topped tower--no, this side of the highest chimneys--there are -figures coming out on it from the window.” - -“There is some one in a reclining chair, n’est ce pas?” he asked, -following her finger. - -“It is your grandfather,” she said softly. “Those are his -apartments--the rows of windows with the white woodwork. When the -sun gets round to them, they bring him out--if he is strong enough. -Evidently this is one of his good days.” - -Christian, gazing eagerly, made out beyond the attendants and the couch -they bore, another figure, with a splash of white like a shield upon its -front. - -“Is it not Julius?” he asked swiftly, pressing her arm. “Oh, then by -this time my grandfather knows of me--knows that I am here! Should you -not think so? And no doubt, since it is his good day, they will take me -to see him. Is that not probable?” - -“I haven’t the least idea,” she responded, after a momentary pause, -“either as to what Lord Julius has told him, or as to how much he is -capable of understanding. Except from this distance, I have not seen him -since he was struck down with paralysis. I know nothing of his condition -beyond a stray, guarded word now and then from the doctors. If I were -a professional thief and he a crown jewel, I could not have been more -securely shut out from him!” - -The melancholy bitterness of her words, and tone appealed to the young -man. He drew her hand closer to his side by a delicate pressure of -the arm. “I can see that you have been very unhappy,” he said, -compassionately. - -“Oh-h-h!” she murmured, with a shuddering sigh. “Don’t--don’t speak of -it, I beg of you!” - -“I also have had a sad youth,” he went on, unconsciously tightening his -arm. “But now”--and he lifted his head and smiled--“who knows? Who shall -say that the bad days are not all gone--for both of us?” - -Only the flutter of the hand against his arm made answer. They walked oh -together down the broad sunlit path. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -At the foot of the terraced slope, the wide, graveled path down which -Lady Cressage had led Christian described a formal curve to the right, -across a lawn which he recognized as belonging to his morning’s -experiences. The angle of the high, domed conservatory recalled itself -to him. Beyond it, on the same side, would be the window from which he -had quitted the house. - -To the left, a smaller footpath turned into still another garden, and -he was glad that his companion moved this way. They were in a relatively -small inclosure, hedged upon three sides by closely knit high walls of -box; the straggling, untrimmed profusion of this tall growth, through -which a multitude of sweet-briers thrust still farther upward their -dipping and interlaced green rods, gave the place a homely if unkempt -aspect. On the fourth side rose the blue-gray masonry of the castle -itself--an ancient curtain stretched between two towers. The autumn -sunlight lay upon this stained old wall, and warmed it, and glowed -softly among the leaves and saffron blossoms of the great rose-tree -trained upon it. This garden preserved the outlines of some former -quaint arrangement of walks and beds, but these were comfortably -softened everywhere, and in part obscured, by the untrammeled freedom -of vegetation. Even over the moldering red tiles of the paths mosses had -been suffered to creep unmolested. A few late roses were in bloom here -and there, and at one corner there rose a colony of graceful white -lilies, the scent of which filled the air. It was all very restful -and charming, and Christian, pausing to gaze about him, gave little -exclamations of pleasure at what he saw. - -In the center of the garden, surrounded by a low seat of weather-worn -woodwork, was what seemed to be a fountain, culminating in a piece of -statuary, so blackened and battered by time and storm that little could -be made out of its creator’s intentions. Christian, with some murmured -inquiry, led the way toward this--and then perceived that Lord Julius, -who had been sitting at the other and sunny side of the statue, was -standing now in the path, confronting the new-comers with a friendly -smile. - -“This is _my_ particular haunt at Caer-mere,” he explained to the young -man. - -“In so huge a place, one is lost if he does not fasten upon a special -corner or nook of some sort, and send down roots in it and make it his -own. This was my mother’s garden, and for over fifty years now I have -bargained with one generation of head gardeners after another to leave -it alone--as she left it. When Cheltnam came, he was so famous a person -that I submitted to his budding some new varieties on the old wall-rose -there--but, bless me, even that is thirty years ago--before either -of you was born. I see you young people have lost no time in becoming -acquainted.” - -Edith Cressage looked into the old gentleman’s eyes for a moment before -she replied. They had exchanged this same glance--on her side at once -puzzled, suspicious, defiant; on his full of a geniality possibly -pointed with cynicism--very often during the last four years, without -affecting by it any prepossession or prejudice in either’s mind. “We met -by accident in the upper fruit-walk, and I introduced myself. It must -be quite luncheon time. Shall we go in?” She added, as upon an -afterthought, and with another steadfast look into his face, “I have -promised to show him over the house and the castle.” - -“Admirable!” said Lord Julius, cordially. - -He looked at his watch. “We will follow you in a very few moments, if we -may. I dare say he is as ready for luncheon as I am, but I want to show -him my old garden first.” - -“Oh, let me stop too!” she exclaimed, without an instant’s hesitation. -“May I confess it?--when you’re not here I call it _my_ garden, too. I -knew it was your mother’s--and I was always going to ask you to tell -me about her, but the opportunity never offered. It is the one -really perfect spot at Caermere, even to me. And I can understand how -infinitely these old associations add to its charms for you! I shall -truly not be in the way if I stop?” - -The elder man regarded her with a twinkling eye from under his broad -hat-brim as he shook his head. “To the contrary, we are both delighted,” - he answered, amiably enough. He began leading the way at this, and the -two young people, walking perforce very close together on the narrow -path, followed at his heels. - -He pointed out to them that the fountain, which he could not remember -being in working order even in his boyhood, was built over the ancient -well of the castle. The statue apparently dated from William and Mary’s -time; at least, it was very like the objects they set up at Hampton -Court. Part of its pedestal was made of three Ogham stones, which were -said to have stood by the well in former times. Flint knives and other -primitive weapons had been found in the garden. Antiquaries were not -agreed as to the possibility of the well having been in existence at -any very remote period, but it was not unlikely that this small -garden had been the center of interest--perhaps the scene of Druidical -sacrifices, or even of the famous conversion of the tribe resident -here by St. David--at the beginning of things. These speculations as to -precise localities were interesting, but scarcely convincing. The wall -at the end was a more definite affair. It had been built after the Third -Crusade by Stephen de la Tour, as the Normanized name went then. - -“Ah, the name has not always been spelled the same then?” interrupted -Christian here. He spoke with an eagerness which the abstract interest -of the query seemed hardly to warrant. - -“Heavens, no!” said Lord Julius. “It has been Tor with one ‘r’ and with -two; it has been de la Tour, as I said, and Tour without the ‘de la,’ -and Toure, and I know of at least one branch of the people of the name -of Tower who are undoubtedly of our stock. It is quite conceivable that -many others of them are, too.” - -“Then the forms of names can be altered at will?” pursued Christian. “If -a man says, ‘I will spell it so and so,’ then it is all right?” - -“Oh, yes,” explained the other. “Often two spellings exist side by side. -Witness the Seymours a few years ago. You had one brother writing -it Seymour and another St. Maur. The latter is now the official -spelling--for the present, at least.” - -“This is extremely interesting to me,” the young man cried. “So I may -keep my name as I have always borne it! I may write myself ‘Christian -Tower’! That lifts a load from my mind. I had been unhappy to think -of abandoning the name my father liked. He always both spelled and -pronounced it ‘Tower,’ and that is why I shall be so glad to do the -same.” - -An acute kind of silence rested upon the group for an awkward minute. - -“Oh, don’t let us have anymore archaeology before luncheon, Lord -Julius,” put in the lady then. “Caermere so reeks with history that one -must take it in small installments or be overwhelmed altogether. You -were going to tell us about your mother, Lord Julius, and how you -remember her, here in this dear old garden. And positively nothing has -been changed since!” - -“I mustn’t go quite so far as that,” said the old man, smilingly. -He seemed grateful to her for the digression. “A certain systematic -renovation has, of course, been necessary; I have arranged with the -gardeners to manage that. I dare say there are scarcely any plants or -roots here now which were individually in existence in my mother’s time; -but their children, their descendants, are here in their places. Except -for Cheltnam’s buds on the wall there, I don’t think any novelties -have been introduced. If so, it was against my wish. The lilies in that -corner, for example, are lineal progeny, heaven knows how many times -removed, of the lilies my mother planted there. These roses are slips -from other slips of the old cabbage and damask and moss roses she used -to sit and look at with her crewel-work in her lap. The old flowers are -gone, and yet they are not gone. In the same way, my mother has been -dead for sixty years, and yet this is still her garden, and she is -still here--here in the person of me, her son, and of Christian, her -great-grandson.” - -“And I,” commented Lady Cressage, upon a sudden smiling impulse, “I -alone am an intruding new species--like one of Cheltnam’s ‘niphetos’ -buds on the old rose. I hasten to extricate myself.” And with a bright -little nod and mock half-courtesy, she caught her gown in one hand, -wheeled round and moved quickly down the path and through the hedge. - -The two men watched her till she vanished. - -“She is a beautiful lady,” observed Christian, with enthusiasm; “and -very courteous, too.” - -Lord Julius offered no remark upon this, but stood for a little with -his gaze apparently fixed on the point whence she had disappeared. Then, -without turning his head, he said in a gently grave way: - -“If I were you, Christian, I would make as few allusions, in mixed -company, to my father as possible.” - -“Ah, yes! this is what I desired to discuss with you!” said the young -man, stoutly. He swung round to face the other, and his eyes sparkled -with impatience. “Everybody avoids mention of him; they turn to -something else when I speak his name--all but those abominable young -men who offered him insult. That is what I should very much like to talk -about!” - -“I had thought it might not be necessary,” replied Lord Julius. “At -least, I had hoped you would pick up the information for yourself--a -harmless little at a time, and guess the rest, and so spare everybody, -yourself included. But that is precisely what you seem not to do; and I -dare say I was wrong in not talking frankly with you at the start. But -let me understand first: what do you know about your father?” - -“Only that he was a soldier, a professional soldier. That I have told -you,” panted Christian. - -“Yes, and a very notable soldier,” responded the other. “He won the -Victoria Cross in the Mutiny--the youngest man in all India to do so. -That is for you to remember always--in your own mind--for your own pride -and consolation.” - -“Ah, yes, always!” murmured the son. - -“And in other services, too, after he left England,” the elder man went -on, “I have understood that he was a loyal and very valuable officer to -those he fought for. This also is something for you to be proud of---but -still inside your own mind! That it is necessary to remember--that you -must keep it to yourself. Forgive my repeating the injunction.” - -“Go on!” said Christian. - -“Well,” Lord Julius began, speaking with more hesitation, “Ambrose as -a soldier was magnificent, but you know enough from your books to know -that splendid soldiers may easily be--how shall I say?--not so splendid -in other walks of life. It is to be said for him that he was bare -twenty-three--poor boy. It was in 1859; and, as misery would have it, I -was in Syria, traveling with my wife. Perhaps if I had been in England, -I could have done something. As it was, there was no one to help him; -and of course it may be that he couldn’t have been helped. It was a case -of a young man returning to London, with honors and flattery enough to -turn even an old head, and walking blindfold into the worst company in -Europe. I have no intention of going into details. You must take my word -for it that suddenly four or five young men of great families fled to -the Continent; and that, without much publicity in the papers, there was -a very miserable sort of scandal after their flight. Other names were -mentioned--but I needn’t go into that. It was to the interest of -many influential people to hush the thing up, and to some extent they -succeeded. After a while it became even possible for the others to come -back to England--there are many ways of managing such matters--but there -was one of them who never returned.” - -Christian gazed into the old man’s face with mute, piteous fixity of -concentration. - -“This one, of course,” Lord Julius pursued, picking his words still more -cautiously, and liking his task less than ever, “was your father. The -way was smoothed for the rest to come back, but not for him--that is, at -first. Later, when he could have returned, he would not. Ambrose had -a stubborn and bitter temper. He was furious with his father, with his -family--with all England. He would touch none of us. Why, I myself went -to Sicily many years ago--it was as soon as I had got back from the -East--and learned the facts, and found out what could be done; and I -tried to see him, and bring him home with me, but he would not speak -with me, or even remain under the same roof with me--and so I could do -nothing. Or yes, there was one thing--that is to maintain some kind of -watch over you--after his death, and that we did. My own idea was to -have brought you over to England years ago--as soon as your mother -died--but Emanuel thought otherwise.” - -He paused here in his narrative, for the reason that his companion was -obviously no longer listening to him. - -Christian had moved a step or two away, and with a white, set face was -looking off over the hill-tops. His profile showed brows knitted and -lips being bitten, under the stress of an internal tempest. It seemed -to the old man a long time that he stood thus, in dry-eyed, passionate -battle with his own mind. Then, with a sudden, decisive gesture he -spread out his hands and turned impulsively to Lord Julius. - -“You are an old man, and a wise one, and you were my father’s friend and -you are my friend!” he said, with trembling earnestness. “I should be -a fool not to pay heed to what you tell me. You advise that I do not -mention my father more than is necessary. Eh bien, I take your advice. -Without doubt it is right--just as it is right that I should speak less -of my brother Salvator. I have remembered that since you warned me, -and now I will remember this. But I should like”--he came forward as he -spoke, still with extended hands, and looked with entreating earnestness -up into the other’s face--“I should like to have you understand that -Salvator is my brother not any the less, and that I love and honor and -have pride in my father more than before. This I keep in my own mind, -as you advise--but one thing I will do for every one to take note of. I -will write my name always ‘Tower.’” - -The great-uncle put a big, comforting hand on his shoulder. “I should -not dream of blaming you,” he said, gently. “But there is a man to tell -us luncheon is ready.” - -He nodded comprehension to the servant who had appeared at the opening -in the hedge, and, still with his hand on Christian’s shoulder, began to -move in that direction. - -“One other matter,” said the young man in lowered tones and -hurriedly--“from the hill above, awhile ago, I saw my grandfather--in -his chair, on the balcony. You said just now that my father hated -him--was furious with him. Did he behave cruelly to my father?” - -“Oh, no-o,” replied Julius, with an indefinite upward inflection on the -deliberate negative. “Not cruelly.” - -“But unjustly?” - -“Oh, no, not unjustly, either--if only because he never in his life -possessed the dimmest inkling of what justice meant. The duke is my -brother, and I know him much better than any one else living, and so -I am free to speak frankly about him. He has been a duke nearly eighty -years--which is, I believe, unprecedented--but he has been an ass still -longer than that.” After a pause he added: “I am going to take you to -him this afternoon.” - -Christian hung his head as they walked along, and framed in his -depressed mind more than one further inquiry about this grandsire -of his, who held so august a station, and yet had been dismissed so -contemptuously, but they did not translate themselves into speech. -Nor, later, during the luncheon, was this great personage more than -indirectly alluded to. - -The way to this luncheon had led through three or four large rooms, -opening one upon the other by small doors, the immediate approaches to -which were given the effect of passageways by means of screens. What -these apartments were used for, or how the residents of the castle -distinguished them apart in their own minds, Christian could not -imagine. To his rapid and curious inspection, they seemed all -alike--each with its bare, indifferently polished floor, its huge stone -fireplace, its wainscoting, walls and ceiling of dark, umber-hued -wood, and its scant store of furniture which only heightened the ruling -impression of big empty spaces. An occasional portrait was dimly to be -discerned up in the duskiness of the oak panels, but the light from the -narrow and small-paned windows was too faint to examine them by. More -cheerless or apparently useless rooms the young man had never seen. - -Lord Julius seemed to guess his thoughts. “This is all an old part--what -might be called mid-Plantagenet,” he explained, as they went along. “My -father had these rooms pulled about a good deal, and done up according -to Georgian standards, but it was time and money wasted. Even if big -windows were cut through they would be too dark for comfort, to our -notions. The men who made them, of course, cared nothing at all about -daylight, at least inside a house. They spent as little time as possible -under roofs, to begin with; they rose at daybreak and went to bed at -dark. When they were forced to be under cover, they valued security -above all things, and the fewer openings there were in the walls, the -better they liked it. They did no reading whatever, but after they had -gorged themselves with food, sat around the fire and drank as much as -they could hold, and listened to the silly rubbish of their professional -story-tellers and ballad-singers till they fell asleep. If it happened -that they wanted to gamble instead, a handful of rush-lights or a torch -on the wall was enough to see the dice by. - -“Really, what did they want more? And for that matter, what do most of -their lineal descendants want more either? Light enough to enable them -to tell a spade from a heart, and perhaps to decipher the label on -a bottle now and then. Nothing more. The fashion of the day builds -plate-glass windows round them, but it is truly a gross superfluity.” - The room in which Lady Cressage and the luncheon-table awaited them was -of a more hospitable aspect. A broad expanse of lawn, and of distant -trees and sky-line fading away in the sunny autumn haze, made a luminous -picture of the high embrasured window stretching almost from corner to -corner across one side. By contrast with the other apartments, the light -here was brilliant. Christian, with a little apologetic bow and gesture -to the others, dallied before the half-dozen portraits on the walls, -examined the modeling of the blackened oak panels about them, and -lingered in admiring scrutiny of the great carved chimney-piece above -the cavernous hearth, on which a fire of logs crackled pleasantly. This -chimney-piece was fairly architectural in its dimensions. It was as full -of detail, and seemed almost as big, as the west front of a church, and -he tipped his head back to look up at its intricate, yet flowing scheme -of scrollwork, its heraldic symbolism used now for decoration, now to -point the significance, as it were, of the central escutcheon--and all -in old wood of so ripe a nut-brown color that one seemed to catch a -fragrance exhaled from it. - -“That is the best thing here,” said Edith Cressage, moving over to -stand beside him. “It came from Ludlow Castle. Those are the arms of the -Mortimers. It _is_ the Mortimers, isn’t it?” She turned to Lord Julius -for support. “I always confuse them with the De Lacys.” - -“Yes, the Mortimers,” answered Julius, as servants entered, and they -took their seats. “But almost every other family of the Marches is -represented in the devices scattered about. You can see the arrows of -the Egertons, the eagles of the Grandisons, and up above, the corbies or -ravens of the Corbets, and so on. That was the period when the Marches -ruled England, and their great families, all married and intermarried -and bolstered up by the feudal structure, were like a nation by -themselves. The Mortimers, you know,” he added, turning to Christian, -“became practically kings of England. At least they had their grandsons -on the throne--but they couldn’t hold it after they had got it. The day -of these parts was really over before Bosworth Field. The printing press -and Protestantism finished the destruction of its nobility. Only a house -here and there has survived among us. Some few of the old names are -preserved, like flies in amber, over in Ireland, but I should not know -where to look to-day for a De Lacy, or a Tregoz, or a west country Le -Strange, let alone a Mortimer. I suppose, in fact, we have more of the -Mortimer blood among us than there is anywhere else.” - -Christian, seated so that he faced the great armorial pageant spread -as a background to the fair head of the lady, smiled wistfully at his -companions, but said nothing. The words about his sharing the blood of -kings were like some distant, soft music in his ears. He looked at -the escutcheons and badges, and sought in a dreamy way to familiarize -himself with the fact that they were a part of his own history--that the -grandeur they told of was in truth his personal heritage. - -There was some talk going on between the others--conversation which, -for a time, he scarcely strove to follow. Lord Julius had begun by -expressing his joy at the absence from luncheon of the physician whom -circumstances kept on the premises, and from this he drifted to an -attack upon doctors as a class. He denounced them root and branch, -as impostors and parasites, who darkened and embittered human life by -fostering all the mean cowardices of smallbrained people, in order that -they might secure a dishonest livelihood by pretending to dispel the -horrors their own low tricks had conjured up. The robust old gentleman -developed these violent theories without heat or any trace of -excitement, and even maintained a genial expression of countenance -while he spoke. Lady Cressage seemed entertained, and even helped on the -diatribe now and again with pertinent quips of her own. But Christian -could see very little sense in such an assault upon a respectable -profession, and his attention wandered willingly again to the splendid -chimney-piece. He resolved to learn all there was to learn of the -heraldry and local history embodied in this sumptuous decoration, -without delay. But then, on every conceivable side there was so much to -learn! - -Suddenly he became aware that his thoughts had concentrated themselves -on the extraordinary badness of the luncheon he was eating. Here at -least was something Caermere could not teach him about--nor, for that -matter, as it seemed, all England either. Since his arrival in the -country, he reflected, he had not encountered one even tolerable dish. -Vegetables and fish half raw, meats tasteless and without sauce or -seasoning, bread heavy and sour, coffee unrecognizable, the pastry a -thing too ridiculous for words--so his indictment shaped itself. He felt -it his duty to argue to himself that quite likely this graceless and -repellent diet was the very thing which made the English such physical -and temperamental masters of the world, but the effort left him sad. He -made a resolution that if ever Caermere were his a certain white-capped -Agostino, in Cannes, should be imported forthwith. Then he became -conscious again of what was being said at the table. - -“If you could only imagine,” Lady Cressage was saying to Lord Julius, -“what a boon your coming has been! I had positively almost forgotten -what intelligent conversation was like. It seems ages since I last heard -ten consecutive words strung together on a thought of any description. -Let me see--it was June when you were last down, with Sir Benjamin -Alstead; he has been here once since--but in your absence he put on such -a pompous ‘eminent-physician’ manner that really I oughtn’t to count him -at all--and with that exception, from June to October, civilization has -left poor me entirely out of its reckoning. But perhaps”--they had risen -now, and there was a certain new frankness, almost confidence of appeal -in her glance into his face--“perhaps, as matters have turned, you will -come oftener henceforth?” - -Lord Julius nodded. “It is quite likely,” he said, and stretched forth -his hand significantly to Christian’s shoulder. “But you were going to -show him the house--and I suppose I may come along too. There is half an -hour before we go to my brother--and our train does not leave Clune till -nearly six.” - -“You are not going to-day! and he too?” she exclaimed, hurriedly. - -The old man nodded again. “We are expected at Emanuel’s to-night,” he -answered. Then, as Christian had moved toward the window and seemed -beyond hearing, he added, in a smiling aside, “There is one reason for -dragging him away that is comical enough. It wouldn’t do for him to -dine at Caermere in morning clothes, and so far as I can see he has no -others.” - -“He could be too tired to dine,” she suggested, quickly, in a -confidential murmur. “Or, for that matter, there is a room full of -Porlock’s things--I suppose--I suppose poor Cressage’s--would be too big -for him. Oh, it’s too dreadful to have him whisked off like this! Can’t -you send a telegram instead?” - -Her tone was as frank as her speech--and on the instant her glance at -his face made keen inquiry whether it had not been too frank. - -He smiled in a tolerant, almost amused way. “Oh, he will return all in -good time,” he assured her, gently enough. “Caermere will see plenty of -him, later on.” - -“Yes, but who can tell where I shall be then?” The necessity for -speaking in an undertone gave her words an added intensity of feeling. -“And it isn’t only him--I had hoped you would be stopping some days at -least--for I wanted to speak with you about this very thing. My position -here--the uncertainty of everything--is intolerable to bear.” She lifted -her head, and turned her direct gaze into his eyes. - -“If only you liked me a little better, I could discuss the matter more -freely with you.” - -“Humbug!” replied Lord Julius, with a geniality which was at least -superficially reassuring. “You shouldn’t say such things, much less -think them. I can understand your impatience--but it will be possible to -straighten out affairs very soon now. I don’t think you will be found to -have suffered by the delay.” - -“Oh, that is all right,” she answered, almost pettishly. “Everybody -assures me of the most magnanimous intentions--but in the meantime”--she -checked herself, tossed her head in resentment, apparently, at the -tears which had started to her eyes, and forced herself to smile--“in -the meantime, you must forgive my tantrums. It is so depressing -here--all alone--or worse than alone! I’m really no longer fit to -receive anybody. But now”--she raised her voice in an eager simulation -of gaiety--“shall the personally conducted tour begin?” - -Caermere had been inaccessible to so many generations of sightseers that -no formula for its exhibition remained. The party seemed to Christian to -wander at haphazard through an interminable succession of rooms, many of -them small, some of them what he could only think of as over-large, -but all insufficiently lighted, and all suggesting in their meager -appointments and somber dejection of aspect a stage of existence well -along on the downward path to ruin. He had only to look about him -to perceive why Caermere had long ago been removed from the list of -England’s show-places. His companions between them kept his attention -busy with comments upon the history and purpose of the apartments they -passed through, but beyond a general sense of futile and rather shabby -immensity he gained very little from the inspection. The mood to -postpone comprehension of what he was seeing to another and a more -convenient time was upon him, and he almost willfully yielded to it. - -Once, when impulse prompted him to climb a little ladder-like staircase, -and push open a door from which the black dust fell in a shower, and he -discerned in the gloom of the attic chamber piles of armor and ancient -weapons, a thrill of fleeting excitement ran through his veins. - -“They say that Prince Llewelyn’s armor is there,” called up Lord Julius -from the landing below. “Some day we will have it all out, and cleaned -and furbished up. But don’t go in now! You’ll get covered with dirt. I -used to venture in there and rummage about once in a while when I was a -boy,” he added as Christian came down. “But even then one came out black -as a sweep.” - -There were fine broad stretches of rugged landscape to be seen here and -there from narrow casements in the older, higher parts they were now -traversing, and occasionally Christian was able to interest himself as -well in details of primitive, half-obliterated ornamentation over arches -and doorways of early periods, but he was none the less almost glad when -they came out at last into a spacious upper hallway, and halted in tacit -token that the journey was at an end. - -“Now I will leave you,” said the lady, with lifted skirt and a foot -poised tentatively over the first step of the broad descending stairs. -“I shall have tea in the conservatory when you come down.” - -Christian felt that something must be said. “It has all been very -wonderful to me,” he assured her. “I am afraid I did not seem very -appreciative--but that is because the place is too huge, too vast, to be -understood quite at once. And I am so new to it all--you will understand -what I mean. But I thank you very much.” - -She smiled brightly on him and nodded to them both, and passed down the -stairway. Christian was all at once conscious, as his eyes followed her, -that there was a novel quickening or fluttering of his heart’s action. -For a brief second, the sensation somehow linked itself in his thoughts -with the tall, graceful figure receding from him, and he bent forward -to grasp more fully the picture she made, moving sedately along, with a -hand like a lily on the wide black rail. Then he suddenly became aware -that this was an error, and that he was trembling instead because the -moment for confronting his grandfather had come. - -Lord Julius, indeed, had already opened a massive mahogany door at the -right of the stairs, and signaled to him now to follow. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -What Christian first perceived about the duke’s apartments was that -they had an odor quite peculiar to themselves. The series of small and -badly lighted anterooms through which he followed Lord Julius--rooms -with pallet-beds, clothes hung against the walls, and other somewhat -squalid signs of domestic occupation--were full of this curiously -distinctive smell. It was not so obvious in the larger and -better-lighted chamber beyond, which the doctor in residence had -converted to his own uses, and where he sat now reading a book, merely -rising momentarily to bow as they passed. But in the next room--the -big sleeping apartment, with its faded pretensions of stateliness of -appointment, and its huge, high-posted bed, canopied by old curtains -embroidered with heraldic devices in tarnished gilt threads--the odor -was more powerful than ever, despite the fact that a broad window-door -was open upon the balcony beyond. The young man’s keen sense was baffled -by this pervasive scent--compounded as it seemed to be of all the -ancient castle’s mustiness, of sharp medicinal vapors and of something -else at once familiar and unknown. He sniffed inquiringly at it, as they -neared the window, and apparently Lord Julius heard him, for he remarked -over his shoulder: - -“It is the dogs that you smell. They’ve practically removed the kennel -up here.” - -On the stone floor of the balcony outside there were to be seen, indeed, -some dozen old hounds, for the most part lying sleepily in the sunshine, -with their heads pointed toward a large, half-covered reclining chair -placed near the balustrade, and occasionally opening a drowsy eye to -regard its occupant. There were a few dogs of other kinds as well, -Christian noted upon a second glance, and one of these, a bulky black -creature with a broad snout and hair curled tight like astrakhan fur, -sat close to the chair and was thrusting its muzzle against a hand at -its side. - -This hand was what Christian saw first of his grandfather--an immense -limp hand, with thick fingers twisted and misshapen, and skin of an -almost greenish pallor. The dog’s nose, thrust under it, moved this -inert hand about, and the young man felt himself thrill unpleasantly, -for some reason, at the spectacle. - -At the further end of the balcony two men in livery lounged against -the wall, but upon a signal from Lord Julius they went in. The latter, -threading his way among the hounds, led Christian round to the side of -the chair. - -“This is Ambrose’s boy,” he said, bending a little and raising his -voice. “He is Christian, too.” - -Upon the chair was stretched, in a halfsitting posture, the gigantic -frame of a very old man. The grandson looked upon him in silence for a -long time, his mind confused with many impressions. The vast shoulders -and high, bullet-like head, propped up by pillows in the partial shadow -of the hood, seemed vaguely to recall the vision his baby memory had -preserved of his own father. But in detail there was no resemblance. -Or yes, there were resemblances, but they were blurred almost beyond -recognition by the rough touch of time. The face, with its big, harsh -features and bushing brows, and its frame of stiff white whiskers under -the jaws and chin, had something in it which for an instant the young -man seemed to identify; then the unnatural effect of its uniform -yellow-clay color drove all thoughts of its human relationships from -his mind, and he saw nothing but a meaningless mask. It was as devoid of -significance, indeed, as if it had been in a coffin. The eyes were open -and they seemed to be fixed upon the distant rolling prospect of hills -and forest, but whether they were seeing anything, Christian could not -imagine. They certainly had not been turned to include him in their -survey. The livid right hand, swaying as the black dog pushed it with -its nose, was the only thing about the duke that moved. - -“He does not know I am here,” said Christian, at last. He spoke -instinctively, with the ceremonious affectation of awe which one puts on -in the presence of death. His grandfather hardly impressed him as being -alive and still less made any appeal to his sense of kinship. He had -expected to be overwhelmed with emotion at the meeting, but he found -himself barely interested. His wandering glance chanced to take note of -some of the dogs’ faces about the chair. They were all alertly watching -him, and the profoundly wise look in their eyes caught his attention. -No doubt they were dreadful fools, if the truth could be known, but -the suggestion of cultured sagacity in their gaze was extraordinary. He -looked back again at his grandfather, and tried to say to himself that -he was a great noble, the head of an ancient and proud line, and the -actual father of _his_ father--but the effort failed to spur his fancy. -He turned to Lord Julius and lifted his brows in wearied interrogation. - -“Move round in front of him,” counseled the other. “Get yourself in the -range of his eyes.” - -Christian obeyed, and, flushing a little with self-consciousness, strove -to intercept the aged man’s gaze. There was no change upon the ashen -face under the hood to tell him whether he had succeeded or not. The -impulse to grimace, to wave his arms about, to compel attention by -any wild and violent device, forced him to smile in the midst of his -perplexed constraint. He stared for a few moments longer at the gaunt, -immovable figure--then shrugged his shoulders, and, stepping over a dog -or two, made bold to rejoin Lord Julius. - -“I do not see that it is of any use,” he said, with annoyance. “If you -wish to go, I am quite ready.” - -Lord Julius lifted his brows in turn, and looked at his grand-nephew -with curiosity. “I said nothing about going, that I recall,” he began, -with an effect of reproof in his tone. But then he seemed to think -better of it, and gave an abrupt little laugh. “It isn’t very -invigorating, I’m bound to admit,” he confessed, cheerfully enough. -“Wait a moment, and I’ll stir him up a bit.” - -He bent forward again, with his head at the edge of the hood, and -shouted into it: “If you want to see Ambrose’s boy, here he is! If you -don’t want to see him, say so, and waste no more of our time!” - -To Christian’s surprise, the duke took instant cognizance of this -remark. His large face brightened, or at least altered its aspect, into -something like animation; his eyes emerged from their cover of lethargy, -and looked alive. - -“My back is very bad to-day,” he remarked, in a voice which, though -it bore the querulous note of the invalid, was unexpectedly robust in -volume. “And I cannot make out whether the numbness is passing down -below my knee or not.” - -Lord Julius nodded, as if confirming to himself some previous suspicion. -“I thought as much,” he commented in an aside to the young man. “It’s -merely his endearing little way. Have patience, and we’ll draw the -badger yet.” - -He bawled once more into the hood, with an added peremptoriness of tone: -“I explained it all to you, hours ago, and I’m sure you understand it -perfectly. Christian naturally wished to pay his respects to you, but if -your back is too bad, why, there’s no more to be said--and we’ll be off. -Goodbye to you!” - -“Did I know his mother? Who was his mother? I have no recollection of -her.” The duke spoke peevishly, twitching his sunken lips in what was -plainly an effort to pout them. Christian noted with curiosity that as -he surrendered himself to such mental exertion as the talk demanded, -the aged man’s face grew disagreeably senile in effect. An infinity -of gossamer-like wrinkles showed themselves now, covering the entire -countenance in a minute network. - -“No, you didn’t know his mother!” replied Lord Julius, with significant -curtness. “It is more to the point that you should know _him_, since he -is to be your successor. Look at him--and say something to him!” - -The duke managed to testify on his stiffened lineaments the reluctance -with which he did what he was told, but he shifted his eyes in a -sidelong fashion to take a brief survey of the young man. “Cressage -could have given you five stone ten,” he said to him, brusquely, and -turned his eyes away. - -Christian cast a look of bewildered inquiry up at Lord Julius, but -encountered only a smile of contemptuous amusement. He summoned the -courage to declare, in a voice which he hoped was loud enough: “I am -glad to hear, sir, that this is one of your good days. I hope you will -have many more of them!” - -Of this assurance His Grace seemingly took no note. After a short pause -he began speaking again. “There’s a dog up here,” he said, with the -gravity befitting a subject to which he had given much thought, “that -I’m sure falls asleep, and yelps in her dreams, and disturbs me most -damnably, and I believe it’s that old bitch Peggy, and when I mention -it the fellows swear that she’s been taken away, but I suspect that she -hasn’t.” - -“We will look to it,” put in Lord Julius perfunctorily. He added, upon -an afterthought, “Did the guns annoy you, this forenoon?” - -The duke’s thoughts were upon something else. He turned his eyes again, -and apparently spoke to Christian. “A good hearty cut across the face -with a whip,” he said, with kindling energy, “is what’d teach-swine like -Griffiths their place--and then let ’em summons you and be damned. -A farmer who puts up barbed-wire--no gentleman would listen to his -evidence for a minute. Treat them like the vermin they are--and they’ll -understand that. Cressage had the proper trick with them--a kick in the -stomach first and reasons afterward. That’s the only way this country -can be hunted. When I got to riding over eighteen stone, and couldn’t -take anything, that ruffian Griffiths screwed up his gates and sent me -round the turnpike like a damned peddler, and Ambrose--it was -Ambrose, wasn’t it?--or am I thinking of Cressage? But they weren’t -together--here, Julius! It was you who were speaking of Ambrose! What -about him? By God, I wish he had my back!” - -Lord Julius, with the smile in his beard hardening toward scorn, took -Christian by the arm. “I think you’ve had enough grandfather to go on -with,” he said, quietly. “Never mind making your adieux. They would be -quite wasted on him.” - -Without further words, they turned and moved away through the dogs to -the window, and so into the house. The doctor, still at his book, rose -once more upon their approach, and this time Lord Julius halted to speak -with him. - -“His Grace seems to ramble in his mind a good deal more than he did -before luncheon. Do you see a change in this respect--say week by week?” - -“It is not observable in gradations, Lord Julius,” answered the -physician, a stout, sandy young man, who assumed his air of deference -with considerable awkwardness; “sometimes he recovers a very decided -lucidity after what had seemed to be a prolonged lapse in the other -direction. But on the whole I should say there was a perceptible--well, -loss of faculty. He knows the dogs, however, quite as well as -ever--distinguishes them apparently by touch, remembers all their names, -and recalls anecdotes about them, and, very often, about their mothers -too. Fletcher tells me His Grace hasn’t once miscalled a hound.” - -“They make an abominable atmosphere up here,” commented the other. - -The doctor smiled lugubriously. “I can’t deny that, Lord Julius,” he -replied, “but all the same they are the most important part of the -treatment. If we took them away, His Grace would die within the week.” - -“Unhappy dogs!” mused Lord Julius, partly to himself, and walked on. It -was not until they were half-way down the big staircase that Christian -felt impelled to speak. - -“I should much like to know,” he began, with diffident eagerness--“you -have already spoken so plainly about my grandfather--the question -will not seem rude to him, I hope--but when he was well, before the -paralysis, was he in any respect like what he is now?” - -“I should say,” answered Lord Julius, in a reflective way, “that he is -at present rather less objectionable than formerly. One can make the -excuse of illness for him now--and that covers a multitude of sins. But -when he was in health--and he had the superb--what shall I say?--riotous -health of a whale--he was very hard to bear. You have seen him and you -have observed his mental and moral elevation. He remembers his dogs more -distinctly than he does his children. In the Almanach de Gotha he is -classed among princes, but what he dwells upon most fondly among his -public duties is the kicking of tenant-farmers in the stomach when they -try to save their crops from being ruined by the hunt. I may tell you, -I was in two minds about taking you to him at all, and now I think I -regret having done so.” - -“No-o,” said Christian, thoughtfully. “It is better as it is. I am glad -to have seen him, and to have you tell me about him, frankly, as you -have done. It all helps me to understand the position--and it seems that -there is a great deal that needs to be understood. I can see already -that there is strange blood in the Torrs.” He paused on the bottom step -as he spoke, and turned to his companion with a wistful smile. “There -is an even bolder question I should like to ask--how does it happen that -_you_ are so different? How do you account for yourself?” - -Lord Julius laughed. “Oh, that is a long story,” he said, “but I can -put it into a word for you. I was made by my wife. I married a woman -so noble and clever and wise and strong that I couldn’t help becoming a -decent sort of fellow in spite of myself. But I am going to talk to you -about all that, later on. It is better worth talking about than anything -else under the sun. Oh--Barlow, please!” - -The old butler had passed from one door to another in the hall, and -turned now as he was called, with a hand behind him upon the knob. Lord -Julius, approaching, exchanged some words with him upon the subject of -his afternoon’s plans. - -Christian, watching this venerable servant with curiosity, as a type -novel to his experience, discovered suddenly that his scrutiny was being -returned. Barlow, while listening attentively and with decorously slow -nods of comprehension to what was being said to him, had his eyes fixed -aslant, beyond his interlocutor’s shoulder, upon the young stranger. -Christian encountered this gaze, and saw it waver and flutter aside, -as from force of polite habit, and then creep back again. This happened -more than once, and Christian began to feel that it had some meaning. -He observed that the butler inclined his head at last and whispered -something--his pale, wan old face showed it to be an inquiry--into the -other’s ear. The action explained itself so perfectly that Christian was -in no way surprised to see Lord Julius turn smilingly, and nod toward -himself. - -“Yes, he is Ambrose’s son,” he said. “He has come to take his place. I -know you for one won’t be sorry--eh, Barlow?” - -It was clear to the young man’s perceptions that Lord Julius spoke as -to one who was a friend as well as a servant. The note of patriarchal -kindness in the tone appealed gratefully to him, and the affectionate -mention of his father’s name was sweet in his ears. A strange thrill of -emotion, a kind of aimless yet profound yearning, possessed him as -he moved forward. On the instant he realized that this was how he had -expected to feel in the presence of his grandfather. The fact that the -tenderness within him was appealed to instead by this gentle, sad-eyed -old family dependant seemed to him to have something beautiful and very -touching in it. Tears came into his eyes. - -“You remember my father, then,” he said, and the breaking of his voice -carried him into the heart of this sudden new mood of self-abandonment. -“You would have known him as a little child--yes?--and you--you--” he -paused, to dash away the tears with his hand, and strive to regain some -control over his facial muscles--“you will have in your memory the good -things about him--the boyish, pleasant things--and you loved him for -them, did you not?” - -Old Barlow, trembling greatly, and with a faint flush upon his white -cheeks, stared confusedly at the young man as he advanced. “I held him -on his first pony, sir,” he stammered forth, and then shook his head in -token that he could utter no more. His glistening eyes said the rest. - -Christian flung his arms round the surprised old man’s neck, and kissed -him on both cheeks, and then, with head bowed upon his shoulder, sobbed -aloud. - - - - -PART II - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -The music of a spirited and tireless band of robins helped Christian to -wake next morning. The character of their cheerful racket defined itself -very slowly to his drowsy consciousness. He lay for a long time with -closed eyes, listening to it, and letting his mind drift quite at random -among the thoughts which it suggested. He knew they were robins because -his hostess had said he would hear them; he lazily pictured to himself -the tiny red-breasts gathered in the shrubbery outside, in obedience to -some mysterious signal of hers, and singing to order thus briskly and -unwearyingly to make good her promise. - -In what gay, high spirits the little fellow sang! The sun must be -shining, to account for so much happiness. He accepted the idea with -a sense of profound pleasure, and appropriated it to his own wonderful -case. - -For him, it was as if happiness had never existed before. - - “‘Wilt thou have music? Hark! Apollo plays, - - And twenty cagéd nightingales do sing.’” - -He murmured the lines in indolent reverie, then opened his eyes, and -smiled to think where he was, and what he had become a part of. Lifting -himself on his elbow, he looked about him. The beauties of the apartment -had not been lost upon him the previous evening. He had carried them -with him in vague processional magnificence on his devious march through -dreamland; he surveyed them again now in the morning light, rising after -a while to pull aside the curtains, and bring in the full sunshine. - -The room was, he said over and over to himself, ‘the most exquisite -thing he had ever seen. The ruling color was of some blue which -could almost be thought a green, and which, embraced as complementary -decoration many shades of ocher and soft yellowish browns in woodwork, -and in the thick, fleecy rugs underfoot. Around the four sides, at -the level of his eyes, ran a continuous band of portraits--the English -drawings of Holbein reproduced in the dominant tint of the room, set -solidly into the wall, and separated from one another only by thin -strips of the same tawny oak which framed them at top and bottom. -The hooded, high-bosomed ladies, the cavaliers in hats and plumes and -pointed beards, the smoothfaced, shrewd-eyed prelates and statesmen in -their caps and fur, all knew him this morning for one of their own, as -he went along, still in his nightshirt, and inspected them afresh. They -appeared to greet him, and he beamed at them in response. - -A dim impression of the earlier morning, which had seemed a shadowy -passing phase of his dreams, revealed itself now to him as a substantial -fact. Some one _had_ been in the room, moving noiselessly about, and had -spread forth for his use a great variety of articles of clothing and of -the toilet, most of which he beheld for the first time. Overnight, his -cousin Emanuel’s insistence upon his regarding everything in the house -as his own for the time being, had had no definite significance to -his mind. He looked now through the array of silks and fine cloths, of -trinkets in ivory and silver and polished metals, and began dressing -himself with a long sigh of delight. - -Recollections of the leave-taking at Caermere straggled into his -thoughts as he pursued the task. He had seen Lady Cressage again in the -conservatory, where she wore another dress, and had her beautiful hair -carefully arranged as if in his honor, and poured out tea for him and -Lord Julius in wonderful little cups which his great-grandfather, a -sailor, had brought from China. Of her conversation he recalled little, -and still less of the talk of the other lady, the actress-person, Mrs. -Edward, who had joined the party, but whose composed pretty face had -been too obviously a mask for anguish not to dampen everybody’s spirits. -He wondered now, as he plied his razor on the strap, what had become of -her husband, and of that poor-spirited brother of his. Had they joined -the pheasant-shooters, after their interview with him? The temptation to -fire upon themselves instead of the birds must have sorely beset them. - -But it was pleasanter to begin the retrospect some hours later, when the -rough country of the Marches, and even Bristol, had been left behind. -Lord Julius had explained to him then, as darkness settled upon the low, -pasture-land levels they were swinging along past, that Somerset was -also a county of the Torrs; two of their three titles were derived from -it, indeed, and Somerset marriages had brought into the family, in -the days following the downfall of the monasteries, some of the most -important of its estates. If the dukes had turned their backs on -Caermere two centuries ago, and made their principal seat here in this -gentler and more equable land, perhaps the family history might have -been different. Christian had absorbed the spirit rather than the letter -of his companion’s remarks. English counties were all one to him, but -intuitively he had felt that he was getting into a kindlier and more -congenial atmosphere. Although it was a black night, he had stared a -good deal at the window, trying to discern some tokens of this change -in the dimly lighted, empty stations they glided through, or paused -reluctantly in. - -When they had finally quitted the train at Bridgewater, and had got -under way inside the carriage waiting for them there, Christian had -asked whether it was not true that the railway servants here were more -courteously obliging than they had been in other parts. - -Lord Julius had lightly remarked that it might be so; very likely, -however, it was some indirect effect of the general psychical change the -family underwent in shifting its territorial base. Then he had gone on -more gravely, alluding for the first time to the episode of the butler. - -“You must be prepared to find everything very different, here,” he had -said. “There is such a thing as having too much past--especially when -it is of the wrong sort. Caermere is as tenacious of its memories as a -prison--and they are as unpleasant. It forces upon you its air of never -forgetting a single one of its miseries and injuries--and you feel that -it cannot remember any compensating joys. I could see how the effect -of it got into your blood, and broke your nerve. Under ordinary -circumstances men do not kiss their butlers, or even sob on their -bosoms. But I understood perfectly how old Barlow appealed to you. As -you beheld him he might have stood as model for a statue of the Family -Grief, choking down its yearning to wail over the generations gone to -the bad. It was all right, what you did. For that matter, I was precious -near raising a howl of lamentation myself. One is always alternating -between tears and curses in that criminal old coalmine of a castle. -But now you are over a hundred miles away from it all--and if it was -a thousand the difference couldn’t be greater. You will find nothing -whatever to cry about down here. Nobody has any bad dreams. There isn’t -a cupboard that ever sheltered a skeleton even overnight. In these -parts, remarkable as it may seem, the Torrs are actually regarded with -admiration--quite the salt of the earth--a trifle eccentric, perhaps, -but splendid landlords, capable organizers, uncommonly good masters--and -above all, happy people who insist that everybody about them shall be -happy too. It was important to show you the other side first--at least -that was what we decided upon, but you are done with that now--and we’ll -give you something to take the taste out of your mouth.” - -Christian recalled these assurances, now, with a delicious sense of -being already enfolded and upheld by the processes of their fulfillment. -The details of his reception at the broad, hospitably lighted door of -Emanuel’s house crowded in upon his memory, and merged themselves with -other recollections of the later evening hours--the supper, the long, -calm, sweetly intimate talk before the fire, the honest, wise, frankly -affectionate faces into which he had looked to say “good-night”--it -almost overwhelmed him with its weight of unimagined happiness. He had -hardly guessed before what other men might mean when they gave a loving -sound to the word “home.” Yet now the doors of such a home as he could -never have dreamed of had opened to him--to him, the homeless, lonely -one! and he was nestled securely in the warm heart of its welcome. He -could have groaned aloud under the burden of his rapture at the thought. - -At last he went downstairs, his misgivings about the hour not quite -allayed by recollection of the parting injunction to sleep his fill and -get up when he liked. There were beautiful things to note and linger -over on every side as he made his way--pictures and armor and -wonderful inlaid work and tapestries, all subordinating themselves with -distinguished good breeding to the fact that they were in a home and not -a museum--but he moved along in rather conscience-stricken haste toward -the part of the house which had seemed to him the previous night to -be the center of domestic life. He formed a sudden resolution, as -he explored the lower hallway, that when he got some money his first -purchase should be of a watch. - -After looking into a couple of rooms which were clearly not what -he sought, Christian opened the right door, and confronted a -breakfast-table, shining in its snowy attractiveness midway between a -window full of sunlight and a brightly tiled chimney-place, with a -fire on the hearth. There was no one in the room, and he stood for -some minutes looking about him, liking very much the fresh, light-hued -cheerfulness of everything, but still wishing that some one would -come to pour his coffee. By degrees, he assimilated the idea that the -ingredients of breakfast were all here to hand. There were dishes beside -the fire, and this was apparently the coffee-pot on the table--a covered -urn, with a thin spirit-flame trembling beneath it. He had reached -the point of deciding to help himself--or should he ring the bell -instead?--when the door opened and the lady of the house came bustling -in. - -Mrs. Emanuel, as he styled her in his thoughts, looked the very spirit -of breakfast--buoyant, gay-hearted and full of the zest of life. Last -night, to the young man’s diffident though strenuous inspection, she -had seemed the embodiment of tender hospitality in general. Though his -glances were more confident now, in the brilliant morning light, she -still gave the impression of personifying the influences which she made -felt about her, rather than exhibiting a specific personal image. She -was not tall, nor yet short; her face pleased the eye without suggesting -prettiness; she had the dark, clear skin and rounded substance of figure -which the mind associates with sedate movements and even languor, but -she herself moved, thought, spoke with alert vivacity. Above all things, -a mellow motherliness in her had struck the forlorn youth the previous -evening. Now it seemed much more like the sweet playfulness of a fond -elder sister. - -“You took me at my word; that’s right,” she said to him, as they shook -hands. “I was afraid the man might disturb you, or give you the idea you -were expected to get up. And do you feel perfectly rested now? A day or -two more will do it, at all events. If I’d known how they were dragging -you about, by night and by day! But your Uncle Julius has no knowledge -of even the meaning of the word fatigue. Sit here, won’t you--and now -here’s bacon for you, and here’s fish taken this very morning, and eggs -I’ll ring for to be done as you like them, and how much sugar to your -coffee? You mustn’t think this has been boiling ever since morning. It -was made when you were heard moving about in your room.” - -“I should be so sorry to have kept anybody waiting,” he began, in shy -comment upon the discovery that he was eating alone. - -She laughed at him with cordial frankness. “Waiting?” she echoed -merrily. “Why, it’s about three o’clock. Lord Julius is nearly in -London by this time, and the rest of us have not only breakfasted, but -lunched.” - -“Lord Julius gone?” he asked with wide-open eyes. - -She nodded, and raised a reassuring hand. “It’s nothing but business. -Telegrams came early this morning which took him away by the first -train. He would have gone later in the day in any case. He left the -most fatherly adieux for you--and of course you’ll be seeing him soon in -London.” - -Christian was puzzled. “But this is his home here, is it not?” he asked. - -“Not at all--more’s the pity,” she replied. “We wish for nothing so much -as that he might make it so--but he elects instead to be the slave of -the family, and to work like a bank-clerk in Brighton instead of cutting -himself free and living his own life like the rest of us, in God’s fresh -air. But he comes often to us--whenever the rural mood seizes him.” She -seemed to comprehend the doubtful expression on the youth’s face, for -she added smilingly: “And you mustn’t be frightened to be left alone -with us. You’re as much our blood as you are his--and--” - -“Oh, don’t think that!” he pleaded impulsively. “I was never so glad to -be anywhere in my life as I am to be here.” - -Her gray eyes regarded him with kindly softness. He saw that they were -only in part gray eyes--that they were both blues and browns in their -beautiful coloring, and that the outer edge of the iris deepened in tint -almost to the black of the splendid lashes. He returned her look, and -held it with a tentative smile, that he might the longer observe the -remarkable eyes. All at once it flashed upon him that there was a -resemblance. - -“Your eyes are like my mother’s,” he said, as if in defensive -explanation of his scrutiny. - -“Tell me about your mother,” she rejoined, putting her arms on the table -and resting her chin upon a finger. “I do not think I ever heard her -name.” - -“It was Coppinger--Mary Coppinger. I never saw the name anywhere -else.” He added hesitatingly: “My brother told me that her father was -a soldier--an officer--who became in his old age very poor, and was at -last a gardener for some rich man at Malta, and my mother gave lessons -as a governess to support herself, and it was there she met my father.” - -The lady seemed most interested in the name. “Coppinger, is it!” she -exclaimed, nodding her head at him. “No wonder my heart warmed at the -sight of you. Why, now, to look at you--of course you’re County Cork. -You’re our slender dark type to perfection.” - -“I am afraid I do not understand,” he murmured. - -“Why, she could not have that name and be anything but a County -Cork woman. Who ever heard of a Coppinger anywhere else? Only it is -pronounced with a soft ‘g,’ not hard, as you speak it. I wonder--but -that can wait; her father will be easily enough traced. And so you are -an Irishman, too!” - -Christian looked abashed at the confusing suggestion. “I think I am all -English,” he said vaguely. - -She laughed again. “Are you turning your back on us? Did you not know -it? I also am Irish. No doubt I am some sort of cousin of yours on my -own account, as well as on Emanuel’s. There are Coppingers in my own -family, and in most of those that we have intermarried with. Your mother -was a Protestant, of course.” - -He shook his head apprehensively, as if fearful that his answer must -give pain. “No, she went to mass like other people, and I was sent to -the Brothers of the Christian School. But she was not in any degree a -_dévotée_, and for that matter,” he added in a more confident tone, “I -myself am still less _dévot_.” - -“Ah!” was her only comment, and he quite failed to gather from it any -clue to her sentiments on the subject. “Well,” she began again, “I’ll -not put you through any more of your catechism now. Are you finished? -Then come with me and we will find Emanuel, and incidentally you will -see the place--or portions of it. It will take you a long time to see it -all. Do you want to smoke? Put some of these cigars in your pocket--or -here are cigarettes if you prefer them. Oh, we smoke everywhere. There -is nothing on earth that we want to do that we don’t do--and there’s -nothing we don’t want to do that any mortal power can make us do. There -you have the sum of our philosophy.” - -He had followed her into the hallway, where the doors were open wide to -the mellow autumn afternoon. He put on the soft shapeless hat she gave -him from a collection on the antlers, and was inspired to select a stick -for himself out of the big standful at the door. - -“Now I shall walk about,” he said, gaily, “quite as if I had never been -out of England in my life. Is your husband--perhaps-shooting?” - -She seemed always to laugh at him. Her visible merriment at his question -dashed his spirits for an instant. Then he saw how genial and honest was -her mirth, and smiled himself in spontaneous sympathy with it. - -“Don’t dream of suggesting it to him!” she adjured the young man, -with mock solemnity. “He has a horror of the idea of killing living -creatures. He does not even fish for sport--though I confess I hardly -follow him to that length. And don’t speak of him in that roundabout -way, but call him Emanuel, and call me Kathleen or Kit--whichever comes -easiest. Merely because Thom’s directory swears we’re forty years old, -we’re not to be made venerable people by you. All happy folk belong to -the same generation, no matter when they were born--and--but here is -Emanuel now. - -“I have been telling Christian,” she continued, addressing her husband -as he paused at the foot of the steps, “that he is to be happy here, -even in spite of himself.” - -Emanuel shook hands with his cousin, and nodded pleased approval of his -wife’s remark. His smile, however, was of a fleeting sort. “Nothing -has come of the Onothera experiments,” he announced to her in a serious -tone. “I’m afraid we must give up the idea of the yellow fuchsia.” - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -Emanuel Torr, at the age of forty, was felt by those who knew and loved -him almost to have justified the very highest of the high hopes which -his youth had encouraged. This intimate circle of appreciation was -rendered a small one by the circumstances of his temperament and choice -of career; but beyond this his name was familiar to many who had -never seen him, or who remembered him at best as a stripling, yet who -habitually thought and spoke of him as an example and model to his -generation. - -At Oxford, twenty years before, he had attracted attention of a sort -rather peculiar to himself. Those who took note of him saw foreshadowed -the promise, not so much of great achievements as of the development and -consolidation of a great influence. He was not specially distinguished -in his work at the University, and he made no mark at the Union, where -there happened at the time to be glittering a quite exceptional galaxy -of future front bench men, judges and bishops. In Emanuel’s case, the -interest he aroused was perhaps more sentimental than intellectual. His -mind was seen to be of a fine order, but his character was even more -attractive to the observant eye. The facts that he was half Jewish in -blood, and that in time he would be the possessor of enormous wealth, -no doubt lent an added suggestion of romance to the picture of delicate, -somewhat coldly modeled features, of ivory skin and serious, musing dark -eyes, and of a rare smile of wonderful sweetness, which Oxford men of -the mid-seventies still associate with his name. It was in the days -when Disraeli’s remarkable individuality was a part of England’s current -history, and when the English imagination, in part from the stimulus -of this fact, dwelt upon the possibilities of a new Semitic wave of -inspiration and ethical impetus. The dreams, the aspirations, the -mysterious “perhaps” of Daniel Deronda were in men’s minds, and -Johannesburg had not been so much as heard of. - -What the University recognized in the youth standing upon the threshold -of manhood, had been an article of faith within his home since his -childhood. It is as well to recount at this place the brief story of -that home. - -At the age of twenty-five Lord Julius Torr, engaged in the listless -pursuit of that least elusive of careers, called diplomacy, found -himself at The Hague, and yawned his way about its brightly scrubbed -solitudes for some months, until, upon the eve of his resolve to have -done with the whole business, and buy a commission in a line regiment, -he encountered a young woman who profoundly altered all his plans in -life. It was by the merest and unlikeliest of accidents that he came -to know the Ascarels, father and daughter, and at the outset his -condescension had seemed to him to be involved as well. They were of -an old family in the Netherlands, Jewish in race but now for -some generations estranged from, the synagogue, and reputed to be -extraordinarily wealthy. It was said of them too that they were sternly -exclusive, but to the brother of an English duke this had not appeared -to possess much meaning. He had previously been of some official service -to the father, in a matter wherein Dutch and English interests touched -each other at Sumatra; from this he came to meet the daughter. He had -been told by the proud father that she was of the blood of the immortal -Spinoza, and had been so little impressed that he had not gone to the -trouble of finding out who Spinoza was. - -The marriage of young Torr, of the Foreign Office, to some Dutch-Jewish -heiress a half-year later, received only a trifle more notice in England -than did the news of his retirement from his country’s diplomatic -service. The duke had already four sons, and the brother, when it seemed -that he intended to live abroad, was not at all missed. Nearly fifteen -years elapsed before a mature Lord Julius reappeared in England--a Lord -Julius whom scarcely any one found recognizable. He bore small visible -relation to the aimless and indolent young attaché whom people, by -an effort of memory, were able to recall; still less did he resemble -anything else that the Torr family, within recollection, had produced. -He took a big old house in Russell Square, and in time it became -understood that very learned and intellectual people paid pilgrimages -thither to sit at the feet of Lady Julius, and learn of her. Smart -London rarely saw this Lady Julius save at a distance--in her carriage -or at the opera. The impression it preserved of her was of a short, -swarthy woman, increasingly stout as years went on, who peered with -near-sighted earnestness through a large pince-nez of unusual form. -On her side, it seemed doubtful if she had formed even so succinct an -impression as this of smart London. She was content with Bloomsbury to -the end of her days; and made no effort whatever to establish relations -with the West End. Indeed, tales came to be told of the effectual -resistance she offered, in later years, to amiable interested advances -from that quarter. It grew to be believed that she had made an eccentric -will, and would leave untold millions to Atheist charities. The rumor -that she was among the most highly cultivated women of her time, and -that the most illustrious scientists and thinkers would quit the society -of kings to travel post-haste across Europe at her bidding, did not, it -must regretfully be added, seem incompatible with this theory about a -crazy will. Finally, when she died in 1885, something was printed by the -papers about her philanthropy, and much was said in private speculation -about her disposition of her vast fortune, but it did not come out that -any will whatever was proved, and London ceased to think of the matter. - -The outer world had in truth been wrong from the beginning. Lady Julius -was not a deeply learned woman, and the limited circle of friends she -gathered about her contained hardly one distinguished figure, in the -popular use of the phrase; her opinions were not notably advanced or -unconventional; she did not shun society upon philosophic principles, -but merely because it failed to attract a nature at once shy and -practical; so far from being rich in her own right, she had insisted -many years before her death upon transferring every penny of her fortune -to her husband. - -Inside her own household, this dark, stout little woman with the -eye-glasses was revered as a kind of angel. She was plainfaced almost to -ugliness in the eyes of strangers. Her husband and her son never doubted -that she was beautiful. Now, when she had been a memory for ten years -and more, these two talked of her lovingly and with no constraint of -gloom, as if she were still the pivot round which their daily life -turned. - -The elder man particularly delighted in dwelling upon the details of -that earlier change in him, under her influence, to which allusion -has been made. Emanuel had in his mind, from boyhood, no vision more -distinct or familiar than this selfpainted picture of his father--the -idle, indifferent, unschooled, paltry-ideaed young gentleman of -fashion--meeting all unawares this overpowering new force, and kneeling -in awed yet rapturous submission before it. To the boy’s imagination -it became a historical scene, as fixed and well known in its lines -of composition as that of Nelson’s death in the cockpit. He saw his -beardless father in dandified clothes of the Corn-Laws-caricature -period, proceeding along the primrose path of dalliance, like some -flippant new Laodicean type of Saul of Tarsus--when “suddenly there -shined around him a light from heaven.” Lord Julius, indeed, thought and -spoke of it in much that same spirit. The recollection that he had not -known who Spinoza was tenderly amused him: it was the symbol of his vast -oceanic ignorance of all things worth knowing. - -“Ah, yes,” the son used to say, “but if you had not had within yourself -all the right feelings--only lacking the flash to bring them out--you -would not have seen how wonderful she was. You would not have understood -at all, but just passed on, and nothing would have happened.” - -And the father, smiling in reverie, and stroking his great beard, would -answer: “I don’t see that that follows. I remember what I was like quite -vividly, and really there was nothing in me to explain the thing at all. -I was a young blood about town, positively nothing more. No, Emanuel, we -may say what we like, but there are things supernatural--that is, -beyond what we can see, and are prepared for, in nature. It was as -unaccountable as magic, the effect your mother produced upon me from the -beginning. At the end of a few hours, when it was time for me to take -my leave, and I turned--there was a gulf in front of me, cutting me off -from where I had been before I came to her, that very day. It was so -wide, it seemed that I could barely see across it.” - -To any listener but Emanuel such language must have been extravagant. To -him there were no words for overpraise of his mother. It was not alone -that he had never seen her in anger or even vexation; that he had -never known her to be in error in any judgment, or suspected in her an -uncharitable or unkindly thought. These were mere negations, and the -memory of her was full of positive influences, all wise and pure and -lofty. Very early in life, when he began to look about the world he -found himself in, he learned to marvel that there were no other such -women anywhere to be seen. She had been so perfect, with seemingly no -effort to herself! Why should other women not even try? - -Emanuel had been born some ten years after the marriage of his parents, -and they thus came into his baby consciousness as persons of middle age, -in appearance and its suggested authority at least, by comparison with -the parents of other children he saw about him. Nowhere else, however, -either then or in later years, did he see another home so filled from -center to circumference with love, and tender gentleness of eye and word -and deed. The perception that this environment was unique colored all -his boyhood. It became a habit with him to set in contrast his own -charmed existence against the unconsidered and uneven experiences of -other children, and to ponder the meaning of the difference. As he -grew up, the importance of this question expanded in his mind and -took possession of it. He was consumed with the longing to make -some effective protest against the peevish folly with which humanity -mismanaged its brief innings of life. From the cradle to the grave the -race swarmed stupidly along, elbowing and jostling in an aimless bustle, -hot and ill-tempered through exertions which had no purpose; trampling -down all weaker than themselves and cursing those who, in turn, had the -strength to push them under; coming wearily at the end to the gate and -the outer darkness of extinction, a futile and disappointed mob--having -seen nothing, comprehended nothing, profited nothing. - -The progress of a generation across the span of life might be made so -serene and well-ordered and fruitful an affair! What else had man to -concern himself about than this one thing--that “peace on earth, good -will to men,” should rule in his time? And how was it that this alone, -of all possible problems, received from him no attention at all? - -The impulse toward a mission was discernible in the lad; it altogether -dominated the young man. His parents, regarding him lovingly and yet -with wise inquiry, were fascinated by what they saw. A sense of lofty -responsibility in their trusteeship for this beneficent new force formed -a fresh bond between them, which grew to absorb within itself all their -other ties. They came to regard themselves in no other light than as -the parents of Emanuel. To preserve him from vitiating and stunting -suggestions; richly to nourish, yet with an anxious avoidance of -surfeit, both the soul and the mind within him; to give him strength -and means and single-hearted courage adequate to the task he yearned to -undertake--they asked nothing better of life than this. - -After Oxford, he went abroad for a couple of years, having as a -companion a young Fellow of Swithin’s, a trifle older than himself, who -shared his moral attitude if not his passionate aspirations. He saw many -parts of the world, and scrutinized closely in each the working of those -portions of the social mechanism which interested him. Returning with a -mass of notes and a mind packed with impressions and theories, he set -to work to write a big book. At the end of a year he produced instead a -small volume, dealing with one little phase of the huge, complex theme -he had at heart. It was a treatise on the relations between parents and -children, and it received very favorable reviews indeed. University men -felt that it was what they had had the foresight to expect from this -serious and high-minded young fellow, who was lucky enough to have the -means and leisure for ethical essay-writing. Evidently he was going in -for that sort of thing, and they noted with approbation that he had been -at great pains with his style. Much to Emanuel’s surprise, only some -three hundred copies of the work were sold; upon reflection, he saw that -it was no part of his plan to sell books, and he forthwith distributed -the remainder of the edition, and another edition as well, among the -libraries of the Three Kingdoms. Within the next three years two -other brochures went through much the same experiences. They treated -respectively of primary education and of public amusements. Again the -reviews were extremely cordial; again the men who had always predicted -that Torr would do something regarded their prophetic intuition with -refreshed complacency; again Emanuel drew considerable checks in favor -of his publisher. What had been hinted at rather vaguely heretofore was -now, however, announced with confidence in “literary” columns: these -small volumes were merely chapters of a vast and comprehensive work to -which the author had dedicated his life--the laborious exposition of -a whole new philosophy of existence, to be as complete in its way as -Herbert Spencer’s noble survey of mankind. - -Not long after came the death of Emanuel’s mother--an unlooked-for -event which altered everything in the world to the bereaved couple left -behind. They went away together in the following month, with a plan of -a prolonged tour in the Orient, but came back to England after a few -weeks’ absence, having found their proposed distraction intolerable. -Lord Julius promptly invented for his own relief the device of taking -over upon himself the drudgery of caring for his millions, which -heretofore had been divided among a banker, a broker, a solicitor and -two secretaries. Emanuel saw his way less directly, but at last he found -the will to begin a tentative experiment with some of his theories -of life on a Somersetshire farm which his father gave him. The work -speedily engrossed him, and expanded under his hands. He became -conscious of growth within himself as well. The conviction that life is -a thing not to be written about, but to be lived, formulated itself in -his mind, and he elaborated this new view in an argument which persuaded -his father. The Somersetshire estates of the family, which had been -bought by Lord Julius in 1859, when the duke and his son Porlock joined -to set aside the entail, were placed now unreservedly at Emanuel’s -disposal. What he did with them is to be seen later on. - -At the moment, it was of the first importance that he should decide for -himself the great question of celibacy v. marriage. The far-reaching -projects which possessed his brain would, beyond doubt, be multiplied -infinitely in value if precisely the right woman were brought in to -share his enthusiasm and devotion. It was no whit less clear that they -would dwindle into failure and collapse under the blight of the wrong -woman. The dimensions of the risk so impressed him, as he studied them, -that for more than two years he believed himself to be irrevocably -committed to the cold middle course of bachelorhood. - -Then, by a remarkable stroke of good fortune, he met, fell in love with -and married the sister of Lord Rosbrin, a young Irish peer whom he had -known at Oxford. No one has ever doubted, he least of all, that she was -the right woman. - -He wrote no more books, in the years following this event, but gradually -he became the cause of writing in others. A review article upon the -character and aims of his experiment in Somersetshire, written in an -appreciative spirit by an economist of position, attracted so much -attention that the intrusion of curious strangers and inquisitive -reporters threatened to be a nuisance. After this, his name was always -mentioned as that of an authority, when sociological problems were -discussed. There was even a certain flurry of inquiry for his books, -though this did not turn out to have warranted the printing of the new -popular edition. Sundry precepts in them became, however, the stock -phrases of leader-writers. People of culture grew convinced that they -were familiar with his works, and only a few months before the period -at which we meet him, his university had conferred upon him an honorary -D.C.L., which gratified him more deeply than any other recognition his -labors and attainments had ever received. - - - - -CHAPTER X - -Christian, observing his celebrated cousin by daylight for the first -time, perceived the necessity of revising some of the previous night’s -impressions. - -Under the illumination of the shaded lamp and the glowing bank of peat -on the study hearth, Emanuel in his velvet jacket and slippered ease had -seemed a delicately refined creature, of so ethereal a type that life -for it outside the atmosphere of books, and of a library’s thought -and talk, would be unnatural, or even impossible. With his back to the -afternoon sunshine, however, and with rough, light clothes suggesting -fresh-air exercise, Emanuel was a different person. - -In stature he was a trifle taller than Christian; perhaps he was also -something heavier, but what the newcomer noted most about the figure -was the wiry vigor of muscular energy indicated in all its lines and -movements. There was apparent no trace of any physical resemblance -to his father, the massive Lord Julius, and Christian, as this fact -occurred to him, remembered what he had heard about the race from which -the mother had come. He could not say that Emanuel’s face was like -anything which he had thought of as distinctively Jewish. The forehead -was both broad and prominent, and at the top, where early baldness -exposed the conformation of the skull, there were curious sutural -irregularities of surface which attracted attention. The rest of the -face was indefinably distinguished in effect, but not so remarkable. -Christian thought now that it was a more virile countenance than he had -imagined it to be. Vague suggestions of the scholarly dreamer flitted -through its expressions now and again, but it was still above all things -the face of a man of action. - -Christian had said to himself, in that crowded instant of analysis, that -he had never seen any Jewish face which at all resembled this of his -cousin’s. Yet somewhere he had seen a face so like it!--the memory -puzzled and absorbed his mind. The same crisping, silky black-brown -hair; the same full line of brow and nose; the same wide-open dark eyes, -intently comprehending in their steady gaze--how strangely familiar they -were to him! He saw them again in his mind’s eye, and they had the same -shadow-casting background of sunlight--only as he looked at the mental -picture, this sunlight was fiercer and hotter, and there was a golden, -hazy distance of purple-blue sea. Suddenly he laughed aloud, and his -brain was alive with recollections. - -“I never recognized you last night,” he declared. “Is it not strange -that I should have been so blind? But seeing you in the sunlight--ah, I -remember you well enough.” - -Emanuel smiled too, a little awkwardly. “Of course I was not making -any secret of it,” he said. “It would have come up naturally, sooner or -later, in the course of talk.” - -But Christian had turned to the lady, and was speaking with gay -animation. “He it is whom I have so often thought of, for years now, as -the ‘mysterious stranger’ of my poor little romance. How long is it ago? -Oh, ten years perhaps, since I saw him first. It was at Toulon, and I -was walking along the quai in the late afternoon, and he stopped me to -ask some question, and we fell to walking together and talking--at first -about the old town, then of myself, because he wished it so. A long -time passed, and lo! I saw him again. This time he came into Salvator’s -little shop at Cannes--it was in the Rue d’Oran--and I was alone, and -we talked again--it seems to me for more than an hour. And I wondered -always who he could be--because he made me feel that he had friendly -thoughts about me. And then, once more--it was a year ago last -summer--he met me again, and came and sat beside me on a seat in the -Jardin Public, at Nice. It must have been in June, for the season was -ended, and it surprised me that he should be there.” - -“Oh, yes, I know all about it,” put in Kathleen. “He told me of his -seeing you, and what he thought of you, almost as soon as your back was -turned. But at that time, of course--things hadn’t happened.” - -“Ah, but he wanted to be kind to me, even then,” the young man broke -forth, with a glow in his eyes. “I felt that in his tone, the very first -time, when I was the young boy at school. Oh, I puzzled my brain very -often about this young English gentleman who liked to talk to me. -And here is a curious thing, that when the Credit Lyonnais gave me my -summons to come to England, it was of him that I thought first of all, -and wondered if he had not some part in it. And then I was so dull--I -come to his own house, and sit at his own table with him as my cousin, -and do not know him at all! It is true that he had no beard then--but -none the less I am ashamed.” He spread his hands out and smiled a -deprecatory gesture at them both as he added: “But then everything has -been upside down in my mind since I came to England. It has been as if -I were going up the side of a straight cliff in a funicular railway--my -heart throbbing in terror, my brain whirling--afraid to look down, or -out, or to realize where I was. But to-day I am happily at the end of -the journey, and the good safe ground is well under my feet--and so I am -not confused any more, but only very, very glad.” - -The elder couple exchanged a frankly delighted smile over the -enthusiast’s head. “You take him for a stroll about the place,” said the -wife. “Perhaps I will come and find you, later on.” - -In obedience to the suggestion, the two men turned, and went off -together across the lawn. - -Emanuel began speaking at once. “My father,” he said, “has given me a -rough outline of what you have seen and heard. In the nature of things, -it could not all be pleasant.” - -“Oh, I have quite forgotten the unhappy parts,” the young man declared. -“I resolved to do that; it would be folly to remember them.” - -“They have their uses, though,” persisted the other. “I wanted you to -start out with just that impression of the family’s seamy side. We have -an immense deal to make up to the people about us, and to humanity in -general, have we Torrs. It seemed to me that you could not realize this -too early in your experience here. What impressions did Caermere itself -make upon you?” - -Christian hesitated a little, to give form to his thoughts. “I am -imagining it in my mind,” he said at last, slowly, and with extended -hands to shape his meaning to the eye, “as a huge canvas, one of the -very biggest. As it happens, there is an unpleasant picture on it now, -but that can be wiped out, covered over, and then on the vast blank -surface a new and splendid picture may be painted--if I have the skill -to do it.” He paused, as his companion nodded comprehension of the -figure, and then added abruptly: “I have not put the question -direct before--but it is really the case that I am to succeed my -grandfather--to be duke of Glastonbury, is it not?” - -“Yes,” answered Emanuel, gravely. “That is the case.” - -“Lord Julius told me to ask you everything,” Christian went on in -defense of his curiosity. “But, grand Dieu! there is so much to ask! -Shall I be a rich man, also? There are dukes in France who can scarcely -give a dinner to a friend--and in Italy who are often in doubt -about even their own dinners. I understand that English dukes are -different--but it has been said to me that my grandfather, for example, -is not a rich man. He would be rich, no doubt, in some other station, -but as a duke he is poor. Shall I also be poor?” - -Emanuel smiled, more, it seemed, to himself than for the benefit of the -young man. With amusing deliberation he took from his pocket a little -oblong book with flexible covers. “Have you ever owned a checkbook?” he -asked drily. - -Christian shook his head. - -“Well, this is yours. It came from London this morning. I have written -here on the back of the first check, on the part that remains in the -book, these figures. They show what the bank holds at your disposal at -the present moment.” - -Christian took the book, and stared with awe at the figures indicated. -“Three thousand pounds! That is to say, seventy-five thousand francs! -But--I do not understand. What portion is this of my entire fortune? -There is more besides--to come at some future period--n’est ce pas?” - -The sum itself had seemed at first glance to be of bewildering -dimensions. Soberer second thoughts, however, told him that he had been -lifted into a social stratum where such an amount might easily come and -go a number of times during one’s life. - -“Well,” Emanuel began, hesitating in turn over his phrases, “strictly -speaking, you have no fortune at all. This money has been placed to -your credit by my father--or if you like, by us both--to put you in a -position of independence for the time being. You are quite free to spend -it as you like. But--this is a somewhat delicate matter to explain--but -we look to you in turn to be more or less guided by us in, say, your -mode of life, your choice of associates and--and so on. Don’t think that -we wish in the least to hamper your individual freedom. I am sure you -will feel that that is not our way. But we have formed very high hopes -indeed for your career and--how shall I make you understand?--it rests a -good deal with us to say how far the realization of these hopes warrants -us in going on. That isn’t plain to you, I see. Well, to put it frankly, -you have nothing of your own, but we turn our money over to you because -we believe in you. If unhappily--let us suppose the very improbable -case--we should find ourselves no longer believing in you, why then we -should feel free to reconsider our financial responsibilities towards -you. That is stating it very baldly--not at all as I should like to have -put it--but it gives you the essence of the situation.” - -They had paused, and Christian regarded him with a troubled face. “Then -if you come not to like me, or if I make mistakes, you take everything -away from me again? I have never heard of a system like that. It seems -to place me in a very strange position.” - -The youth’s mobile countenance expressed such wistful dejection, as he -faltered out these words, that Emanuel hastened to reassure him. - -“No, no,” he urged, putting a brotherly hand on his shoulder, “it is the -fault entirely of the way I explained it. No one will ever take anything -away from you. In all human probability you will live and die a wealthy -and powerful nobleman--and perhaps something a good deal more than that. -But let me show you the situation in another way. You have seen your -grandfather--so I need say little about him. When he had reached the age -of fifty or thereabouts he had come to the end of his resources. Since -the estates were entailed, nothing could be sold or mortgaged, and debts -of all sorts were crowding in upon him and his eldest son, Lord Porlock. -They were at their wits’ end to keep going at all; Porlock could not -hold his head up in London, much less marry, as he was expected to -do. If it had not been for the invention of life insurance, they could -hardly have found money to live from week to week. That was in 1858 -or ’9, when I was two or three years old. It was then that my father -adopted his policy toward the older branch of the family. As you perhaps -know, he was a very rich man. He came forward at this juncture, and -saved the duke and his household from ruin.” - -“That was very noble of him. It is what I should have thought he would -do,” interposed Christian. They had begun walking again. - -“Oh, I don’t know that noble is quite the word,” said Emanuel. “The -element of generosity was not very conspicuous in the transaction. The -truth is that the duke and his son were not people that one could be -generous to. They had to be bound to a hard-and-fast bargain. They -agreed between them to break the entail, so that all the estates could -be dealt with as was deemed best, and bound themselves to sell or -mortgage nothing except to my father, unless with his consent. He on -his side settled seventy thousand pounds on Porlock and his heirs, -thus enabling him to marry, and he not only purchased from the duke the -Somerset properties, of which this is a part, but he bought up his debts -at the sacrifice of a good many thousands of pounds, so that in practice -he became his brother’s only creditor. No doubt there _was_ generosity -in that--since he cut down the rate of interest to something almost -nominal by comparison with the usury that had been going on--but his -motive was practical enough. It was to get complete financial mastery -of the family estates. Nearly forty years have passed since he began; -to-day he holds mortgages on practically every acre. If it were not -for the mine near Coalbrook, which latterly yields the duke a certain -surplus over the outlay at Caermere, my father would probably own it all -outright. Well, you have followed it so far, haven’t you?” - -Christian thoughtfully nodded his head. “These are not affairs that -I have been brought up to understand,” he commented, “but I think I -comprehend. Only this--you speak of your father’s adopted policy; -that means he has a purpose--an aim. The lady at the castle--Lady -Cressage--spoke to me about this, and I wish--” - -“Ah, yes, you met her,” interposed - -Emanuel. “I am not sure she was the best fitted to expound our policy to -you.” - -“Oh, she was very sympathetic,” the young man hastened to insist. “She -had the warmest praises for both you and your father. And I could not -but feel she wished me well, too.” - -Emanuel made no immediate reply, but walked slowly along, revolving -silent thoughts, with a far-away, deliberative look in his eyes. When -he spoke at last, it was to revert with abruptness to the earlier topic. -“The policy, as we are calling it,” he said, “can be put in a nutshell. -We take that kind of pride in the family which impels us to resolve -that, if we cannot induce it to do great things, we will at least -prevent it doing base things. The position which your grandfather -inherited was one of remarkable opportunities, and also of exceptional -responsibilities. He was unfit to do anything with the opportunities, -and as for the responsibilities, he regarded them with only ignorant -contempt. His immediate heirs were very little better. It became a -problem with us, therefore, how best to limit their power for harm. -Money was the one force they could understand and respect, and we have -used it accordingly. I say ‘we’ because as the situation has gradually -developed itself, it is hard to say which part of it is my father’s and -which mine--and still more impossible to imagine what either of us would -have done independently of my mother. I will tell you more about her -sometime. It was she, of course, who brought the money to us, but she -brought much else besides. However, we will not enter upon that at the -moment. Well, suddenly, last summer, the deaths changed everything. -Up to that time, what we had been doing had had, so to speak, only a -negative purpose. We had been keeping unfit people from parading their -unfitness in too scandalously public a fashion. But all at once the -possibility of doing something positive--something which might be very -fine indeed--was opened up before us. As you know now, we were aware of -your existence, but there were inquiries to be made as to--well, as to -the formal validity of your claim. After that, there was some slight -delay in tracing your whereabouts--but now you are here, at last.” - -“Now I am here, at last!” Christian repeated softly. He looked up into -the sky; somewhere from the blue an invisible lark filled the air with -its bubbling song. He drew a long breath of amazed content, then turned -to his companion. - -“That men like you and your father should be making plans and sacrifices -for one like myself,” he said--“it is hard for me to realize it. There -is nothing for me to say but this--that I will spare no thought or labor -to be what you want me to be. And you will make it all clear to me, will -you not? in every detail what it is I am to do?” - -“Oh, hardly to that length,” said Emanuel. He smiled once more--that -grave, sweet, introspective smile of his, which suggested humor as -little as it did flippancy--and spoke more freely, as if conscious that -the irksome part of his task lay behind him. “We dream a great dream of -you, but it would be folly to attempt to dictate to you at every stage -of its realization. That would do you more harm than good, and it would -be unfair to both parties, into the bargain. No, what I desire is to -show you the practical workings of a system, and to fill you with the -principles and spirit of that system. I think it will interest you -deeply, and I hope you will see your way to making it, in its essentials -at least, your own. It has taken me many years to build it up, and I -can’t pretend to suppose that you will grasp it in a week or a year. But -you will see at least the aim I have in view, and you will get a notion -of how I progress toward it. I shall be satisfied, for the time being, -merely to commend it to your judgment as the aim which you might do well -to set before you. It occurs to me to ask you: have you decided opinions -in politics?” - -Christian shrugged his shoulders diffidently. “In France my friends were -of many parties, but since I thought never of myself as a Frenchman, -I did not take sides with any of them. My brother Salvator is very -advanced indeed; he is a Free Mason, and his friends are Carbonari in -Italy and Socialists in France. But to me, these things had not much -meaning. I said always to myself that I was English, and I read journals -from London when I could, to learn about English parties. But it was -not easy to learn. I stood in the streets often at Cannes in the early -spring to see Mr. Gladstone when he passed, and to take off my hat to -him, because I read that he was the greatest Englishman. But then I -talked with English people on the Riviera about him, and they all cursed -and ridiculed him, and told me that in England no respectable -people would so much as speak to him. So it is very hard to know the -truth--when you are born and bred in another country.” - -“Even those who are born here do not invariably agree upon definitions -of the truth,” commented Emanuel. “But I was not speaking of parties -or politicians, so called. Politics, in its bigger sense, means -the housekeeping of humanity--the whole mass of interests that the -individuals of the human race have in common. But I don’t want to -generalize to you. Let us stop here for a few minutes; I have brought -you to this point that you may get the view.” - -Their leisurely stroll through pastures and meadows, and latterly -across a strip of grassy common dotted with sheep, had brought them by -a gradual ascent to the summit of a knoll, crowned by a group of -picturesquely gnarled and twisted old trees, the boughs of which -were all pointed backward in the direction whence the men had come. -Christian, coming to the ridge and halting, confronted the unexpected -breeze, steady and sustained as an ocean swell, which he could hear -murmuring through the land-ward bent branches overhead. In front of him, -at the distance of a stone’s throw, the sloping heath abruptly ended in -what for the instant he supposed was the sky-line--and then saw to be -a vast glittering expanse of water, stretching off to an illimitable -horizon. - -“Oh, the sea!” he cried out, in surprised delight. “I had never dreamed -that we were near it.” - -He could distinguish now the faint intermittent rustle of the waves on -the hidden beach far below. Perhaps a mile out the profile of a craft -under full sail shone magically white in the sunlight. He knew it to -be a yacht, and began watching it with an intuitive appreciation of its -beauty of line and carriage. Then in a sudden impulse he swung around -and faced his companion. “I do not like to look at it,” he broke out -nervously. “I am afraid to see the ghosts of those cousins who were -drowned--killed to make room for me. Where their yacht went down on the -rocks--was that close by here?” - -“At least sixty miles away--in that direction,” and Emanuel gave an -indifferent nod towards the west. “I wouldn’t encourage ghosts of any -sort, if I were you, but theirs would be least of all worth while. I -wanted you to look about you from here--not specially seaward, but in -all directions. There is a small village at the water’s edge, almost -directly under our feet, which can’t be seen from above--we will get -round to it, perhaps to-morrow--but look in other directions. As far -as you can see along the coast to right and left--and inland, too--the -system I spoke of is in operation. It is all my land. Get the scope of -it into your mind. Roughly speaking, you can see over some nine or ten -thousand acres. Imagine that multiplied by seven or eight, and you will -have, an idea of the territory that your grandfather still owns--at -least nominally.” - -Christian kept a rapt gaze upon the prospect, and strove in silence to -grasp the meaning of the words. - -“On the land that you see before you,” Emanuel went on, “in one capacity -or another, nearly two thousand human beings have homes. On your -grandfather’s estates there must be nearly if not quite ten times that -number. Think what this means. You will be in a position to affect the -prosperity, the happiness, the well-being, body and soul, of fifteen or -twenty thousand people. It is a little nation--a small kingdom--of which -you will be the head.” - -The young man turned slowly and forced himself to look out upon the -deep, but still said nothing. - -“This position you may make much of, or little, or worse than nothing at -all,” the other continued. “It is a simple enough matter to put the work -and the responsibility upon other shoulders, if you choose to do it. -Many very respectable men born to such positions do wash their hands -of the worry and labor in just that fashion. They lead idle lives, they -amuse themselves, they take all that is yielded to them and give nothing -in return--and because they avoid open grossness and scandal their -behavior attracts no particular attention. In fact, it is quite taken -for granted that they have done the natural thing. Being born to -leisure, why should they toil? Possessing the title to wealth and -dominion and the deference of those about them, why should they be -expected to go to work and earn these things which they already own? -That is the public view. Mine is very different. I hold that a man who -has been born to a position of power among his fellows, and neglects the -duties of that position while he accepts its rewards, is disgraced. It -is as dishonest as any action for which less fortunate persons go to -prison.” - -“Yes, that is my feeling, also,” said Christian in low, earnest tones. -“It’s all true--but--” - -“Ah, yes, the ‘But,’” commented Emanuel, with his perceptive smile. “Now -let me explain to you that I have met this ‘But,’ and done battle with -it, and put it under my feet. I began planning for this struggle when I -was very young. All the good people I knew admitted frankly the evils -I speak of; they saw them quite clearly, and talked with eloquence and -fine feeling about them, and at the finish they said ‘But!’--and changed -the subject, and everything went on as before. It became apparent to me -that this eternal ‘But’ is the enemy of the human race. There it -stood forever in the path, blocking every attempt of benevolent and -right-minded people to advance in real progress. So I said: at least one -life shall be given to the task of proving that there need be no ‘But.’ -I have been working here now for years, upon lines which were carefully -thought out during other years of preparation. The results are in most -respects better than I could have expected; they are certainly many-fold -better than any one who had not my faith could have believed possible. -Sundry limitations in the system I have, no doubt, discovered. Some -things which seemed axiomatic on paper do not work themselves out the -same way in practice--but as a whole the system is recognized now as -having justified itself. There was an article in the ‘Fortnightly’ on -it last November which I will give you to read. I have written some -chapters upon certain phases of it, myself, which you might also look -at. But the principal thing is that you should see the system itself in -full operation.” - -“I am eager to begin,” declared the young man, with fervor. - -They had turned by tacit consent, and were sauntering back again over -the short, soft grass of the heath. - -Emanuel paused and picked from a furze-bush a belated spray of bright -yellow blossoms. As he continued his walk, he pulled one of these -flowers to pieces, and attentively examined the fragments. - -“I gather that you are much interested in flowers,” said Christian, to -make conversation. - -The other laughed briefly, as he threw the stuff aside, then sighed a -little. “Too much so,” he answered. “I wish I had the courage to give it -up altogether. It murders my work. I spend sometimes whole hours in my -greenhouses when I ought to be doing other things. The worst of it is -that I realize perfectly the criminal waste of time--and still I persist -in it. There is something quite mysterious in plants--especially if you -have grown them yourself. You can go and stand among them by the hour, -and look from one to another, with your mind entirely closed to thoughts -of any description. I used to assume that this mental rest had a -recuperative value, but as I get older I suspect that it is a kind -of lethargy instead--a mere blankness that can grow upon one. I find -myself, for example, going incessantly to see certain pans of my own -hybridized seedlings--and staring aimlessly at them till I get quite -empty-headed. Now, I am too busy a man to be able to afford that.” - -“But if you get pleasure from it,” expostulated Christian, gently. - -“We have no right to think of our pleasure,” Emanuel asserted with -decision, “while any duty remains unperformed. And rightly considered, -duty _is_ pleasure, the very highest and noblest pleasure. The trouble -is that even while our minds quite recognize this, our senses play us -tricks. For example, when I saw how much time I was wasting on flowers, -I tried to turn the impulse into a useful channel. The blossoms of fruit -trees, for instance; the growth and flowering and seeding processes of -melons and broad-beans and potatoes and so on, are just as interesting -and worthy of study, and they mean value to humanity into the bargain. -So I said I would concentrate my attention upon them, instead--but there -was some perverse element in me somewhere; I couldn’t do it. The mere -knowledge that these excellent vegetables were of practical utility -threw me off altogether. They bored me--so I went shamefacedly back to -the roses and fuchsias and dahlias.” - -“They have wonderful dahlias at Caermere,” interposed Christian. “I -walked for a long time among them with Lady Cressage, and she told me -all their names. Poor lady, she is very sad, in spite of the flowers. -I--I think I should like to say it to you--I find myself very sorry for -her. And--such a bewildering number of things are to be done for me--is -there not something that can be done for her?” - -Emanuel walked slowly on in silence for some moments, regarding his -companion’s profile out of the corner of his eye, his own face showing -signs of preoccupation meantime. When at last he spoke, the question -seemed to have lost itself in convolution of his thoughts. - -“Considering their northern exposure,” he said meditatively, “they grow -an extraordinary amount of fruit at Caermere.” - - - - -CHAPTER XI - -At the end of a fortnight Christian found himself able to confront the -system, and even look it in the face, with a certain degree of mental -composure. He was far from imagining that he had comprehended it all, -but the thought of it no longer made his brain whirl by the magnitude of -its scope, or frightened him by its daring. The implication that he -was expected to do still more with it than Emanuel, its inventor and -evangel, had done, possessed its terrors, no doubt, but one is not -young for nothing. The buoyancy of youth, expanding genially amid these -delightful surroundings, thrust these shadows off into the indefinite -future, whenever they approached. - -This system need not detain us long, or unnerve us at all. Lord Julius -had spoken figuratively of it as the Pursuit of Happiness; perhaps that -remains its best definition. - -Like other systems, it was capable of explanation by means of formulas; -but the most lucid and painstaking presentation of these could not hope -to convey complete meaning to the mind. Stated in words, Emanuel’s plan -hardly appealed to the imagination. Save for a few innovations, not -of primary importance, it proceeded by arguments entirely familiar to -everybody, and which indeed none disputes. Most of its propositions were -the commonplaces of human speech and thought. The value of purity, of -cheerfulness, of loyalty, of mercy--this is not gainsaid by any one. The -conception of duty as the mainspring of human action is very old indeed. -For this reason, doubtless, Emanuel’s efforts to expound his System -by means of books had failed to rivet public attention. He could only -insist afresh upon what was universally conceded, and Mr. Tupper before -him had done enough of this to last several generations. - -Viewed in operation, however, the System was another matter. Our -immemorial platitudes, once clothed in flesh and blood, informed with -life, and set in motion under the sympathetic control of a master mind, -became unrecognizable. - -Emanuel as a lad had thought much of the fact that he was of the blood -of the Spinozas. When he learned Latin in his early boyhood, the task -was sweetened and ennobled to his mind by the knowledge that it would -bring him into communion with the actual words of the great man, his -kinsman. Later, when he approached with veneration the study of these -words, the discovery that they meant little or nothing to him was almost -crushing in its effects. Eventually it dawned upon his brain that the -philosopher’s abstractions and speculations were as froth on the top -of the water; the great fact was the man himself--the serene, lofty, -beautiful character which shines out at us from its squalid setting like -a flawless gem. To be like Spinoza, but to give his mind to the real -rather than the unreal, shaped itself as the goal of his ambitions. - -It was at this period that he became impressed by the thought that -he was also of the blood of the Torrs. On the one side the poor -lens-grinder with the soul of an archangel; on the other the line of -dull-browed, heavy-handed dukes, with a soul of any sort discoverable -among them nowhere. Slowly the significance of the conjunction revealed -itself to him. To take up the long-neglected burden of responsibilities -and possibilities of the Torrs, with the courage and pure spirit of a -Spinoza--there lay the duty of his life, plainly marked before him. - -Ensuing years of reading, travel and reflection gave him the frame, so -to speak, in which to put this picture. He had from his childhood been -greatly attracted by the glimpses which his father’s library gave him of -what is called the Mediaeval period. As he grew older, this taste became -a passion. Where predilection ended and persuasion began, it would be -hard to say, but when he had arrived at man’s estate, and stood upon -the threshold of his life-work, it was with the deeply rooted conviction -that the feudal stage had offered mankind its greatest opportunities -for happiness and the higher life. That the opportunities had been -misunderstood, wasted, thrown away, proved nothing against the soundness -of his theory. He had masses of statistics as to wages, rent-rolls, -endowments and the like at his fingers’ ends, to show that even on its -reverse side, the medieval shield was not so black as it was painted. -As for the other side--it was the age of the cathedrals, of the Book -of Kells, of the great mendicant orders, of the saintly and knightly -ideals. It was in its flowering time that craftsmanship attained its -highest point, and the great artisan guilds, proud of their talents and -afraid of nothing but the reproach of work ill-done, gave the world its -magnificent possessions among the applied arts. Sovereigns and princes -vied with one another to do honor to the noblest forms of art, and -to bow to the intellect of an Erasmus, who had not even the name of a -father to bear. Class caste was the rule of the earth, yet the son of a -peasant like Luther could force himself to the top, and compel emperors -to listen to him, more readily then than now. The bishop-princes of -feudal England were as often as not the sons of swineherds or starveling -clerks, whereas now no such thing could conceivably happen to the -hierarchy. Above all things, it was the age of human character. Men -like Thomas More, with their bewildering circle of attainments and their -extraordinary individual force, were familiar products. In a thousand -other directions, Emanuel saw convincing proofs that mankind then and -there had come closest to the possibilities of a golden age. True, it -had wandered off miserably again, into all manner of blind lanes -and morasses, until it floundered now in a veritable Dismal Swamp of -individualism, menaced on the one side by the millionaire slave-hunter, -on the other by the spectral anarchist, and still the fools in its ranks -cried out ceaselessly for further progress. Oh, blind leaders of the -blind! - -No. Emanuel saw clearly that humanity could right itself by retracing -its steps, and going back to the scene of its mistaken choice of roads. -It had taken the wrong turning when it forsook the path of coherent and -interdependent organization--that marvelously intricate yet perfectly -logical system called feudalism, in which everybody from king to serf -had service to render and service to receive, and mutual duty was the -law of the entire mechanism. - -Though Christian heard much more than this, enough has been said to -indicate the spirit in which Emanuel had embarked upon the realization -of his plan. The results, as Christian wonderingly observed them, were -remarkable. - -The estate over which the System reigned was compact in shape, and -enjoyed the advantage of natural boundaries, either of waste moorland or -estuaries, which shut it off from the outside world, and simplified the -problem of developing its individual character. In area it comprised -nearly fifteen square miles, and upon it, as has been said, lived some -two thousand people. About half of these were employed in, or dependent -upon, the industrial occupations Emanuel had introduced; the others -were more directly connected with the soil. Whether artisans or farmers, -however, they lived almost without exception in some one of the six -little villages on the property. - -In each of these hamlets there were conserved one or more old timbered -houses; the newer cottages had been built, not in servile imitation -of these, but after equally old models, no two quite alike. As the -“Fortnightly Review” article said, if the System had done nothing else -it had “gathered for the instruction and delight of the intelligent -observer almost a complete collection of examples of early English -domestic architecture of the humbler sort.” The numerous roads upon the -estate were kept in perfect order, and were for the most part lined with -trees; where they passed through the villages they were of great width, -with broad expanses of turf, shaded by big oaks or elms, some of which -had been moved from other spots only a few years before, to the admiring -surprise of the neighborhood. Each village had a small church edifice of -its own, quaintly towered and beautiful in form, and either possessing -or simulating skillfully the graces of antiquity as well. Beside -the church was a building presenting some one or another type of the -tolsey-house of old English towns, devoted to the communal uses of the -villagers. About the church and the tolsey was the public garden and -common, with a playground with swings and bars for the children at -the back--and there was no grave or tombstone in sight anywhere. A -hospitable, ivy-clad, low-gabled inn, with its long side to the street, -was a conspicuous feature on each village green. - -Christian retained a vivid recollection of entering one of these taverns -with Emanuel, very early in his tour of observation. Above the broad, -open door, as they went in, swung the cumbrous, brightly painted sign -of “The Torr Arms.” Two or three laborers in corduroys were seated on -benches at the table, with tankards before them; they dragged their -heavily shod feet together on the sanded floor, and stood up, when they -saw Emanuel, touching their hats with an air of affectionate humility -as he smiled and nodded to them. There was a seemingly intelligent and -capable landlady in the bar, who drew the two glasses of beer which -Emanuel asked for, and answered cheerfully the questions he put to her. -Two brightfaced young women, very neatly dressed, were seated sewing in -this commodious bar, and they joined in the conversation which Emanuel -raised. Christian gathered from what he heard and saw that his cousin -took an active interest in the fortunes of this tavern and of both its -inmates and its patrons, and that the interest and liking were warmly -reciprocated. The discovery gave him a more genial conception of -Emanuel’s character than he had hitherto entertained. - -“That is one of my most satisfactory enterprises,” Emanuel had said when -they came out. “We brew our own beer, as well as the few cordials which -take the place of spirits, and I really feel sure it’s the best beer -obtainable in England. I am very proud of it--but I am proud of -these taverns of ours too. That was one of the hardest problems to be -solved--but the solution satisfies me better, perhaps, than anything -else I have done. Nobody ever dreams of getting drunk in these ‘pubs’ -of ours. Nobody dreams of being ashamed to be seen going into them or -coming out. The women and children enter them just as freely, if they -have occasion to do so, as they would a dairy or grocer’s shop. They -are the village clubs, so to speak, and they are constantly open to the -whole village, as much as the church or the tolsey. But here is one of -my parsons. I want you to take note of him--and I will tell you about -his part in the System afterward. He is as interesting a figure in it as -my publican.” - -A tall, fresh-faced, fair young man approached them as Emanuel spoke, -and was presented to the stranger as Father William. Christian observed -him narrowly, as he had been bidden, but beyond the fact that he was -clad in a somewhat outlandish fashion, and seemed a merry-hearted -fellow, there was nothing noteworthy in the impression he produced. He -stood talking for a few minutes, and then, with affable adieux, passed -on. - -“That is wholly my invention,” commented Emanuel, as they resumed their -walk. “There is one of them in each of the six villages, and a -seventh who has a kind of general function--and really I have been -extraordinarily fortunate with them all. They come from my college at -Oxford--Swithin’s--and when you think that twenty years ago it was the -most bigoted hole in England, the change is most miraculous. These young -men fell in with my ideas like magic. I don’t suppose you know much -about the Church of England. Well, it drives with an extremely loose -rein. You can do almost anything you like inside it, if you go about the -thing decorously. I didn’t even have the trouble with the bishop which -might have been expected. These young men--my curates, we may call -them--have among themselves a kind of guild or confraternity. -They are called Father William, or Father Alfred; they wear the sort of -habit you have seen; they are quite agreed upon an irreducible minimum -of dogmatic theology, and an artistic elaboration of the ritual, and, -above all, upon an active life consecrated to good works. They have -their own central chapter-house, where they live when they choose and -feel like enjoying one another’s society, but each has his own village, -for the moral and intellectual health of which he feels responsible. -Without their constant and very capable oversight, the System would have -a good many ragged edges, I’m afraid. But what they do is wonderful. -They have made a study of all the different temperaments and natures -among the people. They know just how to smooth away possible friction -here, to encourage dormant energy there, to keep the whole thing -tight and clean and sound. They specially watch the development of the -children, and make careful notes of their qualities and capacities. They -decide which are to be fully educated, and which are to be taught only -to read and do sums.” - -“I am not sure that I understand,” put in Christian. “Is not universal -education a part of your plan?” - -Emanuel smiled indulgently. “There was never grosser nonsense talked -in this world,” he said, with the placid air of one long since familiar -with the highest truths, “or more mischievous rubbish into the bargain, -than this babble about universal education. The thing we call modern -civilization is wrong at so many points that it is hard to say where -it sins most, but often I think this is its worst offense. The race -has gone fairly mad over this craze for stuffing unfit brains with -encumbering and harmful twaddle. In the Middle Ages they knew better. -The monks of a locality picked out the children whose minds would repay -cultivation, and they taught these as much as it was useful for them to -know. If the system was in honest operation, it mattered nothing whether -these children belonged to the lord of the manor or the poorest peasant. -Assume, for example, that there was a nobleman and one of his lowest -dependents, and that each of them had a clever son and a dull one. The -monks would take the two clever ones, and educate them side by side--and -if in the end the base born boy had the finer mind of the two, and the -stronger character, he would become the bishop or the abbot or the judge -in preference to his noble school-fellow. On the other hand, the two -dull boys were not wearied by schooling from which they could get no -profit. The thick-headed young-noble, very often without even learning -his alphabet, was put on a horse, and given a suit of armor and a sword; -the heavy-witted young churl was given a leathern shirt and a pike or -a bow, and bidden to follow behind that horse’s tail--and off the two -happy dunces went, to fulfill in a healthful and intelligent fashion -their manifest destiny. Those were the rational days when human -institutions were made to fit human beings--instead of this modern -lunacy of either shaving down and mangling the human being, or -else blowing him up like a bladder, to make him appear to fit the -institutions. Of course, you must understand, I don’t say that this -medieval system worked uniformly, or perfectly, even at its best--and, -of course, for a variety of reasons, it eventually failed to work -altogether. But its principle, its spirit, was the right one--and it is -only by getting back to it, and making another start with the light of -experience to guide us this time, that we can achieve real progress. -Fortunately, my parsons entered fully, and quite joyfully, into my -feelings on this point. They couldn’t have labored harder, or better, to -make the System a success if it had been of their own invention.” - -“I have seen English parsons often,” said Christian, vaguely. “They are -always married, n’est ce pas?” - -“Oh, no--no!” answered Emanuel, with impatient emphasis. “That would -never do here. It is difficult enough to find men fit to carry on the -task we have undertaken. It would be asking too much of the miracle to -expect also unique women who would bring help rather than confusion to -such men. Oh, no--we take no risks of that sort. Celibacy is the very -basis of their guild. It is very lucky that their own tastes run in that -direction--because in any case it would have had to be insisted upon.” - -Christian wondered if he ought to put into words the comment which rose -in his mind. “But you, and your father,” he ventured--“you personally--” - -“Ah,” interposed Emanuel, with a rapt softening of expression in face -and tone, “when women like my mother and my wife appear--that lifts us -away from the earth and things earthly, altogether. But they are as rare -as a great poem--or a comet. If they were plentiful there would be no -need of any System. The human race would never have fallen into the mud. -We should all be angels.” - -After a little pause he added: “The woman question here has been a very -hard nut to crack. We have made some progress with it--but it is still -one of the embarrassments. Of course there are others. The restless -young men who leave the estate, for example, and having made a failure -of it elsewhere, come back to make mischief here: That is an awkward -subject to deal with. The whole problem of our relations to outsiders -is full of perplexities. To prevent intercourse with them is out of the -question. They come and go as they like--and of course my own people are -equally free. I can’t see my way to any restrictions which wouldn’t do -more harm than good--if indeed they could be enforced at all. I have to -rely entirely upon the good sense and good feeling of my people, to show -them how much better off they are in every way than any other community -they know of, and how important it is for them to keep themselves to -themselves, and continue to benefit by their good fortune. If they fail -to understand this, I am quite powerless to coerce them. And that is -where the women give us trouble. It is the rarest thing for us to have -any difficulty with the men. They comprehend their advantages, they take -a warm interest in their work, and we have developed among them a really -fine communal spirit. They are proud of the System, and fond of it, and -I can trust them to defend it and stand by it. But this isn’t true of -all the women. You have always the depressing consciousness that there -are treacherous malcontents among them, who smile to your face but are -planning disturbance behind your back. It is not so much a matter of -evil natures as of inferior brains. Let a soldier in a red coat come -along, for example--an utterly ignorant and vulgar clown from heaven -knows what gutter or pigsty--and we have girls here who would secretly -value his knowledge of the world, and his advice upon things in general, -above _mine!_ How _can_ you deal with that sort of mind?” - -Christian smiled drolly, and disclaimed responsibility with a playful -outward gesture of his hands. “It is not my subject,” he declared. - -“But it has to be faced,” insisted Emanuel. “My wife has devoted -incredible labor and pains to it--and on the surface of things she has -succeeded wonderfully. I say the surface, because that is the sinister -peculiarity of the affair; you can never be sure what is underneath. -When you go up to London, you must do as I have done since I was a -youth: take a walk of a bright afternoon along Regent Street and Oxford -Street, where the great millinery and drapers’ and jewelers’ shops are, -and study the faces of the thousands of well-dressed and well-connected -women whom you will see passing from one show-window to another. -There will be many beautiful faces, and many more which are deeply -interesting. But one note you will catch in them all--or at least in the -vast majority--the note of furtiveness. Once you learn to recognize -it you will find it everywhere--the suggestion of something hidden, -something artfully wrapped up out of sight. God knows, I don’t suggest -they all have guilty secrets--or for that matter secrets of any sort. -But they have the trained facial capacity for concealment; it is their -commonest accomplishment; their mothers’ fingers have been busy kneading -their features into this mask of pretense from their earliest girlhood.” - -“Would you not find it also on the men’s faces?” demanded Christian, -with a dissolving mental vision of sly masculine visages before him as -he spoke. “That is to say, when once you had learned to detect the male -variation of the mask? And even if it is so, then is not the reason of -it this--that men have long been their own masters, making their own -laws, doing freely what they choose, and there is no one before whom -they must dissemble?” - -Emanuel had not the temperament which is attracted by contradiction. He -listened to his cousin’s eager words, seemed to ponder them for a space, -and then began talking of something else. - -Those whom Emanuel called “his people” were for the most part -descendants of families who had been on the soil for centuries--since -before the Torrs came into possession of it. In a few cases, their stock -had been transplanted from the Shropshire estates of the same house. -Emanuel had discerned it to be an essential part of the System that -its benefits should be reaped by those to whom his family had historic -responsibilities. The reflection that the Torrs in Somerset only went -back at the farthest to Henry VIII.’s time, and became large landlords -there so recently as Charles II.’s reign, saddened him when he dwelt -upon it. He would have given much to have been able to establish -the System at Caermere instead, where the relations between lord and -retainer had subsisted from the dawn of tribal history. He dwelt a good -deal upon this aspect of the matter in his talks with Christian. “If you -take up the idea,” he would say, “you will have the enormous advantage -of really ancient ties between you and your people. Here in Somerset -we are, relatively speaking, new-comers--merely lucky bridegrooms or -confiscating interlopers of a few generations’ standing. I have had -to create my feudal spirit here out of whole cloth. But you at -Caermere--you will find it ready-made to your hand.” - -Emanuel had created much more besides. - -The villages hummed with the exotic industries he had brought into -being. The estate produced most of its raw material--food, wool, hides, -peat for domestic fuel, stone in several varieties for building, and -numerous products of the sea. It drew coal, wood and iron across the -channel from the Caermere properties. The effort of the System had been -from the outset to expand its self-sufficiency. Christian saw now the -remarkable results of this effort on both sides. One village had its -leather workers, beginning with the tanners at one end and finishing -with the most skillful artificers--glovers, saddlers and shoemakers--at -the other. A second village possessed its colony of builders--masons -and carpenters alike--and with them guiding architects and designers of -furniture and carving. Here also were the coopers, who served not only -the brewery, but the butter-makers. These latter formed in turn a link -with the great dairy establishment, which had for its flank the farming -lands. The gardens, nurseries, orchards and long glasshouses were -nearest to Emanuel’s residence, and their workers made up the largest of -the hamlets. This was in other senses the metropolis of the state, for -here were the printing-press, the bindery, the chemical laboratory, -the electric-light plant, the photographic and drawing departments, the -clergy house and the estate office. The smallest of the villages was in -the center of the stock farm, where scientific breeding and experimental -acclimatization had attained results of which the staid “Field” spoke in -almost excited terms. - -But to Christian’s mind by far the most interesting village was that -nestled on the sea-shore, under the protection of the cliffs. When he -had once seen this place, his cousin found if difficult to get him away -from it, or to enlist his attention for other branches of the System. -There was a small but sufficient wharf here, to which colliers of a fair -burden could have access; shelter was secured for the home-built fishing -craft in the little harbor by means of a breakwater. The red-roofed, -gray-stone cottages clustered along the winding roadway which climbed -the cliff made a picture fascinating to the young man’s eye, but his -greater delight was in something not at first visible. Around a bend in -the cove, out of sight of the village, was a factory for the manufacture -of glass, and beyond this were pointed out to him other buildings, near -the water’s edge, which he was told were used for curing, pickling and -otherwise preserving fish. “We make our own glass for the gardens and -forcing houses, ‘and for all the dwellings on the estate,” Emanuel had -told him, “and for another use as well.” - -The statement had not aroused his curiosity at the moment, but a little -later, when he confronted the embodiment of its meaning, he murmured -aloud in his astonishment. He found himself walking in a spacious -corridor, beneath a roof of semi-opaque, greenish glass, and between -walls that seemed of solid crystal, stretching onward as far as the eye -could reach. A bar of sunlight, striking through aslant from somewhere -outside, painted a central glowing prismatic patch of color, which -reflected itself in countless wavering gleams of orange and purple all -about him. A curious moving glitter, as of fountains noiselessly at -play, traversed the upper surface of these glass walls, and flashed -confusion at his first scrutiny. Then he gave a schoolboy’s shout of joy -and rushed forward to the nearest side. He was in a giant aquarium--and -these were actual fishes of the sea swimming placidly before him! Even -as he stared in bewildered pleasure, with his nose flattened against the -glass, there lounged toward him, across the domed back of a king-crab, -the biggest conger he had ever imagined to himself. He put up a hand -instinctively to ward off the advance of the impassive eel--then laughed -aloud for glee. - -“Oh, this is worth all the rest!” he cried to Emanuel. - -“Yes, good idea, isn’t it?” said the other. “It was my wife who -suggested it. We had started making our own glass--and really this was -a most intelligent way of using it. In time I think it will be of great -value, too. We have some clever men down here, from time to time, to -study the specimens. I’m sorry no one is here for the moment. I thought -at first of building a residence for them, and putting it all at their -disposal in a regular way as a kind of marine observatory, like that at -Naples. But after all, it would hardly be fair to the system. My first -duty is to my own people, and we’ve got some young men of our own who -are making good use of it. There are a hundred or more of these tanks, -and we are fitting up electrical machinery to get automatic control -of the water supply, and to regulate the temperature more exactly. But -beyond the spectacle of the fishes themselves--our people make holiday -excursions here every fortnight or so--and certain things we learn about -food and fecundation and so on, I don’t know that there’s much to be -said for the practical utility of this department. Further on you will -see the oyster and mussel beds, and the lobsters and crabs. I attach -much more importance to the experiments we are making out there. There -seems almost no limit to what can be done in those fields, now that -we have learned how to go to work. It is as simple a matter to rear -lobsters as it is to rear chickens.” - -“But it is all wonderful!” cried Christian, once more. “But tell -me--this costs a great sum of money. I am afraid to think how much. Is -it your hope--shall you ever get a profit from it?” - -Emanuel smiled. “There is no question of profits,” he explained, gently. -“The System as a whole supports itself--or rather is entirely capable of -doing so. The capital that I have spent in putting the System upon its -feet, so to speak, I count as nothing. It belonged to the people who had -been with us all these centuries and I have merely restored it to them. -In the eyes of the law it is all mine, and from that point of view I am -a much richer man than I was before the System began. But in practice -it belongs to all my people. I take enough to live as befits my -station; each of the others has enough to maintain him in _his_ station, -comfortably and honorably. Whatever the surplus may be, that is devoted -to the objects which we all have in common. You see it is simplicity -itself.” - -“But that is like my brother Salvator’s doctrine,” said Christian. -“It is socialism, is it not?” Emanuel’s fine brows drew together in an -impatient frown. “Please do not use that word,” he said, with a shade of -annoyance in his tone. “The very sound of it affronts my ears. Nothing -vexes me more than to have my work unthinkingly coupled with that -monstrous imposture. If you will think of it, I am more opposed to what -is called socialism than anybody else on earth. I have elaborated the -one satisfactory system, on lines absolutely opposed to it. I furnish -the best weapon for fighting and slaying that pernicious delusion that -the whole world offers. So you see, I have a right to protest when -people confuse me with my bitterest antagonist.” - -“Pardon!” said Christian, with humility. “I am so badly informed upon -all these matters!” - -“Ah, well, you will understand them perfectly, all in good time,” his -cousin reassured him in a kindly way. - -Christian drew a furtive sigh as they moved along. To his fancy the -large fishes in the tanks regarded him with a sympathetic eye. - - - - -CHAPTER XII - -It has done Emanuel a world of good to have you here,” said Kathleen, -on the morning of Christian’s leave-taking. “Of course it has been a -delight to us both--but he has had a personal benefit from it, too. -He works too hard. He carries such a burden of details about in his -mind--by day and by night, for he sleeps badly and is forever dreaming -of his work--that companionship with some new and attractive mind is of -the greatest rest and help to him. And he is very fond of you.” - -Christian nodded gratified acknowledgment of the words and their spirit, -with a glow in his dark eyes. In little more than an hour he would be -on his way to London--that mighty, almost fabulous goal of his lifelong -dreams. He was already dressed for the journey, in a traveling-suit of -rough, fawn-colored cloth, and as he sat at ease in the breakfast-room -with his cousin’s wife, his glance wandered very often from her face -to a pleased contemplation of these garments. They were what he -individually liked best in the wonderful collection of clothes for which -a fashionable tailor had come from London to measure him, and which were -this moment being packed by the man up-stairs in bags and portmanteaus -equally new. The tweeds enabled him to feel more like an Englishman than -he had succeeded in doing before. - -He smiled diffidently at her. “I am so excited about going,” he said, -his voice wavering between exuberance and appeal--“and yet I ought to be -thinking of nothing but my sorrow in leaving you dear people. But that -will come to me soon enough--in a storm of homesickness--when once I -find myself really alone.” - -“Oh, I’ll not deny we expect a _little_ homesickness,” she replied to -him, cheerfully--“but it must not be enough to at all take the edge off -your spirits. Oh, you’ll be vastly entertained and interested by all -you see and hear. Young Lord Lingfield--you’ll be seeing him to-night -at dinner--he will be greatly pleased to take you about, and properly -introduce you; He will do it better than any other we can think of. He -is not by any means an intellectual gladiator, but he is good-looking -and amiable and he goes everywhere.” - -“He is my relation, too, I think Emanuel said?” - -“Let’s work it out--his grandfather’s sister was your grandmother. Yes, -that is it. She was the Lady Clarissa Poynes, the sister of the old earl -of Chobham, who used to wear the blue coat and brass buttons to the -end of his days. So she would be the aunt of the present earl, and -the grand-aunt of young Lingfield. You stand in exactly the same -relationship to Lord Lingfield that you would to a son of Emanuel’s--if -he had one, poor man!” - -Christian had long since become sensible of the pathos which colored -these references to the childlessness of the house. A tender instinct -impelled him to hasten a diversion. - -“And how strange it is!” he cried. “They are as close to me, these -people, in blood as Emanuel is--and yet I care nothing for them -whatever. I shall meet them, and know them, and not feel that I am bound -to them at all--whereas Emanuel is like a brother to me, whom I have -been with and loved all my life. And you,” he added, with a smile in his -eyes--“you are more than any sister to me.” - -“Well, then, let me talk to you like a sister,” she rejoined. - -He thought he had not seen her before in precisely the mood which was -discernible in her face and tone this morning. Outwardly she was as -gay and light-hearted as ever, and certainly she had not seemed on any -previous day to come so near being beautiful as well. The sense of sheer -pleasure in being where she was, in listening to her and looking’ -at her, and holding her affectionately bright attention for his own -thoughts, was peculiarly strong in him to-day. But there was also the -consciousness of a new gravity in her attitude toward him--a kind of -yearning apprehension of dangers threatening him. He saw again in her -eyes when she looked at him that likeness to his mother’s glance--a -wistfully sad glance as he most often recalled it. And yet Kathleen -smiled merrily with it all, when occasion required. - -“You are entering upon the great experience now,” she said to him: “I -think it was very wise of Emanuel to show you first what we may call -his ideal state of society. By all the rules, it ought to help you -to understand in the right way what you will see of the society -which--well, which isn’t in an ideal state. But there are certain things -which get to be understood, not so much by brains, as by years. That -is to say, the very cleverest youth may not be able to see, in this one -respect, what is plain enough to most dull persons at forty. Emanuel -tells me that he has talked with you about women in general.” - -“He does not like them very much,” said Christian, laughingly. - -She twisted the corners of her mouth in a droll little grimace, which -seemed to express approval of his mirth, and something more besides. - -“He takes them with tremendous seriousness,” she answered. “That is his -way with everything. He makes all sorts of classifications--the bigger -they are and the more complicated the better he likes them--and then he -treats each one as a problem, and he worries at it with all his energy -until he works out a satisfactory solution. It is only in that sense -that he has a grievance against women. He has proceeded upon the theory -that the sex is a unit, for philosophical purposes at least, and that -he ought to be able to get at the rules which govern its actions. But we -continue to baffle him,” she added, again with the playful curl of the -lips. - -“Oh, you--you are not in the problem,” protested Christian. “For you -and his mother he has only the veneration one gives to one’s favorite -saints.” - -“His mother was a great woman,” said Kathleen, serious once more. “I -never saw her, but she is my patron saint, as you put it, quite as much -as his. I never permit myself to doubt that we should have loved each -other deeply--and it is the sweetest thing any one can think of me, -or say to me--to link us together. But even the saints have their -specialties--and that implies limitations. I have a notion that -Emanuel’s mother did not know many women, and so fell into a way of -generalizing about them. Emanuel has that same tendency. I, who work -among them daily, and make it my business to be teacher and mistress and -mother and sister to some five hundred of them, young and old, foolish -and wise--I come to believe that these generalizations are entirely -mistaken. If a woman is brought up like a man, and circumstanced -precisely like a man, and knows nothing of any conventions save those -which control a man--why, then you can’t tell the difference between -her opinions and actions and those of her brother. But you never get the -chance to view a woman under those conditions.” - -“But here we shall see them!” cried Christian, with premature -enthusiasm. “You will change all that!” - -“Oh, no, I shan’t,” she answered abruptly. “It is not being tried--it is -not desirable. What I am doing proceeds quite on orthodox lines. We -make a point of developing them in the way of usefulness--material -usefulness, I mean. We teach them the useful accomplishments--spinning, -weaving, sewing, dairy and poultry work, and above all things good -cooking.” - -“That I can well believe,” he declared. “I have never eaten so many good -dishes in my life as here.” - -“Yes, I _have_ a talent in that direction,” she assented. “And I -am prouder of it because it represents a triumph over my ancestral -prejudices. You will get nothing good to eat in Ireland. The Irish have -never respected food as a proper subject for serious human thought. -It is the rarest thing to hear them mention it. There may be some fine -spiritual quality in that--but at all events we cook well here, and I -have worked a complete revolution in that respect on the estate. There -are certainly no such cooks and housekeepers anywhere else in England as -my women. But you see what I mean. There is no effort to take women away -from the work they have always been doing, but only to make them do it -better.” - -“But that in itself is very much,” urged Christian. Somehow he had the -feeling that he was defending the System against a critic. - -“Undoubtedly,” she admitted. “And of course we do something more than -that. In a good many cases, when it was not inconvenient, I have put -young girls of aptitude forward to learn designing and other arts. Some -of them have made me some very tolerable tapestry, and a few of them are -as intelligent and valuable in the greenhouses as our best men. In the -matter of music they really beat them. Emanuel insists on a choir of -glee singers in each village--and at Christmas time we have a -competition of ‘waits’ which will be worth your while coming to hear. -For my part, I have a string orchestra of girls that I should not be -ashamed to have play in London.” - -The word seemed to bring them back, “You were going to speak to me,” - Christian ventured, “about London. One thing--I shall see you there -often, shall I not?” - -She slowly shook her head. “No, we have outgrown London, I’m afraid. It -can be proved, I believe, that it is the biggest town in the world--but -to us it is too small for comfort. It is now more than a year since we -have been up at all. Why should we go? We have the National Gallery by -heart, and the year’s pictures are rather distressing than otherwise. -The theaters are intellectually beneath notice. There is the opera of -course, and the concerts, but the people annoy us by talking loudly, -and besides, we have our own music, and occasionally we bring down a -Paderewski or a Sarasate for our people to hear. At the houses where -we would naturally go, the women talk about matters of which I know -absolutely nothing, and Emanuel either quarrels with the men about what -they call their politics, or chokes silently with rage and disgust. -And then the spectacle of the people in the streets--the poor of -London!--that fairly sickens our hearts. We have no joy of going at all. -Occasionally we have guests down here, but it is not a very happy -time they have of it. Everything is so strange to them that they are -confused, and walk about with constraint, as if they were being shown -around an asylum. So it happens that I see very few women of my own -class--and really know less about them than most people. And yet,” she -added, with a twinkle in her eye, “so naturally audacious a race are the -Irish--it is precisely about ladies in London society that I am going to -read you a lecture.” - -Christian drew up his feet, and assumed an air of delighted -anticipation. - -“First of all, you are six and twenty, and you will be thinking of -marrying. What is more, you are what is called a great match, and for -every thought that you give to the subject of a wife, others will give -ten thousand to the subject of you as a possible husband.” - -The young man looked into her kindly eyes with a sustained glance of -awakening thought. This dazzling and princely position which she had -thus outlined--sure enough, it was his! How extraordinary that this -had not suggested itself to him before! Or had the perception of it not -really lain dormant in his consciousness all the while? This question -propounded itself to a mind which was engrossed in something else--for -of a sudden there rose upon the blank background of his thoughts -the luminous face of a lady, beautiful, distinguished, exquisitely -sensitized, and as by the trick of a dream she first wore a large garden -hat, and then was bare-headed, her fair hair gathered loosely back into -a careless knot. The mental picture expanded, to show the full length of -her queenly figure as she descended a broad staircase, with one lovely -hand like a lily against the oak of the rail. Then it contracted, and -underwent a strange metamorphosis, for it was another face which he saw, -a pale, earnest, clever face, and instead of the great stairway, there -was the laced tawdriness of a French railway compartment. - -Then, with a start, and a backward movement of the head, he was free of -dreamland, and blushingly conscious of having stared his cousin out of -countenance. He laughed with awkward embarrassment. “I--I suppose it is -true--what you say,” he remarked, stumblingly. - -She had perhaps some clew to the character of his reverie. She smiled -in a gently quizzical way, but went on soberly enough. “The thing of all -things,” she said, “is to be clearly and profoundly convinced in your -own mind that your marriage will be the most important event of your -life--that it will indeed affect, for good or for bad, every conceivable -element of your life. You have the kind of temperament which would be -peculiarly susceptible to such intimate influences. There are great -numbers of men--the vast majority--to whom it does not matter so much. -They accommodate themselves to their burdens, and shuffle along somehow, -with the patience of a cart-horse. But you--the wrong wife would wreck -you and kill you. I am speaking frankly, laddie,”--she gave the novel -word an intonation which made it music in his ears--“because you have -no mother, and because you are going into a very trying and delicate -situation with what I feel to be a pathetic lack of preparation.” - -Christian drew his chair nearer to her, and crossed his knees, and -leaned back in an attitude of intimate ease. The conversation appealed -powerfully to him as having more of the atmosphere of domesticity and -sweet home influences in it than any he had ever heard. - -“I know almost nothing at all of women,” he said, quite simply. “The -mothers of my pupils I saw sometimes and occasionally a sister, but they -were not in any sense my friends. As to marriage--of course that has -never been in my head. Until only the other day, the idea of a wife -would have been absurd. But now--as you say--it is not any longer -absurd.” He paused and gazed absently past her, as if in pursuit of -the thoughts his own words had set in motion. “I wonder--I wonder”--he -murmured, and then turned his bright eyes to her, full of wistful -expectancy. “Have you, par exemple, some one in your mind for me?” he -asked. - -She laughed and shook her head. The implication in his tone, of entire -readiness to accept the bride of her selection, had its amusing and its -flattering sides; upon a second glance, however, it contained something -else not so much to her liking. She frowned a little at this something. - -“Oh, you must not approach the subject in that spirit,” she adjured him. -“It is the one affair of all others on earth in which you must be guided -absolutely by your own heart and your own mind. We speak of the heart -and mind as distinct from each other; I don’t know that they are not -one and the same. Perhaps I would put it this way--when your heart _and_ -your mind are completely agreed, when your personal liking and your -deliberate judgment pull together in exactly the same direction--so that -it seems to you that they _are_ one and the same thing--then--then-----” - -“Then what?” demanded Christian, bending forward. - -“Oh, I am not fortunate in expressing myself to-day,” Kathleen declared, -with a gesture of playful impatience. “But in general, this is what I -wanted to say: Do not be betrayed into haste in this matter of deciding -about a girl. You will see a large number of extremely attractive young -ladies. They will certainly not be looking or behaving their worst for -your benefit, and you on your side will be lacking the experience to -tell precisely what it is all worth. So walk quietly along, with your -wits about you, and see what there is to be seen for a time, and commit -yourself to nothing. A year hence, for example, you will look back -upon your present condition of mind with surprise. You will not seem -to yourself at all the same person. I can’t promise that you’ll be -happier,” she added, with a little smiling sigh, “but you will know a -great deal more about what you want--or rather about making sure that -you are getting what you want.” - -“I know what I shall do,” he declared, after a moment’s reflection. “I -shall come always to you, and beg your wise and good advice. You will -tell me if I am making a bad choice.” - -“You talk as if you were entering upon a lifelong series of -experiments,” she laughed at him. “No, I’ll undertake no such -responsibility as that, young man.” She explained, more gravely: “It -is never quite possible for a friend, no matter how wise and fond the -friend may be, to advise upon this matter. To give information upon the -subject, that is another affair. But specific advice, no. But let me -finish what I had in mind to say. You have seen here, during this past -fortnight, what great hopes are built upon your administration of your -affairs when you come into the title. No, don’t speak yet. You must not -pledge yourself at all to the System. It would be unfair to let you do -it. But at all events you have seen it, and you will think it all over, -and, whether you take it up altogether or not, I know it will have its -effect on you. You will set an ideal of usefulness and duty before -you, and you will have your heart fixed on realizing it. Well, then, -I counsel you above all things to keep that idea in mind whenever you -think of marriage. A man has a good many sides to his life, but the side -which is most vital to him is that of the work he wants to do in the -world. If the wife fits perfectly on that side, the discrepancies -elsewhere are of small account by comparison. They smooth away, -they adjust themselves. But the misfit on the side of the man’s -ambitions--that never effaces itself. And so, just in proportion as the -work you want to do becomes clear in your mind, you ought to define -to yourself the type of woman who will be most sympathetic toward that -work, and who will best help you in it--or rather, who will help you in -it in the way you like best. I don’t say you will find the perfect type -of that woman--but you should have the type before you, and be able to -measure people by its standards. But I have harangued you long enough! -There is something in the atmosphere here: we all deliver lectures to -each other at the most unscrupulous length. Poor boy! We’ve done nothing -but make speeches to you since you showed in sight.” - -Christian deprecated her suggestion with persuasive hands. “I have -learned here, I think, all that I know,” he protested. He did not, -however, insist upon further generalizations. “One thing you said,” he -remarked, thoughtfully, “puts a question into my head. You said it was -better to give information than advice. Now there is so much that I am -in ignorance about. Perhaps I do wrong to ask you--but I am curious to -know more about the people of the family--our own family. There are no -ladies of my own blood? I mean, all I have seen or heard of come to us -by marriage, like yourself.” - -“You hit upon the weakest and unhappiest point,” she replied. “There has -not been a daughter born in the Torr family for over a hundred years. I -have always insisted that this has operated like a curse on the family. -The beautiful humanizing charm of little girls about the house--this -they have never felt. The mothers have had no daughters to lean upon, -the men have never known what a sister was like. That one fact, it seems -to me, is enough to account for everything that is hard and rough and -cruel in their story.” - -Christian bowed his head in silent token of comprehension. - -“I am always more grieved than angry, when I’m thinking of the black -sheep in the family fold,” she went on. “They had never a chance. It was -like a tradition in the family that the father should be a brute and -the mother a fool. A daughter here and there might have softened the -combination--but with little boys alone face to face with it--what could -they do? They grew up in the stables and the kennels. Think of those two -young men whom you met at Caermere, for example. Lord Julius told me of -their scene with you, and I’m far from blaming you--but think of their -bringing up! Their father, Lord Edward, I remember very well. I saw him -when I was a girl, at the Punchestown races, and my brother told me his -name. Even without it, I should have remembered his face as the coarsest -and meanest I ever saw. He married a woman out of some vile gambling set -that he was in as a young man. She is still alive somewhere, and has an -allowance from Lord Julius for suppressing herself, and not using the -family name. Well, when I think of the blood in those two boys, and -of the horrors of their childhood till they were taken away from their -mother, and sent into the country to school--upon my soul I can only -wonder that they come so near decency as they do. Your encounter with -them happened to strike out sparks, but you must remember what a blow it -represented to them.” - -The young man gave a somewhat perfunctory nod. His sympathies were -somehow obdurate upon this particular point. - -“Oh, and that reminds me,” she went on. “I said that the family was -daughterless--but Eddy has a little girl. It is very quaint to think -what she will grow up like, under the maternal wing of Cora Bayard. -Yet I am told there are worse mothers than Cora. I’ve never seen her, -myself.” - -“I saw her at Caermere,” Christian remarked. “She seemed very frightened -and sad--and since it was because of me, I did not look much at her. I -remember only the effect of a likeness to Pierrot--the red lips on the -white face. But”--he drew his chair still nearer, and betrayed by -manner and tone alike his approach to a subject of more than casual -interest--“the other lady whom I saw there--Lady Cressage--I had much -conversation with her. I feel that she and I are friends. I liked her -very much indeed--but I have no information about her whatever. If I am -permitted to confess it--I tried to talk about her with Lord Julius -and with Emanuel, but they at once spoke of other things. You see how -frankly I am telling you everything; that is because you make me feel -so wonderfully at home. But perhaps you do not like to talk about her, -either.” - -She smiled pleasantly enough in comment upon his faltering conclusion. -“Oh, I think you exaggerate the conspiracy of silence,” she answered. -“Neither Lord Julius nor Emanuel has anything hostile to say about Edith -Cressage, but she doesn’t quite appeal to their imagination, and so they -find nothing of any sort to say. But it is only fair to remember that -they are both men with peculiar and exacting standards for women. They -would be equally silent about a hundred other ladies of unblemished -character, and of beauty and wit untold. It is nothing at all against -her that she hasn’t excited their enthusiasm. I do not know her at all -well, but I think she is very nice. Now--is that what you wanted me to -say?” - -The mild note of banter which informed her words put Christian if -possible even more at his ease. He stood up, with his hands in the sleek -pockets of his new coat, and bent down upon her a joyous smile. - -“No, ever so much more!” he insisted, gaily. “She is very beautiful; -she has the air and the distinction of a grande dame; she speaks like a -flute, and what she says is clever and apropos; she is unhappy, and yet -with no bitterness toward any one; she seemed to like me very much, and, -mind you, she was the first fine lady whom I had ever met. Enfin, she is -my cousin, and the fact impresses me. What is more natural than that I -should be eager to know all about her?” - -Kathleen did not respond readily to his mood. She knitted her brows -slightly once more, and looked away from him toward the window. “It is -rather hard for me to explain,” she began at last, doubtfully. “From -a good many points of view--her own included--I dare say we do her an -injustice. Don’t misunderstand me; we are all sorry for her--and I for -one have my moments of doubt whether we oughtn’t to be something more -than sorry.” - -“Yes, that is the phrase,” put in Christian, strenuously. “I think that -I myself am something more than sorry for her.” - -She looked up at him, at first with a shadow of apprehension in her -eyes. Then she estimated aright his enthusiasm with a gentle smile. “I -will explain as well as I can,” she said, softly. “As you say, you are -entitled to be told. The feeling, then, is--I am speaking of Lord Julius -and Emanuel, and more or less of myself too--the feeling is that she -ought not to have made the marriage she did. Everybody knew that the -young man she married was a worthless creature--a violent, ignorant, -low-minded fellow. You could not see him, much less talk with him, -without recognizing this. One knows perfectly well that she must have -hated the very thought of him as a lover or a companion. But he is -the heir to a dukedom, and so she marries him. You see what I mean; it -seemed an unpleasant thing to us.” - -Christian considered with a puzzled air the situation thus defined. -“But,” he commented, with hesitation, “it is the metier of a young woman -to get a husband, and to get the best one for herself that she can. If -she is so beautiful that a man wishes to make her a duchess, why, that -is her triumph. Would you have her forego it? And if she says ‘no’, -why, then the next one he asks says ‘yes’--and it is merely that the -first one has waived her place in the queue for another. The queue -remains the same. And if this were not so, why, then, young men who are -not very good, they would get no wives at all. But,” he added, in -extenuation of his dissent, “all these matters are so differently regarded, -you know, in France.” She did not look altogether pleased with him. -“I thought you would have caught my meaning more readily,” she said, -“despite your Continental point of view. For that matter, it is the -common English point of view also. There is a matrimonial market, of -course, and girls offer themselves in it to the highest bidder, and -nothing that we can do will change it. But at least we are free to think -what we like of the wretched business--and to hold our own opinions of -the people who traffic in it.” - -Kathleen had stated her position with a certain argumentative warmth, -which gave her tone a novel effect of reproof. The sight now of the -young man’s saddened and surprised expression sent her mood up with -a rebound. She put a hand on his arm, as he stood before her, and -reassured him by a kindly laugh. “Ah, now,” she said, with genial -pleading in her soft voice, “don’t be making a mountain of my molehill. -I only wanted you to understand how we felt. And as I have told you, we -have our reservations about even that feeling. The poor girl did only -what she was expected to do--what her mother and her family and all the -friends that surrounded her took it quite as a matter of course that -she should do. Probably she never once encountered the opinion that she -should do otherwise. No doubt that is to be said for her. In fact, I -should never have dreamed of blaming her to you, if you had not pressed -me. And after it’s all said and done, you may take it from me that -perhaps I don’t blame her so very much. She was poor, and not over -comfortable at home, I think, and she was very young, and people ran -after her to an extraordinary extent--and to be the beauty of the season -in London is enough to turn any one’s head. Poor creature--it’s bitterly -enough she’s paid for her whistle!” - -He smiled down into her eyes. “That is how I knew you would end by -speaking of her,” he said. “It is in that same way that she moves me--by -my compassion. And this is my fancy”--he began, in a more vivacious -tone--“I should like to tell it to you--it seems that I am to have the -power to do so many such wonderful things--well, then, nothing would -delight me more than to be very good to her. It is my _fantaisie_--and -there is no harm in it, _is_ there?--to atone to her for some of the -unhappiness she has suffered. I have thought about it much since I left -Caermere. It seems that it would be a good thing for me to do--like an -act of piety. You must remember--she was the first lady who spoke kindly -to me in England. And I think you will be pleased with me for being -grateful. But, of course, if Emanuel tells me ‘no’----” - -“Oh, no one will tell you ‘no,’” she assured him, rising as she spoke, -and looking into his face with beaming eyes. “It is the kind of spirit -we like in you. Never imagine that we will be obstacles in its way. Only -be on your guard against the soft heart running away with you. The -world is full of clever and adroit people who practice upon innocent -generosity. It is not so much the worth of what they wheedle from you, -as the shock of your discovery of their tricks. That hurts a young -nature, and very often callouses and hardens it. But here I am, -lecturing you again!” - -Christian had not, in truth, been following her remarks with complete -attention. Something had come up in his mind, which by the time she -stopped he seemed to have turned over and over, and examined from many -standpoints, and finally decided to speak about. - -“I was not wholly exact,” he began, with constraint, “when I said that -Lady Cressage was the first lady who spoke kindly to me in England. I -mentioned it to Lord Julius--there was a very charming and good young -lady who traveled with me from Rouen, and crossed on the boat--and it is -a very curious thing, but when we became acquainted, and I hinted to her -about my story, she knew who I was. Indeed, it was she who told me who I -was. I had the whole wonderful tale from her--and the kindness and sweet -sympathy with which she told it to me, a little at a time--ah, that is -what I will never forget! I am bound to remember her with gratitude -all my life. And that is another _fantaisie_ of mine--that I shall do -something good for her. Oh, she has no selfish thoughts! She would not -even tell me her name!” - -Kathleen’s comment was prefaced by a mirthful chuckle. “I can’t -deny that gratitude is a very active and resourceful element in your -composition,” she declared, and laughed again. “Oh, we’ll advertise for -her. How would this do: ‘The young lady who meets returning lost heirs -to the British nobility at Rouen, and lets them down easily’? Or we -might----” - -“Ah,” Christian interrupted, pleadingly, “I am really very sincere -about her. You cannot imagine anything finer or more delicate than her -character. And besides,”--he added this with visible reluctance--“I have -learned since who she is. Lady Cressage told me. She is the sister of -the lady you call Cora--the wife of that young man Edward--but she is -not an actress! It is not in the least her _type!_ She earns her -own living--she has some work to do--I think it is with a -writing-machine--that is, a type-writer, n’est-ce pas?” - -Mrs. Emanuel did not immediately reply, but moved to the window, looked -out and then walked slowly back to where he stood. “I am not going to -suggest an unkind thought about this girl,” she said, deliberately. -“I would not want you to think differently of her, or of the grateful -impulse you have toward her. Indeed, I have heard something of her--and -it is much to her credit. But--this sounds a mean thing to say, and yet -it has its important true side--people should stick to their class. Bear -that always in mind. There seem to be brilliant exceptions to the rule, -whenever we look about us--but just the same, the rule exists. But--now -I _will_ stop, once for all!” She mused at him, with a twinkling eye. -“You poor lad, there’s something about you that draws down lectures as a -lightning-rod draws electricity. And here’s the trap!” - -When Emanuel returned from London a few days later, to report that his -young cousin had been comfortably installed in chambers on Duke Street, -St. James’s, and seemed to get on capitally with Lord Lingfield, who -was showing him the ropes, Kathleen received the news with less than her -accustomed cheerfulness. - -“I haven’t been quite happy, thinking of him alone in London,” she -admitted, in the course of their conversation. “I feel, somehow, as if -we should have gone up, and taken a house for the winter.” - -“Ah, but, sweetheart,” he urged, almost reproachfully, “you see how I am -up to my eyes in all sorts of work. This is really about the most -trying and ticklish stage we have gone through yet. If the fibrous -silk processes are what is claimed for them, and your girls display the -aptitude that you count upon----” - -But Kathleen for once seemed not to listen. She had turned, and moved a -few steps listlessly away. She took a flower from a vase, picked it to -pieces and gazed in a brown study at the meaningless fragments. - -“Yes, I know,” she remarked at last, with a half sigh. Then she threw -the petals into the grate, and, with a decisive little shake of head and -shoulders, wheeled round, and came smilingly to her husband. - -“And whom did you see in town?” she asked. - - - - -PART III - - - - -CHAPTER XIII - -Toward the end of April, there came an afternoon on which Christian -seemed to himself to wake up of a sudden as from a harassed sleep. - -He had been in England for over six months, when all at once he became -conscious of this queer sensation: the experiences of his half year put -themselves together before his mental eye in the aspect of a finished -volume--of something definitely over and done with. - -There was warm spring in the London air, and at first the vague feeling -of unrest impressed him as a part of the general vernal effect. The -device of taking a stroll through the parks, to note the early flowers -and the wonderful infancy of leafage among the trees, seemed at the -outset to fit this new mood that was upon him. Then abruptly he wearied -of nature and turned his back upon it, driving in a hansom to his club. -Here there was no one whom he knew, or at least cared to speak with. He -sat for a time in the billiard-room, watching with profound inattention -the progress of a game he knew nothing about. From this he wandered into -the library, where some fierce-faced old gentlemen slept peacefully in -armchairs about the alcoves. The sound of their breathing vexed him; -he pretended to himself that otherwise he would have found solace in a -book. The whim seized him to go home to his chambers, and have tea there -comfortably in gown and slippers, and finish a novel Lady Milly Poynes -had induced him to begin weeks before. - -Once in his own easy-chair, the romance lying opened beside him, he put -back his head, stretched his feet and yawned. He left untasted the tea -which Falkner brought in; with fingers interlaced behind his neck -he stared up at the blue of the sky through his window in formless -rumination. - -His earlier glimpses of London were dim enough memories now. The town -had been described by his cousin Lingfield as empty when he arrived, and -after a few days of desultory sight-seeing, he had been carried off to -the earl of Chobham’s place in Derbyshire. Here, among people who -behaved like kindly kinsmen to the young new-comer, yet failed to arouse -much interest in his mind, he learned to shoot well enough to escape -open protests by the autocratic head gamekeeper, and to keep his seat in -the saddle after a fashion of his own. These acquirements stood him in -good stead at the four or five other country houses to which the amiable -Lingfield in due course led him. Without them, meager as they were, he -would have been in a sorry plight indeed. They provided him with a -certain semblance of justification for his presence among people who -seemed incapable of amusing themselves or their guests in any other way. -There were always ladies, it was true, and it was generally manifest to -him that he might spend his time with them if he chose, but after a few -tentative experiments he fell back upon the conviction that he did not -know how to talk to English ladies. He drifted somehow through these -months of hospitable entertainment, feeling that he had never known -before what loneliness could mean. - -When, at Christmas, he went to spend another fortnight with Emanuel, he -had it in his heart to confess to disappointment, and even depression. -He had not thus far fitted at all into the place which had been prepared -for him, and he looked forward, with wistful eagerness, as he journeyed -westward, to the balm of sympathy and tender comprehension with which -Kathleen and Emanuel, dear people that they were, would soothe and heal -his wounded self-consciousness. Somehow, the opportunity of unburdening -his troubled mind, however, did not come to him. There were other -guests, including Lord Julius, and such exceptional attention was -devoted on the estates to elaborating the holiday festivities of the -various villages, that no individual could hope to secure consideration -for his own private emotions. It was sometimes suspected that Emanuel -made so much of Christmas in his System, unconsciously no doubt, because -the Jewish side of him felt the need of ostentation in its disavowal of -theological prejudices. For whatever reason, the festival was observed -here in a remarkable spirit. The little churches were embowered in holly -and mistletoe, and were the scenes of numerous ornate services. There -were processions, merry-makings, midnight visitations of the “waits,” - concerts and dances throughout the week, and only the strictly necessary -work of the community was performed meanwhile. On New Year’s Day the -rejoicings culminated in a children’s carnival from one end of the -property to the other, with big trees laden with lights and gifts in the -German fashion, and exhibitions of the magic lantern, and other juvenile -delights. The fortnight passed, and Christian returned to London, as -has been said, without having anything like the intimate talk he had -expected. Both Kathleen and Emanuel had seemed pleased with him; they -had noted with approving comment his progress in the use of idiomatic -English, and his rapid assimilation of the manners and bearing of those -about him; they had heard none but welcome reports of him from outside, -and made clear to him their gratification at the fact. Their smile for -him was as affectionate, their display of pleasure in his presence -as marked, as ever, but he had the sense, none the less, of something -altered. Lord Julius bore him company on his journey to London, and -after a brief halt, took him away again for another fortnight, this time -at Brighton. He was no more successful with the father, in the matter of -helpful confidences, than he had been with the son. It was impossible -to tell the strong, big, redoubtable old gentleman of what he felt to be -his weaknesses. A kind of desponding pride possessed him, and closed his -lips. He was not happy, as he had supposed he would be, and he could not -bring himself to feel that at any point the fault was his. It was the -position that was incongruous. Yet how could he complain, or avow his -discontent, without seeming an ingrate to the benefactors whose heart -had been in the work of shaping and gilding that position for him? - -Parliament met this year in January, and Christian saw now a London -which he had not imagined to himself--for which nothing, indeed, had -prepared him. There came all at once a great many invitations, and the -young man, surprised and not a little dismayed, called Lord Lingfield -to his assistance. The prospect unfolded to him by this accomplished -professor of the proprieties was terrifying enough. At the end of a week -Christian cried out that the reality was too much. But Lingfield could -see no alternative to going on. “You will get used to it soon enough, -now that you have once taken the plunge,” he assured him. “There are -certain things that a fellow has to do, you know, when he’s in London -in the season, or even now, in what you may call the half season, -unless he’s going to chuck the thing altogether.” Christian replied with -excitement that this was precisely what he wished to do. In his own mind -he had already reached the point of debating whether he could honorably -go on using the money placed to his credit at the bank, most of which -was still there, if he fled from London, and even England. - -Lord Lingfield was a fine young man, irreproachable in attire and -manners, who expected to do something in politics, and who regarded his -duty both to the future which he hoped to create for himself, and to -the immediate present which had been created for him, with conscientious -gravity. He had never thought of lightening or evading the tasks set -before him; he had no perception whatever of the possibility of -making such things easier for others. He assured Christian with -gentle solemnity that desertion was not to be mentioned, and that even -mitigation was undesirable. “It has all been arranged for you,” he -urged. “Upon my word, you are very lucky. You have been to two houses -already where I never get asked except to luncheon, and here is a card -here which I could hardly believe my eyes to see To trifle with such -chances would be simple madness. You will get to have all London at your -fingers’ ends, your very first season. Such a start as you’re likely to -have, I’ve never seen in my life. My dear fellow--you don’t understand -what it means.” - -“But I’m tired to death!” groaned Christian. “No doubt they are -excellent people, but they weary me to the bone. The dinners, the calls, -the receptions, the dances--I have no talent whatever for these things. -It is very kind of these people--but I know I am ridiculous in it all. I -give them no pleasure, and God knows I receive none. Then why must it go -on? For whose benefit is it? I swear to you, I would not mind the labor -and fatigue, if it was any good that I was doing. Emanuel, for example, -toils like a slave, but then his work has great results. But this of -mine----!” - -“Ah, yes,” interposed Lingfield, smilingly. “But Emanuel could never have -made much running in London. He disputes with people too much, don’t you -know. They don’t like that. And I think you make much too hard work of -it all. There’s no need for _you_ to talk, you know. It isn’t expected -of you. And I don’t see why you can’t move quietly along, going -everywhere, being seen at the right places, and being civil to -everybody, and not worry yourself at all. That’s what you need, my dear -boy--repose! Let the other people do the worry. Now, of course, in a -case like Dicky Westland’s it’s different. He has to be amusing and -useful, or he wouldn’t get asked. But you are not on all fours with him -at all. To tell the truth--no doubt it’ll sound strange to you, but it -is the truth all the same--it’s better form for you not to be amusing, -or brilliant, or that sort of thing. Fellows in your place don’t go in -for it, you know.” - -Christian sighed, and chafing at the necessity of submission, still -submitted. - -Now, as he lay back in his chair, the retrospect was augmented by six -other weeks, in which he had passively yielded to what Lingfield had -assured him was the inevitable. He had dined out almost every-night, -and had made countless calls. It seemed to him that he must have -met everybody in this huge metropolis who had a pair of shoulders or -possessed a dress coat. He yawned at the thought of them. - -Was he not himself to blame for this? At Christmas time he had been -quite confident in answering “no” to this question; now he did not feel -so sure about it. At one place or another he had come into contact -with most of the members of the government, and with many of those -distinguished statesmen on the opposite bench who, by the grace of the -genial British electorate, would be ministers next time. He had talked -with eminent artists, eminent scientists, eminent writers, eminent -soldiers and sailors, and watched them and listened to them as they sat -over their cigars, or moved about among the ladies in the drawing-rooms. -Hostesses whose cordial good will toward him seemed equaled only by -their capable control over others, had said to him time and time again: -“If there is any one you want to know, tell me.” The phrase lingered in -his mind as a symbol of his position. He had merely to mention his wish, -like some lucky person of the fables who possessed a talisman. It could -not be said that he had used his magic power foolishly or perversely. He -had followed in dutiful, painstaking solicitude the path marked out for -him by his advisers. He had done the best that was in him to do; he had -gone wherever Lingfield bade him go; he had loyally kept awake late -at night; he had smiled and bowed and spoken affable words; he had -fulfilled punctually all the engagements imposed upon him. What was -more, he could no longer pretend that he made a failure of the thing; it -was known to him that he had created a pleasant impression upon London, -and that people liked him. - -For all that, he could not feel that in turn he liked these people. -Among those of whom he had seen the most, was there any whom he -profoundly desired ever to see again? He passed some random figures in -mental review, and suffered them to vanish without thrusting forth any -tentacle of thought to detain them. They had not entered his real life; -they meant nothing to him. Positively he was as much alone in London -to-day as he had been when he first set foot in it. Indeed, was he not -the poorer to-day by all those lost illusions and joyous, ardent hopes -now faded to nothingness? In return for these departed treasures, he had -only empty hands to show--and a jaded, futilely mutinous, empty mind as -well. - -The soft, equable tinkle of the door-bell caught his ear, but scarcely -arrested his attention. Perhaps unconsciously the sound served to -polarize his thoughts, for suddenly it became apparent to him that -he was in revolt. All this intolerable social labor was ended for -him--definitely and irrevocably ended. He would not dine at another -house; he would burn forthwith his basket of cards, and the little book -with its foolish record of ladies’ days “at home.” - -He sat up and sipped at his lukewarm tea, with the glow of a new resolve -on his face. - -Falkner--a smooth-mannered, assiduous, likable man of middle age whom -Emanuel had given him from his own household--entered the room to -announce a caller. A brisk, alert tread on the polished hall floor -behind him cut into his words, so that Christian did not catch them. He -rose, and looked inquiringly. - -For an instant, he felt that he was not glad to see the person who came -in. It was a young man of about his age, tall and fair, and handsome -in a buoyant, bright-faced way of his own. His blue eyes sparkled -cheerfully into Christian’s doubtful glance, and he held out a hand as -he advanced. Everybody in the world called him Dicky Westland, and for -this opening moment Christian thought of him as preeminently typical of -all the vanities and artificialities he was on the point of forswearing. - -“Not seedy, I hope?” the new-comer said in comment upon the other’s -loose attire--and perhaps upon his dubious countenance as well. His -voice had a musical vivacity in it which seemed to lighten the room. -Christian, as he took the hand and shook his head, smiled a little. It -began to occur to him that really he did like this young man. - -“No,” he replied, with a gesture toward a chair. “I’m all right. Only -the whim seized me--to come home and read a book. I got homesick, I -think.” - -This statement, once in the air, seemed funny to the young men, and -Dicky Westland laughed aloud. Christian, sitting down opposite his -visitor, felt himself sharing his animation. ‘“It was good of you to -come,” he declared, with a refreshed tone. “The truth is, I’m tired out. -I am up too late. I run about too much.” - -“Yes, a fellow does get hipped,” assented Dicky. “But you are so -tremendously regular, it doesn’t do you any harm. A days’ rest now and -then, and you’re right as a trivet again.” - -“Regular,” Christian repeated, musingly. He formed his lips to utter -some reflection upon the theme, and then closed them again. “Will you -have a cup of tea?” he asked, with the air of thinking of something -else. - -The other shook his head, and preserved a posture of vivacious -anticipation, as if Christian had made a literal promise to unburden -his mind. The suggestion was so complete that Christian accepted it as a -mandate. - -“I am glad you came,” he said, “because--well, because I have come to -a conclusion in my mind, and I should like to put it into words for -you--so that I can also hear it myself. I am resolved to go away--to -leave London.” - -Dicky lifted his brows in puzzled interrogation. “How do you mean?” he -asked. - -“I do not like it,” Christian replied, speaking more readily now, -and enforcing his words with eager hands. Lingfield had cautioned him -against this gesticulatory tendency, but the very consciousness that he -was in rebellion brought his hands upward into the conversation. “It -is not what I care for. I come into it too late, no doubt, to -understand--appreciate it, properly. The people I meet--I have no -feeling for them. It seems a waste of my time to sit with them, to stand -and talk, to go about from one of their houses to another. At the end -of it all, there is nothing. They have all thick shells on, and they -are not going to let me get inside of them. And, moreover, if I did get -inside, who can be sure there would be anything of value there? It does -not often look so to me, from the outside. But it is a waste of time and -labor, and it does not amuse me in the least, and why should I pursue -it?” - -“Quite right!” said Dicky. - -“Then you agree with me?--you approve?” asked Christian, not concealing -his surprise. - -“Of course I do. It’s awful rot,” the other affirmed. He observed his -host silently for a space, and meanwhile, by a quite visible process, -the familiar external elasticity, not to say flippancy, of his manner -seemed to fall away from him. “With me, of course,” he went on, almost -gravely, “I have to do it. I must get my secretaryship, or I can’t live. -My relations could put me into the swim, but they can’t support me there -indefinitely. I have only two aunts, you know--dear old things, they -are--and they keep me going, but they have only life interests, and I -fancy they have to scrape a little as it is. - -“So you see,” pursued Dicky Westland, “I must help myself, and it’s only -by knowing the right people, and being seen at the right places, that -a fellow can bring anything off. For example, now: Lady Winsey is a -distant cousin of mine, and she’s promised the aunts, you know, and -there’s an old Sir Hogface Something-or-Other dodging about the place, -who’s going to get a West Indian governorship in May, and Lady Winsey -has not only had him at her house to dinner, where he could see me, but -has contrived to throw me at him at three other houses. Next week I’m -to go down to a closing meet in Berkshire, just because he’s to be -there--and that she arranged, too. And it’s all to get a place worth -perhaps three hundred a year, with yellow fever thrown in--if it comes -to anything at all.” - -“Three hundred a year,” commented Christian, knitting his brows. “I -still make pounds into francs to know what a sum means,” he explained, -smilingly, after a moment. “Once I would have thought that a great -fortune--and only a few months ago, too, at that.” - -“Well, you see how it is,” said Dicky. “I mustn’t let any chance slip -by. But if I stood in your shoes, dear God! how I would chuck it all!” - -“But what would you do instead?” Christian propounded this question -sitting back in his chair, with the tips of his fingers joined, and a -calm twinkle in his eye. He discovered himself feeling as if it were his -companion who had made confessions and craved sympathy. - -Dicky looked into his hat, and pouted his lips in whimsical indecision. -“What I mean is,” he explained at last--“my point was this--I hate the -whole thing, and if I didn’t have to do it, why then I wouldn’t do it, -d’ye see? I’d go about with nobody except the people I really cared -about--my right-down, intimate friends. That’s the idea.” - -“Ah--friends!” said Christian. “That is the word that sings in my ears!” - -He rose impulsively, and began walking about the room with a restless -step. Now and again he halted briefly to look down upon his companion, -to enforce with eyes as well as gesture some special thing in his -talk. “Yes, friends!” he cried. “Tell me, you Dicky Westland, where are -friends to be found? Have you some, perhaps? Then where did you come -upon them? It is what I should like very much to know. Listen to me! -I have been in England six months. I possess in England, say -two--three--no, five friends--and all these came to me in my first week -here. All but one belong to my family, so they were here, ready-made for -me. But since that time, now that I am for myself, I have not gained one -friend. Is there then something strange--what do I say--forbidding in -me? Or no--it is nonsense for me to say that. It is the other way about. -I have seen nobody who awakened voices within me. There has been no one -who appealed to me as a friend should appeal. I live among a thousand -rich and fine people who are as good to me as they know how to be--and -yet I am as if I lived in a desert. And it is very cold--and lonely--and -heartbreaking in this desert of mine!” - -Westland looked at him, as he stood now in the pathetic abandonment of -his peroration, with a contemplative squint in one eye. - -“I see what you mean,” he remarked finally. “You’ve been looking for -flesh and blood, and you find only gun-metal.” He thrust out his lips a -little, and gave further consideration to the problem. “There isn’t any -need for you to go away, you know,” he added after a pause. “You can -have any kind of life you like in London. It is all here, if you want -it. But what is it that you do want?” - -Christian threw himself sidewise into his chair, and bent his head with -a sigh. Then, with a new light in his eyes, he looked up. “You yourself -said it”--he exclaimed--“to see only my true friends. That is my idea -of life: To have a small circle of people whom I love very much, and to -make constant opportunities to be with some of them--talking as we like -to talk, going about together, making life happy for one another as we -go along. All my youth, I envied rich people, because I thought that -they used their wealth to command this greatest of delights. I imagined -that if one had much money, then one could afford to spend his time -only with his close, dear friends. But what I discover is that they do -something entirely different. They seem not to let friendship come into -their lives at all. They desire only acquaintances, and of these the -more they have the better, if they bear the proper cachet.” - -“It is the women,” said Dicky, sententiously. - -“They like the crowd, and the new faces. And what they like, of course -they have. They run the whole show.” - -Christian nodded comprehension--then put out a hand to signalize a -reservation. “I know women--here in England--who have a higher idea than -this,” he declared, softly. - -“Of course, so we all do,” assented Westland. “There are a million -splendid women, if one could only get at them. But it’s a sort of trades -union, don’t you know. You don’t take the workmen you want, on your own -terms; you take those the society gives you, and the terms are arranged -for you. It’s like that with women. You meet some awfully jolly girls -now and then, but they are not in the least degree their own masters. -If you try to get to know them well, either they’re frightened, and pull -back into their shells, or you’re headed off by their mothers. But,” he -added upon reflection--“of course it’s different with you.” - -“At least I am not interested,” said Christian, wearily. The advice of -Kathleen had produced upon his mind an even greater effect, perhaps, -than he imagined. He had encountered, by the dozen, extremely beautiful -and engaging girls, whose charm should have been enhanced in his eyes by -the dignity and even grandeur of their surroundings. But an impalpable -yet efficient barrier had stood always between them and him. If they -exhibited reserve, he was too shy for words. If they expanded toward -him with smiles or any freedom of demeanor, he recalled instantly the -warning of Emanuel’s wife, and that was fatal. “I have not cared for any -of them,” he reaffirmed. - -“Oh!” cried Westland of a sudden, his comely, boyish face beaming with -the thought that had come to him. “How stupid of me! I’d forgotten what -I came for--and I’m not sure it doesn’t precisely fill the bill. Are you -doing anything to-night? Will you come with me to the Hanover Theater at -midnight? It’s the five-hundredth performance of ‘Pansy Blossoms’--and -there’s to be supper on the stage and a dance. I don’t think you’ve seen -much of that sort of thing, have you?” - -Christian shook his head, and regarded his companion doubtfully. -“Nothing at all of it,” he said, slowly. “But it does not attract me -very much, I’m afraid. You would better take some one else. I should -be a fish out of water there. The people of the theaters--they are not -congenial to me--that is, I do not think they would be.” - -“But, hang it all, man, how do you know till you’ve tried?” Dicky put -a little worldly authority into his tone as he proceeded. “You mustn’t -mind my saying it to you--it is you who make your own desert, as you -call it, for yourself. If you say in advance that you know you won’t -like this sort of person, or that, how are you ever going to form any -friendships?” - -Christian received the remonstrance with meekness. “You do not quite -understand me,” he said, amiably enough. “I have some work to do in the -world, and I don’t think that actresses and actors would help me much to -do it. The young men who run after them do not seem, somehow, to do -much else. It is only a prejudice I have; it applies only to myself. If -others feel differently, why, I have not a word to say.” - -“No, you must come!” Westland declared, rising. “It’s nonsense for you -not to see that side of things. My dear fellow, it’s as respectable as -the Royal Academy--or Madame Tussaud’s. Are you dining anywhere? Then -I’ll run home and dress, and I’ll drive round here for you. We’ll dine -together, and then look in at some of the halls. Shall I say seven? It -gives us more time over our dinner.” - -Christian accepted, with a rueful little smile, his committal to the -enterprise. “You must not mind if I come away early,” he said, getting -to his feet in turn. - -The other laughed at him. “My dear man, you’ll never want to come away -at all. But no, seriously--it’s just the kind of thing you want. It’ll -amuse you, for one thing--and deuce take it, you’ll be young only once -in your life. But more than that--here you are swearing that you’ll do -no more social work at all, and you don’t know in the least what other -resources are open to you. It isn’t alone actresses that you meet at a -place like this, but all sorts of clever people who know how to get what -there is out of life. That is what you yourself want to do, isn’t it? -Well, it’ll do you no harm, to say the least, to see how they go about -it.” - -“Very likely,” Christian replied, as the other turned. “I will be ready -at seven.” He followed him to the door, and into the hallway. “Mind,” - he said, half jokingly, half gravely, as he leaned over the banister, “I -have not altogether promised. When midnight comes, I may lose my courage -altogether.” - -“Ah, it’s that kind of timidity that storms every fortress in its path,” - Dicky called up to him from the stairway. - - - - -CHAPTER XIV - -The two young men dined at the Café Royal. “It’s as good a kitchen as -there is in London, and in the matter of people it isn’t such a tiresome -repetition of those one meets everywhere else as Willis’s or the -Prince’s. To see the same shoulders and the same necks, night after -night--a fellow gets tired of it.” - -To this explanation by Dicky of his choice, as they rolled forward in -their hansom, Christian made no direct response. After a little he said: -“Very soon now, I am going to do something that seems to have been in my -mind for months. Perhaps I have only thought of it since this afternoon: -I cannot be sure. But I am going to do it--I am going to know for myself -what the real London and the real England are like. A thousand gentlemen -in black clothes and silk hats, a thousand ladies with low-cut dresses -and feathers in their hair--all thinking and talking about themselves -and their own little affairs--that does not mean London. And a few large -houses in the country, where these same people spend a few months riding -after the hounds and shooting tame birds and wearying each other with -idle, sleepy talk--that does not represent England.” - -“Doesn’t it!” cried Westland. “I should say that’s just what it did, -worse luck!” - -“No, no!” protested Christian. “I don’t want to be told that it -does--for then I should want to go away altogether. No--there is the -other thing, and I am going to find it out, and see it and know it. -When all those years of my boyhood and youth I was so proud of being an -Englishman, it was not this empty, valueless life of the West End, or -the chase of foxes and birds in the country, that I longed for, and -nourished pride in.” - -“Oh, but they do other things, you know,” laughed Dicky. “They are in -Parliament, some of them, or they are at the bar, or in the Services, -or they manage estates or are directors in companies, and that sort -of thing. And some of them go in a lot for charities, and work on -committees and organize things, you know. You’d hardly believe how much -of that most of the women let themselves in for.” - -“That is not what I mean,” said the other, rather abruptly. “To me all -that is not worth the snap of a finger,” and he emphasized his words by -a gestured with the hand which rested on the door of the hansom. - -At an advanced stage of the dinner, the young men came to the subject -again. In reply to a random inquiry Christian said that his grandfather, -the duke, as far as he knew, was neither worse nor better in health -than he had been all winter. “I have not been to Caermere since my first -visit,” he went on. “I am really living upon a programme arranged for -me, I should think, by a committee of my relations. Lord Lingfield is -my active bear-leader. He conducts me, or sends me, wherever it has been -decided that I shall go. It was not deemed important that I should go to -Caermere again--and so I have not gone. Voilà tout! If I had been free -to myself, I think I should have gone.” - -“It must be an awfully jolly place, from the pictures I’ve seen of it,” - said Westland. - -“Jolly!” cried Christian. “My dear creature, it is a grave, a mausoleum, -a place of skulls and dead men’s bones! You have never seen such a -family vault in all your days. When I even begin to think of undertaking -the task of brightening it into life again, I grow dizzy. The immensity -of the work unnerves me. And now I do not know if I shall ever put my -hand to it. The country-gentleman idea--which you make so much of in -England--it does not appeal to me. It is too idle--too purposeless. Of -course my cousin Emanuel, he makes a terrible toil of it--and does some -wonderful things, beyond doubt. But after all, what does it come to? -He helps people to be extremely fine who without him would only be -tolerably fine. But I have the feeling that one should help those who -are not fine at all--who have never had the chance to be fine, who do -not know what it means. Emanuel’s wife--oh, a very lovely character--she -said to me that they disliked coming up to town, the sight of the London -poor distressed them so much. Well, that is the point--if I am to -help anybody at all, it is the London poor that I should try to help. -Emanuel’s plan is to give extra bones, and teach new tricks, to dogs -already very comfortable. My heart warms to the dogs without collars, -the homeless and hungry devils who look for bones in the gutters.” - -“Oh, you’re going in for settlements and that sort of thing,” commented -Dicky. “I hear that is rather disappointing work. If you don’t take the -sporting papers at the reading-room they say the men won’t come at all. -Slingsby Chetwynd was awfully keen on the thing. He went down to stop -a whole week--at Shoreditch or Houndsditch or the Isle of Dogs, or -somewhere like that--and a woman smashed his hat in, and he fell into a -cellar--and he was jolly glad to get back again the same night.” - -Christian was pursuing thoughts of his own. The wine was admirable--as -indeed it should have been considering the pains Dicky had been at, with -pursed lips and lifted eyebrows, in the selection of it--and Christian -had found an unaccustomed pleasure in its aromatic, sub-acid taste. He -had drunk rather freely of it, and was satisfied with himself for -having done so. He leaned back in his chair now, and watching the golden -fountain of bubbles forever streaming upward in his glass, mused upon -welcome new impulses within him toward the life of a free man. - -“None the less,” he remarked, indifferent to the irrelevancy of his -theme, “I should have liked to go to Caermere during the winter. I am -annoyed with myself now that I did not go--whether it was arranged for -me or not. There is a lady there for whom I felt great sympathy. I had -expected to be of service to her long before this--but I am of service -to no one. She is a cousin--no doubt you know her--Lady Cressage.” - -“But she is in London,” put in Westland. “I only know her a little, but -Lady Selton used to be by way of seeing a good deal of her. She told me -last week that she was in town--taken a little flat somewhere--Victoria -Street way, I think. She doesn’t go in for being very smart, you know. -Why--yes--of course she’s your cousin by marriage. Awfully pretty woman -she was. Gad! how well I remember her season! All the fellows went quite -off their heads. How funny--that she should be your cousin!” - -Christian took no note of his companion’s closing words, or of the tone -in which they had been uttered. He scowled at the playful bubbles in his -glass, as he reflected that the news of her arrival in London ought not -to have come to him in this roundabout, accidental way. Why did none -of his own people tell him? Or still more to the point, why had not -she herself told him? He really had given her only an occasional and -sporadic thought, during these past four or five months. Now, as he -frowned at his wine, it seemed to him that his whole winter had been -burdened with solicitude for her. Or no, “burdened” was an ungracious -word, and false to boot. He would say “mellowed” or “enriched” instead. - -“You must find out for me”--he began, and then, upon a second -thought born of pique, checked himself. “Or do not mind--it is of no -consequence. I shall hear as a matter of course.” He called for the bill -with a decision in his voice which seemed full of warning that the topic -was exhausted. - -Westland could not help observing the fat roll of crackling white notes -which the other drew from his pocket. If they were all of the smallest -denomination, they must still represent something like his whole year’s -allowance. The general understanding that Christian’s unfamiliarity -with English ways excused, and even invited, wise admonition from his -friends, prompted him to speak. - -“That’s rather a lot to carry about with you, old man,” he said, in -gentle expostulation. - -“Oh, I like it!” Christian declared, with shining eyes. He snapped the -elastic band about the roll, with an air of boyish delight in the sound, -as he returned it to his pocket. “If you knew the years in which I -counted my sous!”. - -It was nearly ten o’clock when they left. Beginning with the Pavilion, -they went to four or five music halls, only to find that there were no -seats to be had. “Why, of course it’s the boat-race,” exclaimed Dicky at -last. “Stupid of me to have forgotten it. I say, I ought to have come -for you this morning, and taken you up the river to see it. It’s worth -seeing--for once. I wonder Lingfield did not arrange it for you.” - -“Oh, several people asked me to join their parties,” Christian replied. -“But it did not attract me. The athletics here--they rather annoy me. -It is as if people thought of nothing else. And to have students at the -universities consumed with the idea--that is specially unpleasant to my -mind. You must remember--I am a teacher by profession.” - -“We’ll go back to the Empire,” Westland decided. “Ever been there? Well, -it’s worth seeing, too--perhaps more than once. The Johnnies’ll be out -in extraordinary force, I’m afraid, but then you ought to see them too, -I suppose. It takes all sorts to make a world--and the world is what -you’ve come out to look at. Let me get the tickets--or, well, if you -insist--ask for the promenade.” It was indeed a novel spectacle, which -smote and confused his eyes, rather than revealed itself to them, when -Christian found himself inside. The broad, low, rounded promenade was -so crowded with people that at first sight walking about seemed wholly -impracticable, but Dicky stepped confidently into the jumbled throng and -began moving through it, apparently with ease, and the other followed -him. They made their way to the end, where a man in uniform guarded a -staircase; then, turning, they elbowed along back to the opposite end -of the half-circle. This gained, there was nothing in Dicky’s thoughts, -seemingly, but to repeat the performance indefinitely. Their progress -was of a necessity slow. On the inner side a dense wall of backs and -high hats rendered hopeless any notion of seeing the stage below. -Christian, struggling after his guide, wondered what else there was to -see. - -After a time it became obvious to him that the women who formed so large -an element of the lazily shifting crowd were also the occasion of its -being. They walked about, looking the men in the face with a cold, free, -impassive scrutiny upon which, even if he had never seen it before, -intuition would have fixed a label for him. Other women, from the plush -seats on the outer edge of the circle, bent upon the whole moving mass -of promenaders the same stoical, inscrutable gaze. The range of age -among them did not seem extended to his uninformed glance. In years they -were apparently all about alike. Some, indeed, had fresher faces and -smoother skins than others, but when the eyes were considered a certain -indefinable equality was insisted upon in them all. Their toilets were -often striking in effect, and especially their hats--exaggerating both -in breadth of brim, and in the height and bulk of the edifice of plumes -above, the prevalent fashion in such matters--were notable to the -spectator; but Christian found himself, upon consideration, more -interested in their eyes than in anything else. - -A certain stony quality in this stereotyped gaze of theirs suggested a -parallel to his memory; he had seen precisely that same cool, unruffled, -consciously unconscious stare in princesses who had looked at him -without beholding him in the far-away days of his life about the hotels -of the Riviera. It was very curious, he thought--this incongruous -resemblance. But a little closer analysis showed that the likeness was -but partial. These ladies of the promenade could look about them with -the imperturbability of princesses, it was true, but only so long as -they saw nothing which concerned them immediately. Nay, now he could -discern beneath the surface of this passionless perlustration a couched -vigilance of attention, which ever and again flashed uppermost with -electric swiftness. When this mercurial change came, one saw the -temperament mapped out like a landscape under the illumination of -lightning. There gleamed forth expectancy, dread, joy, irritability, -fun, dislike or wistful hope--whatever the mood of the instant -yielded--with a force of intensity almost startling. Then, as quickly -as it came, the look might vanish; even if it flickered on, the briefest -interval of repose brought back again the watchful, dispassionate, -hardened regard. - -“Have you had enough of this?” Dicky asked, with an implication of -weariness in his tone. - -Christian, halting, took slow and bewildered cognizance of the fact that -he had been going from one end of the promenade to the other for a very -long time. Insensibly, at some period of the experience, he had taken -the lead from his companion, and had been dragging him about in his -wake. - -“It is very interesting,” was the vague excuse he offered to Dicky, and -even more to himself. - -A sofa just beside them was for the moment unoccupied. Christian seated -himself with the air of one physically tired out. “Ought we not to -order drinks?” he asked his companion, who stood over him, looking down -somewhat doubtfully. - -“Oh, dear, no--not here!” Dicky replied, with conviction. “It’s nearly -closing time--and we’ll go over to the club for half an hour--where we -know our tipple. Shall we run along now?” - -“No--sit down here,” said Christian. He spoke with the authority of -a profound emotion, that glowed in his eyes and quivered on his lips. -Westland obeyed him, pretending to a nonchalance which his mistrustful -glance belied. - -“This is all very extraordinary to me,” Christian continued, in a low, -strenuous voice. He spoke with even more than his wonted fluency. -“It catches hold of me. It fills my mind with new thoughts. There is -something in the very air here--” - -“Musk and cigarette smoke,” interposed Dicky, lightly. Then he saw that -levity struck a false note. - -“Pah!” the other jerked forth, impatiently. “Don’t talk like that! It -is the most terrible, the most touching, the most inspiring thing I -have seen in my life. I breathe in a new ambition here, out of this -atmosphere. We were talking of the London poor. I thought they made the -loudest appeal--but they are nothing beside _this!_” He spread his thin, -nervous hand out as he spoke, and swept it in a comprehensive gesture -over the spectacle before them. “These are my sisters--my unhappy and -dishonored sisters, scorned and scornful--oh, yes, they are all my -sisters!” - -“But fortunately they don’t know it,” urged Dicky, surveying the ladies -with pouting lips and half-closed eyes. “For God’s sake, don’t mention -it to them.” - -Christian turned round, with one knee on the sofa, and claimed his -companion’s attention. “I wanted to be able to add you to my very little -list of friends,” he said, gravely. “All the evening I have had that in -my mind--and it may be something else, too. But if you cannot understand -me, now, when I tell you how all this moves me--and if you only care to -mock at what I say--why, then, it is not needful to say more.” - -Dicky faced about in turn, and regarded him with a puzzled glance, -from which he was at pains to exclude all signs of frivolity. “But you -haven’t told me _how_ it moves you at all,” he said, vaguely. - -“Oh, how,” repeated Christian with hesitation. “It is not easy to say -just how. But I am devoured by a great compassion. I could weep tears -at the heart-misery I see here. They shout in the papers and wring their -hands over the massacre of Armenians--but right here--this thing--is -it not more cruel and dreadful still? Here there is no question of race -hatreds and religious hatreds, but just the cold, implacable pressure of -poverty on human souls, crushing them and sinking them in shame.” - -“Oh, that’s only a part of the story--not such a deuce of a big part -either,” urged the other, gently. “Don’t get so excited about it, my -dear fellow. It is by no means a new thing. And wait till you know more -about it, and have thought it over--and then, if you feel that there is -anything you can do, why, take my word for it, it will still be here. It -won’t disappear in the meanwhile. You’ll still be in time.” - -Christian regarded him wistfully, and with a mild, faint smile. “You -would never enter into my feelings about this,” he said, softly. “We are -made differently. It strikes you as strange, does it not, that a young -man, coming into contact with this for the first time, should be filled -only with the yearning to help these poor girls, and do good to them? It -surprises you? It is something new to you, n’est ce pas?” - -Dicky grinned within decorous limits. “My dear boy,” he declared, -confidentially, “so far from being new, it’s the oldest thing in the -world. Every young fellow worth his salt that I have ever known, or that -anybody’s ever known, has swelled himself out with precisely these same -reform sentiments. In this very promenade here I have witnessed at least -a dozen attacks like yours. And don’t think I am jeering at the thing. -It is a very beautiful and generous spirit indeed, and I admire it -awfully, I assure you--only--only, as one gets to know his way about -a trifle better, he sees that there isn’t so much in it as he thought -there was. And that’s what I was trying to say to you. Don’t let your -first impulses run away with you. If the subject interests you, appeals -to you, very well; get to understand it. You will find that it is more -complicated, perhaps, than you think. But when you know it all, why, -then you can do what you like.” - -Some of the light seemed to have been turned out. A definitive blare -rolled up from the orchestra below; the throng of promenaders, though -still informed by the most leisurely of moods, was converging upon the -door of exit. The two young men arose. - -Christian suddenly yawned. “I am tired--and depressed,” he said, -wearily. “I think I will ask you to let me go home.” - -“Nonsense!” said Dicky, promptly. “We’ll go to the club, and get a -pick-up, and then you shall see something that won’t depress you. I -grant you this _is_ rather melancholy. God knows why we came.” - -An hour or more later, emerging from a confusing sequence of narrow -passages and winding ascents and descents, Christian followed Westland -out through a groove of painted canvas to the stage of the Hanover -Theater. - -He had never seen a theater from this point of view, and the first few -minutes of his scrutiny--here where he stood at the wings, while Dicky -looked after the coats and hats--were full of pleased interest. The huge -dusky space of the galleries overhead, strange and formidable in its -dark bulk like some giant balloon, was very impressive. By contrast, -the stage itself seemed to give out light. A long riband of a table -stretched across the back, and down the two sides, and about this -clustered many people; shining shirt-fronts and bald heads, pale -shimmering dresses and white shoulders, the glitter of napery and plates -and glasses--all was radiant under the powerful electric glow from -above. He could see now, in the halfshadows down beyond the footlights, -two or three rows of heads of people sitting in the front stalls. To -his fancy these detached heads appeared to belong to an order of beings -quite distinct from those on the stage. He wondered if actors felt their -audiences to be thus remote and aloof from themselves. - -“We can push our way in at the other end--there’s less of a crush -there,” he heard Dicky say to him. He followed his guide across the -stage, through groups of conversing guests who had brought out their -sandwiches and glasses from the throng, and came eventually to the table -itself. Some one held out a bottle toward him, and he lifted a glass to -be filled. From under some other stranger’s arm he extricated a plate, -containing something in gelatine, he knew not what. In straightening -himself he pushed against a person unexpectedly close behind him. - -Half turning, with the murmur of an apology upon his lips, his eyes -encountered those of a lady, who seemed to know him, and to be smiling -at him. - -“How d’ye do?” this lady said to him. There could be no doubt about -the cordiality of her tone. Her left hand was occupied with a champagne -glass and a fan, but her right was being lifted to him, almost against -his breast, in greeting. He gazed at her in smiling perplexity, the -while he signed that both his own hands were filled. - -“You don’t know me from Adam,” she said to him, cheerfully. “But I’m -your cousin--Cora Torr, you know.” - - - - -CHAPTER XV - -You’ve altered so much since I saw you! It was odds against my -recognizing you at all,” declared Cora, beaming forth into conversation -before Christian had fairly grasped the significance of her identity. - -“I should never have believed they would make such an Englishman out -of you, in just these few months. Let’s see--it was October, wasn’t it? -Yes, of course--the First.” She showed her beautiful teeth in a flash of -gaiety. “The pheasants weren’t the only ones that got hit that day. But -bygones are bygones.... And how do you like London? How do you find it -compares with Paris? I always maintain that there’s more real life here, -if you know where to look for it.... But I am afraid you’re not glad to -see me.” - -“There you are wrong. I am glad to see you,” Christian replied, with -deliberation. He made his words good by thrusting his plate back upon -the table and shaking her gloved hand. There was a frank smile in his -eyes. - -“Get my glass filled again,” she suggested--“and-your own too--and let’s -get out of the way. These people push as if they had had nothing to eat -since Christmas. Of all the hogs in evening clothes, the stage-supper -hog is the worst. Well, and how have you been, all this time?” - -They had moved across the stage to the entrance, and paused near it in -a little nook of momentary isolation. Christian made conventional answer -to her query, and to other remarks of hers calling for no earnest -attention, the while he concentrated his thoughts upon the fact that -they were actually standing here together, talking like old friends. - -It was sufficiently surprising, this fact, but even more remarkable was -the satisfaction he himself was getting from it. There was no room for -doubt; he really enjoyed being with her. There was no special need to -concern himself with what she was saying. She hardly paused for replies, -and seemed not to mind in the least the automatic character of the few -which came to her. He had only to smile a little, and nod, and let his -eyes glow pleasurably, and she went blithely on. The perception came -suddenly to him that he had been sorry also for her. Indeed, now that he -reflected upon it, had not hers been the most cruel misfortune of all? -The memory of the drawn, agonized mask of a face she had shown, over the -tea-table in the conservatory at Caermere, rose in his mind’s vision. -He looked up at the strips of canvas and lamps above, with half-closed -eyes, recalling in reverie the details of this suffering face; then he -turned abruptly to confront her, and observe afresh the happy contrast -she presented to-night. - -Cora was looking away for the instant, and apparently conveying by -lifted eyebrows and shakes of the head a message of some sort to some -person on the bustling stage unknown to him. He glanced instinctively -in the direction of her signal, but gained no information--and indeed -realized at once that he was not in search of any. Of course, she knew -everybody here, and would be exchanging nods and smiles of recognition -all the evening. It occurred to him to wonder if her husband, that -Captain Edward of unpleasant memory, was on the stage, but he had the -power to put the thought promptly out of his mind. It was only Cora that -he was interested in, and that he wanted to talk with. And here she was, -once more looking into his face, and restoring by her smile his almost -jocund pleasure in the situation. - -He still maintained the rôle of listener, but it grew increasingly clear -to him that when his turn came he would have a good deal to say, and -that he would say it well. He had never spoken on familiar terms with an -actress before--and the experience put him wonderfully at his ease. -He felt that he could say things to her; already he delighted in the -assurance of her receptivity, her immunity from starched nonsense, her -genial and comforting good fellowship. As he continued to look at her, -and to smile, he remembered what people always said, or rather took -for granted, about ladies on the stage. The consciousness shaped itself -within him that she offered a timely and felicitous compromise--a sort -of bridge between those formal, “gun-metal” women of society whom he -desired never to see again, and those hapless, unblest creatures of the -Empire. - -Presently she took his arm, and they moved round to the stalls in front, -and found seats a little apart from any one else. A large number of -young ladies, in white or light-hued evening dresses, were seated about -in the rows before them, and Cora pointed out this one and that among -them to Christian. “That is Dolly Montressor--the dancer, you know--her -photos are all the rage just now. The girl in pink, over there--just -turning round--she is the one who sued young Concannon for breach of -promise. You must remember. Her lawyers put the bailiffs in for what -she owed them, after they’d taken everything the jury gave her, and she -dressed the bailiffs in livery and had them wait at the table at a big -supper she gave. The little thicknosed dark man there--next but one to -her--he drew a check for the supper and the bailiffs too. You see the -small, thin girl with the tomato-colored hair--she didn’t bring _her_ -suit into court--one isn’t fox-headed for nothing. She settled outside -at the last minute--the Lord Carmody case, you know--and no one’s ever -heard a whisper of any supper she ever gave. It isn’t at all her line. -She puts it all into South Africans; they say she’s good for thirty -thousand pounds, if she’s got a penny. It isn’t bad, you know, on a -salary of six quid, and only the pantomime season at that. Oh, there’s -Peggy Wiltshire--just in the doorway. She’s the most remarkable woman in -England. How old would you think she was? Forty? Why, my dear man, she -was billed as a star in the old original Black Crook--just about the -time I was born. She can’t be a minute under sixty. But look at her--the -neck and shoulders of a girl! Isn’t it amazing! Why, she was knocking -about town when your father was a youngster--and here she is still going -strong.” - -The tables were being cleared from the stage, and the fringe of -gentlemen who remained hungry and thirsty was retiring slowly and with -palpable reluctance toward the wings. Some sad-faced musicians emerged -wearily from an unsuspected cave beneath the footlights, and exhibited -their violins and flutes to the general gaze with an air of profound -dejection. Their fiddle strings began to whine at one another, in a -perfunctory and bad-tempered groping about for something they were -expected to have in common. A stout man on the stage vigorously -superintended the removal of the last table, and warned off with a -comprehensive gesture the lingering remnant of unsated raveners; then, -turning, he lifted his hand. On the instant, some score and more of the -young ladies in white and pale pinks and blues and lavenders rose from -their front stalls, and moved toward the stage door at the left. They -pressed forward like a flock of sheep--and with faces as listlessly -vacant as any pasture could afford. Christian observed their mechanical -exit with a curling lip. - -“If these are the renowned beauties, whose fascinations turn the heads -of all the young men about town,” he confided to his companion, “then it -says extremely little for the quality of what is inside those heads.” - -“Yes, isn’t it extraordinary!” she mused at him, eyeing the bevy of -celebrities with a ruminating glance. “This must be somewhere near the -sixth or seventh lot of ’em that even I’ve seen passing through the -turnstile, as you might say. Where do they all come from?--and good -heavens! where do they all go to? It’s a procession that never stops, -you know. You’d think there was a policeman, keeping it moving. You have -these girls here--well, they’re the queens, just for the minute. They -own the earth. Nothing in the world is too good for them. Very well: -just behind them are some other girls, a few years younger. Goodness -knows where they were to-night--in the back ranks of the ballets, -perhaps, or doing their little turn at the Paragon or the Canterbury, -or doing nothing at all--nothing but keeping their toes pointed in this -direction. And they are treading close on the heels of these queens -you see here; and behind _them_ are girls of sixteen or so, and behind -_them_ the little chits of ten and twelve--and they’re all pushing -along--and in time each lot gets in front, out under the limelight, and -has its little year on the throne--and then gets shoved off to make room -for the next. You might have seen two-thirds of these men here ten years -ago. But not the women. Oh, no! Only here and there one--an old stager -like Polly Wiltshire--or a middle-aged stager like myself. But we’re -merely salt to the porridge.” - -“But do you not wish to dance?” he asked her. The orchestra had begun a -waltz, and the young ladies from the front stalls, each now attached to -a stiffly gyrating male figure, were circling about on the stage, with -a floating, wave-like swing of their full skirts which revealed to those -below in the stalls rhythmic glimpses of whisking feet and trim black -ankles. - -“I will dance with you with pleasure,” she replied, promptly. - -“Unfortunately”--he began with confusion--“it is ridiculous of me, but I -never learned.” - -“Oh, then, we will sit here and talk,” she insisted. “I truly don’t want -to dance. It’s ever so much cooler and more comfortable here. One has to -come to these things, you know--you have to show yourself or you’re like -the man who fell out of the balloon--simply not in it. But they’re all -alike--all deadly stupid unless you’re young and want to kick your legs -about--or unless you find some one you’re particularly glad to see.” - -Christian did not seek to evade the implication of the genial glance -with which she pointed this last remark. “Yes, it is good of you to stay -here with me,” he declared. “Except you and my friend who brought me -here--I thought I saw him dancing a moment ago--I don’t know a soul. I -have been saying to-day,” he continued, settling down in his seat toward -her, “that I make friends badly--I remain here in England almost a -stranger.” - -“Why, I thought you went everywhere. I know I’m forever seeing your name -in the ‘Morning Post.’ You spell it Tower, I notice.” - -“Oh, yes, I have been going everywhere--but going as one goes alone -through a gallery of pictures. I do not bring out any friends with me.” - -She stole a swift glance at him, as she fanned herself. “You surprise -me,” she commented. “I should have thought everybody would be running -after you.” - -“Do they? I am not conscious of it.” He spoke wearily. “If they do, it -does not interest me. They are not my kind of people. They take no hold -whatever upon my sympathy. They make no appeal to the imagination.” - -“You could hardly say that about those ladies’ skirts up there,” she -jocosely remarked. “I had no idea silk petticoats flapped so.” - -He was not to be diverted from his theme. “It is very funny about me,” - he went on. “I seem to make no friends among men, of my own age or any -other. Of course there are two or three exceptions--but no more. And as -for the majority of women, they attract me still less. Yet when, once in -a great while, I do meet some one who really interests me, it is always -a woman. These few women whom I have in mind--oh, I could count them -on the fingers of one hand--they make a much deeper and more lasting -impression on me than any man can make.” - -“I believe that frequently happens,” she put in lightly. She did not -seem to him to be following his thread of reasoning with conspicuous -closeness, but her pleasant smile reassured him. - -“I think I am most readily moved on the side of my compassion,” he -continued, intent upon the development of his self-analysis. “If I am -sorry for the people, it is easier for me to like them--that is, if they -are young and pretty women.” - -Cora laughed aloud at this, then lapsed abruptly into thoughtfulness. -“How do you mean?” she asked. - -“To-night I went to the place of the--the promenade--the Empire, is it -not? And the sight of the young women there--it terribly affected me. I -wanted to shout out that they were all my sisters--that I would protect -them all--that they should never be forced by poverty and want to face -that miserable humiliation again.” She looked at him, her lips parted -over the beautiful teeth, a certain blankness of non-comprehension in -the beautiful eyes. As she slowly grasped the drift of his words, the -eyes and lips joined in a reserved and baffling smile. “You’re a nice -boy,” she decided, “but you’re tremendously young. Those girls are lazy, -greedy, good-for-nothing hussies. They wouldn’t do honest work for a -living if it was brought to them on a silver salver. They haven’t an -idea in their empty painted heads except to wheedle or steal money from -drunken fools. They’re nothing but--what d’ye call ’em?--parasites. I’d -put ’em all on the treadmill, if I had my way.” - -Christian sat up a little, and she was alert in noting the signs of -disaffection on his mobile face. “Nevertheless, there is a great sorrow -and a great shame in it all,” he said, gravely. - -“Oh, that I admit,” she declared, making busy work with her fan. “Of -course! Perhaps I spoke more sharply than I meant. Every one is sorry -for the poor creatures--but--but I confess I’m sorrier still for the -girls who have to work like slaves for the barest necessities of life. -Why, my dressmaker’s girls, two of ’em--poor little half-starved -sisters who may come at nine or ten o’clock at night to deliver things, -or try something on--they get twenty-five shillings a week between them. -That’s what gets on _my_ nerve.” - -He preserved silence for a time, then suddenly sat upright and faced -her. A new light shone in his eyes. “I am the dullest person on earth,” - he protested. “All this time I have not thought of it. I want to ask you -a thousand things about your sister. Did you not know?--She is my oldest -friend in England.” - -Cora drew a long breath, and held up her fan for a protracted and -attentive inspection. “Oh, yes--you mean Frank,” she said, tentatively. - -“Frank? Is that her name? She works. She has a machine à écrire--a -typewriter it is called. You must tell me about her! Is she very well? -And where is she to be found? How shall I go about it to recall myself -to her?” As there came no immediate response, he put his further -meditations into dreamy words: “She spoke the first kind words to me, -here in England. I bade farewell to France and the old hard life, in her -company. It was she who pointed with her finger for me to have my first -look at England--the little, rose-colored island in the green water, -with the purple clouds above it. It seemed that we were very close -together--on that one day. And I was so full of the thought of seeing -her very soon again! And that was September--and now it is very nearly -May!. . . But you have not told me! Where is it that she is to be found? -Where does she live?” - -“She lives at home with my people,” Cora replied, still with reflective -deliberation. It was with a visible effort that she shook off the -preoccupied air into which she had lapsed. “But you don’t want to go -there--it’s out of the world--red-busses and green-busses and a tram and -that sort of thing. But she has an office now of her own; that’s where -you’d find her most easily. Bless me if I know where it is--it’s between -the Strand and the Embankment, but I never can remember which is Norfolk -Street and which Arundel Street--and really I’m not sure she’s on -either. But my brother is here. I’ll ask him, presently. And so you know -Frank?” - -“Ah, yes, but you know her better still,” said Christian, softly, -nestling again into the corner of his chair nearest her. “I wanted you -to tell me about her.” - -“Oh, well--but what is there to tell?” she made answer, vaguely. “She -is a good girl; she’s frightfully clever; she works very hard, and gives -most of her money to her mamma; she’s successful, too, because she’s got -a shop of her own, at last--and--and--that’s about all, isn’t it? You -know, we’re not by way of seeing much of each other. There’s no quarrel, -of course--not the least in the world--but I’m too frivolous to be in -her class at all. I dare say it’s my fault--I ought to go and look her -up. That’s what I will do, too, one of these days. But--you mustn’t -misunderstand me--she’s an awfully good girl, that is, of course, if you -like that sort of girl. And she’s pretty, too, don’t you think?” - -“Yes, I think so,” affirmed Christian, almost with solemnity. “What time -would she come to her office--in the morning, I mean?” - -“Oh, don’t ask me!” laughed Cora. “At some ghastly hour, when they have -breakfast, I believe, in cabmen’s shelters, and the streets haven’t been -swept. I know it only by hearsay. I’ve never stopped up quite as late as -that, you know. But you see something like it, driving round by Covent -Garden on your way home from a late dance, to see the flowers. Have you -ever done that?” - -Christian shook his head. The idea attracted him, apparently. “At what -hour is it?” he asked, with interest. - -“Oh, four or five or something like that. It’s really the prettiest -sight you ever saw. I used to go often, at this time of year, and -take home a cabload of flowers. But I am getting too old now--and too -serious-minded. The mother of a family--you know.” - -Christian looked at his watch. “It has occurred to me”--he suggested, -hesitatingly--“it is now after two--perhaps we could make a party to go -this morning. The dancing will not stop earlier, will it?” - -On the stage nothing seemed further from any mind than stopping. There -was some complicated kind of set dance in progress, which at the moment -involved the spectacle of some score of couples, hands all joined, -romping madly around in a gigantic ring. The dresses whirled more wildly -than ever; the men crooked their legs and hung outward from the circle -as they went, stamping their feet and laughing boisterously. Christian’s -eyes singled out one young man who seemed to be making most noise of -all--and then he perceived that it was Dicky Westland. - -“Perhaps it might be arranged,” Cora replied, after consideration, and -with a sidelong eye upon her companion. “I will go behind for a moment, -and find my brother, and see what he says. No, you stop here. I will -come back again.” - -So many people were moving about with entire individual freedom, that -he offered no objection to her departure. She pushed her way confidently -yet affably past the others in the row, and disappeared at the stage -door. He had no clues by which to follow her in fancy after that. Once -he thought he distinguished her at the back of the stage--but for the -rest it was her sister rather than the friendly Cora who engaged his -thoughts. The idea that he was to see her again, quite without delay, -seemed to illuminate his whole mind. - -In the labyrinth of shunted scenery behind the back-curtain, and -along the narrow corridors of dressing-rooms, now devoted to varying -hospitable uses, Cora prosecuted what was for a time a fruitless search. - -“Where are the gentlemen getting their drinks?” she asked at last of a -cloak-room attendant, and the answer simplified her task. Downstairs, at -the door of the manager’s room, she was lucky enough to hit upon Major -Pirie. “Tell Eddy that’ I want him, will you, old man,” she said, -nodding with assurance toward the crowded, smoky little interior, “and -if that brother of mine is in there, I want to see him for a minute, -too.” - -The brother came out first--a slender, overdressed youth, with a -face which suggested a cheap and inferior copy of Cora’s. It had the -self-complacency without the high spirits--the comeliness of line -without the delicacy of texture and charm of color. He was obviously -young in years, but he regarded her through the eyes of an elderly and -wearied person. - -“Hello,” he said, amiably enough. “Goin’ to take Eddy home? He won’t be -the worse for a friendly lead. Oh, he’s all right, though, up to now. -He’s got rippin’ odds against Perambulator from Hoskins, seventy to -three, you know, in fivers. Try and get him to let me in on the bet, -will you? I offered to take half of it, the minute the bet was made--but -he didn’t answer me. You can work it, if you try, old girl.” - -“What’s Frank’s address--her office, I mean?” she put in abruptly, “Got -a pencil? Go and get one from somebody. Thirty-two A, you say? Thanks! -Now tell Eddy to come out.” - -“But what’s up? What do you want with Frank? Anything I can tell her?” - -“Never you mind! And don’t lisp a word to her, or to Eddy or to any one -else. If it comes off, it’ll be a beano for the lot of us.” - -“Right you are,” he assented, with a glimmer of animation. “But say, -you won’t forget about the Hoskins bet, will you? If I could even have -a third of it! I could do with some odd sovereigns just now, and no -mistake.” - -“Sh-h! Here he comes. You run away-now, d’ye see; I want to talk with -Eddy.” - -Captain Edward emerged from the haze of cigarette smoke which veiled the -throng within the manager’s room. “Well?” he demanded, with a kind of -sulky eagerness. - -“I haven’t told him you were here,” Cora began, under her breath, -drawing her husband aside down the passage. “It didn’t seem to come into -the talk. He thinks I’m here with Tom.” - -Edward looked down upon his wife, with a slow, ponderous glance of -mingled hope and uneasiness. He pulled at his small yellow mustache, and -aimlessly jingled some keys in his pocket. - -“You’ve had nearly two hours with him, you know,” he protested, -doubtfully. - -“_Don’t_ I know it!” she ejaculated, holding up her hands in mock pain -at the retrospect. “Good God! If I had a thousand pounds to show for it, -I’d say it was the hardest earned money _I_ ever handled.” - -“Yes, but you haven’t got anything to show--so far’s I can make out,” he -commented with gloom. “You didn’t mention my name at all, eh? But that -was what you particularly set out to do, I thought.” - -“Well, you thought wrong,” she responded briskly. “I set out to do -what was wisest under the circumstances, and I’ve done it. I’ve got an -inkling of a game to be played”--she let her eyes twinkle at him as she -made this tantalizing little pause--“a game, you old goose, worth seven -hundred thousand times anything you ever thought of.” - -The ex-hussar regarded her fixedly, the while he pondered her words. -“I don’t think I’m very keen about games,” he remarked at last, with -obvious suspicion in his tone. “A married woman always gets the worst of -games, in the long run.” - -She grinned affectionate contempt up at him. “Don’t be such a duffer, -Eddy!” she remonstrated with him. “If I had a notion of that sort--do -you suppose I’d come and give it away to you? What rot you talk!” - -“Yes--but what _is_ your game?” he demanded, doggedly. - -“I won’t tell you!” She spoke with great apparent decision. “You’d blab -it all over the place. You can no more keep a secret than you can keep a -ten-pound note.” - -“Oh, I say, Cora,” he urged, in grieved protestation. “You know I’m a -regular bailey oyster, where a thing has to be kept dark. You’d better -tell me, you know. It’ll keep me from--imaginin’ things.” - -The wife smiled. “It’s only a plant I’ve got in my mind,” she explained, -after consideration. “What’s the matter with my naming a wife for him, -eh?” - -Edward, upon reflection, pouted his lips. “Probably you’d come a cropper -over it, in the first place,” he objected, slowly, “and then even if you -did name the winner, she’d probably welsh us out of our winnings--and -besides, what do we want of his marrying at all. The longer he puts off -getting married, the less the odds against us gets. I should think even -a woman could see that.” - -Cora permitted herself a frank yawn. “I’ll explain it to you to-morrow,” - she said. - -“And now I must go back to my Juggins for a few minutes. I’ll come and -fetch you when I’m ready to go.” - -“I don’t fancy it much, you know,” he urged upon her as she turned. He -took a step toward her, and put his hand on her arm. “If your brother -Tom was any good”--he began, with a hard growl in his voice--“by God, -I’d have half a mind to talk with him about _my_ plan. Old Pirie’d be no -use--but if Tom had the sense and the nerve--why, we’d--” - -She had held his eye with a steady, comprehending glance, under the -embarrassment of which his speech faltered and then lapsed altogether. -“No, the less either you or Tom have to do with your plan the better. Go -in now, and take a plain soda, and wait for me! You’ve got no plan, mind -you. You’ve simply been dreaming about it. Do you hear? You never had a -plan! You can’t have one!” - -She spoke with significant authority, and he deferred to it with a -sullen upward wag of the head. “All right,” he muttered curtly, and -turned on his heel. - -“Plain soda, mind!” she called after him, and without waiting for an -answer, ran briskly up the steps toward the stage. - -Captain Edward’s plain soda had become a remote and almost wholly -effaced memory by the time his wife again summoned him from the -manager’s room. - -“We’ll cut this now, if you don’t mind,” she remarked, in her most -casual tone. “I’m as tired as if I’d danced every minute.” She had put -on her wraps, and her small, pretty face, framed by the white down of -her hood, seemed to his scrutiny to wear an expression of increased -contentment. - -“Anything fresh?” he asked, as they went in search of his coat and hat. - -“Yes--fresh is the word,” she replied, with simulated nonchalance. -“Fresh, fresher, freshest--as we used to say at school.” - -“Wha’ is it?” he inquired, when they were within touch of the open air. -The music was still audible behind them, broken by faint, intermittent -echoes of stamping feet and laughing voices. - -“I’ll tell you about it in the morning,” she answered listlessly. “I -hope to heaven you’ve got a cab-fare.” - -“Yes, tha’s all right,” said Edward, waving his stick toward the rank -in the dark middle distance of the street. “Whyn’t you tell me all about -it?” - -“Oh, you wouldn’t get onto it now,” she replied, But later, in the -hansom, the desire to unburden her mind achieved the mastery. - -“Are you awake?” she demanded, and went on: “He’s not a bad sort, that -boy, you know.” - -“Damn him!” said Edward, breathing heavily. - -“I rather like him myself,” she continued. “He’s a bit slow to talk to, -and he’s fresher than Devonshire cream, but there isn’t a drop of the -Johnnie in him. He’s as clean as my little girl.” - -“Damn him,” repeated her husband, but in a milder and even argumentative -tone. - -“He’s a proper bundle of nerves, that youngster,” she mused, as if -talking to herself. “And whatever those nerves of his tell him to do, -he’ll do it. And I’d lay odds he’s goin’ to surprise us all. He’s -got something boilin’ in his mind--something that’s just struck him -to-night--I could see that. Oh, if I was a man!--I’d get out of this -hansom now, and I’d follow that lad, and I’d get hold of him somehow, -and I’d bend him any way I chose--_that_ would be something like!--but -then again, you take him some other way, and he’s as stubborn as a moke. -But I like him, all the same.” She turned toward her husband, and lifted -her voice a little. “I like him so much, I’m thinkin’ of havin’ him for -a brother-in-law.” - -“Strornary thing,” commented Edward, earnestly, “no man’er where I start -from, whenever I get t’ the Circus, I get the hiccups.” - -Cora put her head back against the cushions, and closed her eyes. - - - - -CHAPTER XVI - -Christian discovered that he was not sorry to be alone. Cora’s company -had been amusing and vivifying, no doubt, but it was even better now to -have his own thoughts. He observed with relief that others in the stalls -were smoking; tobacco as a rule had not very much meaning for him, -but now he lit a large cigar from the dinner-case in his pocket, and -stretching himself in his chair, proceeded to enjoy it. He kept his -glance, in an indolent fashion, upon the stage, but his mind roamed far -and wide. - -Cora, in returning to explain that it would not be possible for her to -stay till the time for Covent Garden, had ingenuously sat on for nearly -another hour, cheering him with her lively prattle. She asked him many -questions about himself, his diversions, his tastes, his relations with -Lord Julius and Emanuel. He wondered now if these queries had been quite -as artless as they seemed at the time. There rose up before him, in -retrospect, certain occasional phases of her manner which suggested -something furtive. She had watched the stage, and the doorway leading -from it, with a kind of detached uneasiness on which he now languidly -speculated. It occurred to him again to wonder if her husband was really -in the building. Christian found himself thinking of this cousin of his -almost with compassion. Poor devil! Was his fate not even more tragic -than that of the others who were merely dead? He regretted now that -he had not asked Cora point-blank as to his presence. His mood was so -tolerant to-night that even the unforgivable insult to his father lost -its sharp outlines, and became only a hasty phrase, the creature of -imperative provocation. - -In her final leave-taking, Cora had genially proffered her services if -he desired to know any or all of the young ladies--and he had begged -to be excused. Dicky Westland came down to the stalls later on, and -shamefacedly linked a similar offer to his apologies for his prolonged -neglect of his guest. But Christian protested that he was enjoying -himself thoroughly. He was never less sleepy in his life; he did not -want a drink; he would not dream of wishing to go until his friend was -entirely ready. “You cannot realize,” he concluded, with his persuasive -smile, “how strange and interesting this all is to me.” - -But when Dicky had returned again to the stage, Christian paid less -attention than ever to the diverting spectacle. His thoughts reverted -obstinately to Captain Edward--? and to that portion of the family of -which he was the congenital type. Was not that really the sort of man -who should have the title? There seemed a cloud of negative reasons, but -were these not sentimental abstractions? Should the duke not be a rough, -hard sportsman, a man with a passion for horses and dogs and gunpowder -saturating his veins? One who loved the country for its rude, toilsome -out-of-door sports, and who liked best in town the primitive amusements -of the natural man? He figured Edward in his mind’s eye most readily as -puffing and cursing over a rat-hole with his terriers--or as watching -with a shine of steel in his blue eyes the blood-stained progress of -a prize-fight. And truly, were these not the things that a duke of -Glastonbury of right belonged to? - -He could not think of Lord Julius and of Emanuel as being Torrs at all. -The older man had the physical inheritance of the family, it was -true, but he was almost as much estranged from its ideals as that -extraordinary son of his. They both were grotesquely out of the picture -of English aristocratie life, whether in country or town. And he -himself--how absolutely he also was out of the picture! - -The immensity of the position which his grandfather’s death would -devolve upon him had been present in his mind, it seemed sleeping as -well as waking, for half a year. At the outset he had thrilled at the -prospect; sometimes still he was able to reassure himself about it, and -to profess to himself confidence that when the emergency came, he -would be equal to it. But more often, in these latter days, the outlook -depressed him. Of course nothing grievous would happen to him, in any -event. He would be assured of an excellent living to the end of his -days, with an exceptional amount of social deference from those about -him, and relative freedom to do what he liked. He could marry and rear -a family of lords and ladies; he could have his speeches in the House -of Lords or elsewhere printed in the “Times”; if he looked about in -America, he could secure a bride with perhaps millions to her dower. -There was, in any case, the reasonable likelihood that he would be, to -some extent, the heir of Lord Julius and Emanuel, in the latter part -of his life. Thus he could go on, when he set himself to the task, -piling-up reasons why he ought to view the future with buoyant -serenity--to count himself among the happiest of men. - -But then--was his not all self-deception? Did he not know in his heart -that he was not happy?--that this gilded and ornate career awaiting -him really repelled all his finer senses? To-night as he followed his -thoughts behind the transparent screen of whisking dresses and jolting -figures upon which his outer vision rested, the impulse to escape the -whole thing rose strong within him. Already he had sworn that he would -no longer weary himself with the meaningless and distasteful routine of -social obligations in London. Why should he not plunge boldly forward -beyond that, and say that he would make no further sacrifices of any -sort to the conventions of mediocrity? - -He lit another cigar and, rising, walked about a little by himself at -the side of the stalls, his hands deep in his pockets, his brows knitted -in formative introspection. - -First of all, it was clear that Emanuel’s hopes about his taking up the -System were doomed. It was not in him to assume such a part. He had -not the capacity for such work; even if he had, he lacked both the -tremendous driving energy and the enthusiasm. - -But when Emanuel learned this, then he would be angry, and he would -cover over no more money to that account at the bank. Eh bien! It -couldn’t be helped. Christian recalled that he had still at that blessed -bank more than sixty thousand francs!--truly a prodigious sum, when one -thought of it soberly. The question whether this sum ought not to be -given back to Emanuel, under certain circumstances, seemed to have -settled itself. When it had first occurred to him that afternoon, it had -suggested a good many moral difficulties. But it was really simplicity -itself, as he considered it now. There were all those lean and -poverty-stricken years of his youth and childhood to be remembered--and, -stretching back beyond that, those other years of his father’s exile -before he was born--nearly forty in all. The intelligent thing was to -regard the three thousand pounds as a sort of restitution fund, to be -spread out over the whole of that long period. Viewed in this light, -the annual fraction of it was a paltry matter. Besides, Emanuel had -expressly declared that no conditions whatever were attached to the -money. Christian saw that he could make his mind quite easy on that -score. - -So then, there were sixty thousand francs! With that he might live -admirably, even luxuriously, on the Continent, until his grandfather’s -death. That event would of course alter everything. There would then -come automatically to him--no matter where he was or what he did--a -certain fixed income, which he understood to be probably over rather -than under seventy-five thousand francs a year. This--still on the -Continent--would be almost incredible wealth! There was really no limit -to the soul-satisfying possibilities it opened before him. He would -have a yacht on the Mediterranean; he would have a little chateau in -the marvelous green depths of the Styrian Mountains--of which a boyhood -friend had told him with such tender reverence of memory. He would see -Innsbruck and Moscow, and, if he liked, even Samarkand and China. Why, -he could go round the world in his yacht, if he chose--to remote spice -islands and tropical seas! He could be a duke when, and as much, as it -pleased him to be one. Instead of being the slave to his position -and title, he would make them minister to him. He would do original -things--realize his own inner fancies and predilections. If the whim -seized him to climb Mount Ararat, or to cross the Sahara with a caravan -of his own servants--that he would do. But above all things--now and -henceforth forever, he would be a free man! He laughed grimly as he -thought how slight was the actual difference between the life of pauper -bondage he had led up to last October, and the existence which polite -England and London had imposed upon him ever since. The second set of -chains were of precious metal--that was all. Well, hereafter there would -be no fetters of any description! - -“I’m quite ready to go now, old man, if you are,” Dicky Westland said at -some belated stage of this reverie. He had approached without being seen -by his friend, and he had to pull at Christian’s sleeve to attract his -attention. “I fancy you’ve been walking in your sleep,” he laughed, in -comment upon this. - -Christian shook himself, and, blinking at Dicky, protested that he had -never been more wide awake in his life. “I go only if you’re entirely -ready,” he said. “Don’t dream of leaving on my account I have been -extremely interested, I assure you.” - -“Every fellow has his own notions of enjoyment,” reflected Westland, -with drowsy philosophy, as they went up the stairs toward the stage. “I -tried to explain your point of view to some of the girls up here, but -I’m not sure they quite grasped it. They were dying to have me bring you -up and make you dance, you know. By George, I had a job to keep Dolly -Montressor from coming down and fetching you, off her own bat.” - -“How should they know or care about me?” asked Christian. “I didn’t -expect to be pointed out.” - -“My dear man,” retorted Dicky, sleepily, “no one pointed you out. They -all know you by sight as well as they do George Edwards. It isn’t too -late, still, you know--if you really would like to be introduced.” - -Christian shook his head with resolution, as they halted at the wings. -“Truly, no!” he repeated. “But I should like a glass of wine and a -sandwich, if we can get past the stage. I’m not an atom sleepy, but I’m -hungry and thirsty.” - -On their way through a narrow, shadowed defile of huge canvas-stretched -frames of deal, they passed two young men, one much taller than the -other, who had their heads bent together in some low-voiced, private -conversation. Christian glanced at them casually, and was struck with -the notion that they observed him in turn, and exchanged comment upon -his approach. He looked at them with a keener scrutiny as he went -by--and it seemed to him that there was something familiar in the face -of the larger man--who indeed looked away upon the instant their eyes -met. - -“Did you see those men?” he asked Westland, in an undertone, a moment -later. “Do you know them?” - -“Those we just passed?” Dicky looked over his shoulder. “I don’t know -the thin chap, but the other fellow is Gus Torr--why, of course--your -cousin. Somehow, I never think of you as belonging to that lot--I mean, -being related to them. Of course--that was his sister-in-law you were -sitting with. Why did you ask if I knew him?” - -“Nothing--I was not sure if it was he--I’ve seen him only once,” - Christian replied, with an assumption of indifference. “I remember -having noticed then how much he looked like his brother.” - -“Yes--poor devils!” commented Dicky, as they entered the manager’s room. -Apparently it was in his mind to say more, but the place was crowded, -and the problem of getting through the throng to the food and drink -monopolized his attention. - -Some minutes later, while Christian stood in another corridor, waiting -for his friend to bring their hats and coats from the mysteriously -elusive spot where he had left them, he overheard the mention of his -name. Two women’s voices, wholly unknown to him, came from behind an -improvised partition of screens near at hand, with great distinctness. - -One of them said: “He spells his name ‘Tower,’ you know. I understand -the idea is to make people forget who his father was.” - -“Good job, too!” replied the other voice. - -Christian turned abruptly, and strode off in the direction whither Dicky -had disappeared. “After forty years!” he murmured hotly to himself. -“After forty years!” and clenched his fists till the nails hurt his -palms. - -***** - -The two young men walked homeward, arm in arm, through silent streets -over which the dawn was spreading its tentative first lights. It was -colder than they had thought, and the morning air was at once misty and -fresh. In Leicester Square the scent of lilacs came to them; beside the -pale, undefined bulk of the squat statue they caught the lavender splash -of color which was sister to the perfume. - -“By Jove, it’s spring!” said Dicky. He pointed out the flowers, and -then, still drawing Christian’s arm to turn his attention to the -square, recalled to him as they moved that this was the oldtime haunt -of foreigners in London. “Dickens’s villain in ‘Little Dorrit,’ you -know--the fellow whose mustache went up and his nose went down--I never -can remember his name--he lived here. In those days, all that sort of -chappies lived here--the adventurers and jailbirds who had made their -own countries too hot to hold them.” - -Westland’s insistence upon this theme had no purpose other than to -divert Christian’s attention while they passed the Empire. He was tired, -and profoundly disinclined to any renewal of the discussion about the -promenade. He encountered with vague surprise, therefore, the frowning -glance which Christian, half halting, bent upon him. The young man’s -displeasure was marked, but Dicky for the life of him could not imagine -why. He tightened his hold on the other’s arm and quickened their pace. - -But Christian, after a few yards, suddenly withdrew his arm altogether. -“I do not like to walk so fast,” he said, with a sharp note in his -voice. - -Dicky regarded him with puzzled apprehension. “What’s up, old man?” he -asked, almost pleadingly. “Has anything gone wrong?” - -Christian, still with knitted brows, parted his lips to speak. Then -he seemed to reconsider his intention, and let his face soften as he -paused. “No--nothing at all,” he replied, after a moment. He smiled -a little to reassure the other. “It was nothing at all,” he repeated. -“Only I am nervous and excited to-night--this morning, I should say--and -my head is full of projects. It is twelve hours since you came to -me--and the whole world has changed meanwhile. I see everything -different. I am not altered to your eyes--but none the less, I am not -at all, in any respect, the man you took to dine with you. You have not -observed anything--but it is a revolution that has occurred under your -very nose, Mr. Dicky Westland.” - -“I’m too sleepy to observe anything,” the other declared. “I couldn’t -tell a revolution from a--from a hot-potato can.” - -The comparison had forced itself upon Westland’s jaded mind through the -medium of his weary eyes. There before them, by the curb at the corner, -stood the dingy wheeled-oven of the streets, the sullen red glow of -its lower door making a strange patch of fiery light upon the ragged -trousers of the man in charge. He was a dirty and undersized creature, -and he looked up at the two young gentlemen in evening dress with a -speculative, yet hardly hopeful, eye. - -Christian stopped short. “Ah, this is very good,” he said, with a -brightening face. “I have never eaten a potato from a can.” - -Dicky sighed, but resigned himself with only a languid protest: “You -have to eat so much else besides the potato,” he commented dolefully. - -The man opened an upper door, and then drew from under the machine a -twisted wad of old newspaper, which, being unwound, revealed a gray heap -of salt. “How many, cap’n?” he demanded, briefly. - -Christian had been glancing across the Circus meanwhile--to where, in -the misty vagueness of dawn, Piccadilly opened between its tall, shapely -corners, and beyond, the curved yellowish sweep of Regent Street began. -The dim light revealed some lurking figures to his eyes. - -“Can you call over those women?” he asked the potato-man. - -A tall, fresh-faced young policeman came upon the group round the -Criterion corner. Although the pounding of his thick boots on the -pavement had been audible long before his appearance, he regarded them -with the slightly dramatic air of one who has deftly surprised a group -of conspirators. The potato-man looked from Christian to the officer and -made no reply. - -Christian drew some silver from his pocket, shaking off the restraining -hand Westland tried to lay on his arm. “Is there any objection, -constable,” he inquired, “to my buying potatoes for those friends of -ours over there? It is a cold morning.” - -The policeman’s glance ranged from the white ties of the young gentlemen -to the coins in Christian’s palm. His official expression relaxed. “I -dare say it’ll do no ’arm, sir,” he replied with courtesy. He even -lent himself to the enterprise by stooping down and beating a certain -number of strokes with his baton on the pavement. - -“How many times did he strike?” Dicky made whispered inquiry. “That’s a -new dodge to me.” - -New or old, it was efficient. Forlorn shapes began to emerge from the -shadows of the big streets opposite, and move forward across the empty -open space. Others stole noiselessly in from the byways of Leicester -Square. There were perhaps a dozen in all when the potato-man made his -census--poorly dressed, fagged, bold-faced, furtive-eyed women. They -spoke in monotonous, subdued tones among themselves. There were to be -heard German, French, Belgian French, cockney English, and Lancashire -English. Two of them pulled at the sleeve of the potato-man to make him -hurry. - -Christian, regarding his motley guests, found himself neither touched -nor entertained. They seemed as stupid as they were squalid. With a -gesture of decision he gave the money to the policeman. - -“Pay for it all,” he directed, “and if more come, give them a look-in, -too--and keep what is left for yourself.” - -“Now then, Frenchy!” broke in the constable, sharply. “Mind what you’re -at! Pass Germany the salt!” With an abrupt change to civility, he turned -to Christian. “Right you are, sir!” he said. - -Dicky laughed drowsily. “It’s like the Concert of Europe,” he declared. -“Shall we go on?” - -They moved down the broad pavement, again arm in arm, breathing in -slowly the new, keen air, and observing in a silence which was full of -tacit comment the beautiful termination of the street before them: the -dark figures of the Crimean monument standing in grim relief against -the morning light, the stately palace beyond, with its formal portals -of club buildings, its embowered statues, its huge column towering -ponderously above the pale green of spring in the park--all gray and -cool and, as it were, thoughtfully solemn in the hush of daybreak. - -“Ah, yes--this wonderful London!” sighed Christian, as they halted at -the Continental corner. He spread his hand to embrace the prospect -before them. “How right you were! I have not learned to know it at all. -But I begin now! If you will walk through the square with me--there is -something I wish to say.” - -This something did not get itself said till they halted within this -somber, slate-colored square. Christian paused before a big, pretentious -house of gloomy, and even forbidding aspect--a front of sooty stucco, -with cornices of ashen-hued stone, and many windows masked with sullen -brown shades. - -“This was our town house a hundred years ago,” he said meditatively. “My -father was born here. My grandfather sold it when the entail was broken. -Until this afternoon, it was my fixed resolve to buy it back again. I -said always to myself: ‘If I am to have a house in London, it must be -this old one of ours in St. James’s.’ But that is all changed now. At -least, it is no longer a resolve.” - -Dicky gazed at him with sleepy eyes. “How do you mean?” he asked, -perfunctorily. - -“Wake up now, and I will tell you!” Christian, with a lingering glance, -as of renunciation, at the mansion, began to walk again. “This is it. -You said you were eager to be some colonial official’s secretary--to -have three hundred pounds--and the yellow fever. To obtain this, you -expend all your energies, you and your relations. Well, then--why will -you not be my secretary instead? You shall have more than three hundred -pounds--and no yellow fever.” - -Westland had roused himself, and looked inquiringly now into the other’s -face. “What do you need of a secretary?” he objected, half jestingly. -“If you want to talk about it after you’ve come into the thing--I don’t -say that I shouldn’t be glad-to consider it. But the deuce of it is----” - -“No--I wish it to begin now, this morning, this hour--this minute!” - Christian spoke peremptorily. - -Dicky, pondering, shook his head. “No, you mustn’t insist on -settling anything now,” he decided. “It isn’t regular, you know. If -you--really--want to propose something immediate--why, I’ll call and -talk with you to-morrow--or, that is to say, this afternoon. But I -couldn’t possibly let you commit yourself to anything of that sort now.” - -Christian frowned at his friend. “You speak of what you will let me do!” - he said. - -“In your opinion--I see it!--you think I have not sober command of -myself, am not responsible--is that it?” - -“Nonsense! I’ve said nothing of the sort,” protested the other. “Of -course, you’re perfectly all right--but we’re both tired and sleepy, and -you’re not so accustomed to go home by daylight as I am--and it wouldn’t -be at all the thing for me to close a bargain with you now. Can’t you -see what I mean? I wouldn’t play threepenny écarté with you at this -hour in the morning--and I’m damned if I’m going to let you in for three -hundred a year for the rest of my life. Shall I come round, say, at -luncheon time?” - -“I shall not be in,” said Christian, curtly. He looked at his companion, -and then past him at the trees in the square, in vexed rumination. “What -I have it in my mind to do”--he continued, vaguely, after a pause--“it -is not a thing for delay. It is in my blood to do it at once. It was my -impulse to make you my comrade in it--but of course, since you have your -reservations and doubts, there need be nothing more said about it.” - -The shrug of the shoulders which emphasized these last words nettled -Westland, and at the same time helped him to repress his annoyance. It -lent to the whole episode just that savor of foreign eccentricity which -appealed to the amiable tolerance of the islander. - -“My dear man,” he urged, gently, “I haven’t the slightest notion what it -is that you’re so keen about--but whatever it is, do go home and sleep -on it, and make up your mind calmly after breakfast. It’s no good -deciding important questions, and striking out new lines, and all that -sort of thing, at this hour in the morning. Nobody ever does it, you -know. It simply can’t be done.” - -“Good-night!” said Christian, proffering his hand. “You are right; it is -high time for those who are sleepy to go to bed I won’t drag you round -to Duke Street.” - -Dicky looked at him doubtfully. “You do wrong to be angry, you know,” he -said. - -“But that is your error--I am not in the least angry--I beg you to -believe it,” cried Christian. His eyes beamed genially in proof of his -assertion, and he put heartiness into his voice. “For a minute I was -disappointed--shall I say vexed?--but not any more. How should I quarrel -with you for not beholding things through my eyes? To me, something is -a giant; you perceive that it is a windmill. Eh bien! We do not convince -each other--but surely we do not quarrel.” - -“Oh, I am game enough to play Sancho to your Don,” expostulated Dicky, -with a readiness which Christian had not looked for, “but I draw the -line at starting out on an empty stomach, and when we’re too sleepy to -stand. Well, what shall it be?” He took the hand offered him, and strove -to signify by his cordial grasp that no trace of a misunderstanding -remained. “Shall I look you up, say, at two o’clock?” - -“I do not think I shall be there. Goodnight!” responded Christian, and -the two parted. - - - - -CHAPTER XVII - -Christian climbed the stairs at Duke Street, and let himself into his -apartments, with painstaking precautions against being overheard. There -was an excess of zeal about Falkner which might easily impel him to -present himself for service at even this most unseasonable hour. - -The young man had still only formless notions of what he was going to -do, but it was at least plain to him that Falkner was to have no part in -the proceedings. He drew off his varnished boots as a further measure -of security, and then, with more hesitation, removed his cloak and coat, -and raised the inside blinds at the two windows. This sitting-room of -his had rather pleased him formerly. He could recall having taken quite -an affectionate interest in buying and arranging the rugs and pictures -and bookcases with which he had supplemented the somewhat gaunt -furnishing of his predecessor. But now, in this misty and reluctant -light of the London morning, nothing seemed good to him as he looked -about. - -The pretty things of his own selection said no more to him than did the -chattels he had taken over from a stranger. There was no spirit of home -in them. - -He moved noiselessly to the adjoining bedroom, and drew the curtains -there as well, and glanced round. Here, too, he had the sense of -beholding the casual appointments of a hotel chamber. Nothing made an -appeal of intimacy to him. He reflected that in a day or two he -should not be able to remember how his room looked--even if his memory -attempted the fatuous task. Duke Street had been engraved on his cards -for six months, but it had not made the faintest mark on his heart. - -With an air of decision, he suddenly began to drag forth his clothes -from the wardrobe and drawers, and spread them on the bed. In the tiny -dressing-room beyond were piled his traveling bags, and these he brought -out into the light. Upon consideration, however, the original impulse -to take a good many things weakened and dwindled. To begin with, their -secret removal was in no way practicable. Moreover, now that he thought -of it, he did not want them. They would be simply encumbrances. He would -take with him only the smallest handbag, with a change of linen and a -few brushes. - -Finally, the conviction that even this must be a nuisance became clear -to him, and he desisted from the random packing he had begun. Still -moving about as silently as possible, he changed his ceremonial tie for -one of every-day wear, and put on a suit of sober-colored tweeds, and -his easiest brown boots. The transfer of his watch, some loose gold -and the roll of notes from one set of pockets to another, completed his -preparations in the bedchamber. He tiptoed out to the larger room, -and there, upon reflection, wrote a few lines for Falkner’s direction, -saying merely that he was called away, and that matters were to go on as -usual until he returned or sent further orders. He separated a banknote -from the roll to place inside this note, but on second thoughts wrote -a check instead, and sealing and directing the envelope, laid it in a -conspicuous place on the table. - -He noticed then, for the first time, that there were some letters from -the evening post for him, neatly arranged on this table. He opened the -nearest, and glanced at its contents: it was a note from his second -cousin, Lady Milly Poynes, the fair-haired, fair-faced, fair-brained, -fair-everything sister of Lord Lingfield, reminding him that she was -depending upon his escort for the Private View of the Academy, and that -the time for getting tickets was running very short. He laughed aloud -at the conceit of the Royal Academy rising in his path as an obstacle -at such a moment--and without more ado thrust this with the unopened -letters into his pocket. Then, when he had made sure once more that he -had his check-book, nothing remained to be done. He went softly forth, -without so much as a thought of taking a farewell glance behind him, -found a soft dark hat in the hallway and then closed the outer door with -great care upon the whole Duke Street episode of his life. - -“You are not to see me here again in a hurry,” he confided aloud to the -banisters and steps, when he had descended to the first floor. Then he -laughed to himself, and tripped gaily down the remaining flight. - -There was no hesitation now in his mood. He walked briskly back through -the square, and then down Waterloo Place, till he came to the Guards’ -Memorial. He moved round this to the front, and looked up at one of the -three bronze Guardsmen with the confident air of familiarity. He knew -this immutable, somber face under every shifting aspect of light and -shadow; he had stared at the mantling greatcoat and the huge bearskin of -this hero of his a hundred times. The very first day of his arrival in -London he had made the acquaintance of this statue, and had started, -dazed and fascinated, at the strange resemblance it suggested. Thus his -boy-father must have looked, with the beard and the heavy dress of -the Russian winter. The metal figure came to mean to him more than all -London beside. In the sad, strong, silent countenance which gazed down -upon him he read forever the tragedy that gripped his heartstrings. -Forever Honor, standing aloft, held the laurel wreath poised high above -the warrior’s head--immovable in the air, never to descend to touch its -mark. Christian had seen this wreath always through moist eyes. - -This morning, for a wonder, no tearful impulse came to him as he -looked upward. The impassive face was as gravely fine as ever, but -its customary effect of pathos was lacking. There even seemed in its -sightless eyes a latent perception of Christian’s altered mood. He -lifted his hat soberly and saluted the statue. - -Toward the Strand now he made his way, walking blithely, and humming to -himself. He could not forbear to smile at a policeman he passed in front -of St. Martin’s. Two elderly and much bewrapped cabmen stood stamping -their feet beside a shelter, and they pointed toward their ridiculous -old horses and battered growlers as he came along, with an air that -moved him to glee. He gave them a shilling to divide, and went on, -conscious of a novel delight in himself and in the world at large. - -The big clock showed it to be half-past five. There was no blue in the -sky, but the mist of daybreak was abating, and the air was milder. Not a -living creature was visible along the naked length of the Strand. At the -end, the beautiful spire of St. Mary’s rose from the dim grays about its -base, exquisite in tints and contour as an Alpine summit in the moment -before sunrise. - -A turning to the left opened to Christian, unexpectedly, a scene full of -motion and color. He had not thought himself so near Covent Garden, -but clearly this must be it. He walked up toward the busy scene of -high-laden vans, big cart-horses and swarming porters, wondering why -no sign of all this activity was manifest in the sleeping Strand below, -barely a stone’s throw distant. He saw the glowing banks of flowers -within, as he approached, and made toward them, sighing already with -pleasure at the promise they held out to him. - -He might have read in the papers that it was a backward and a grudging -April, this year, in the matter of flowers. But to Christian, no memory -of the exuberant South suggested any rivalry with this wonderful show -of northern blossoms. Tulips and daffodils, amaryllis and azaleas, -rhododendrons, carnations, roses--he seemed to have imagined to himself -nothing like this before. He spent over an hour among them, in the end -making numerous purchases. At each stall he gave an address--always the -same--and exacted the pledge of delivery at eight o’clock. - -At last he could in reason buy nothing more, and he went out to look -about him. He found the place where the market-men take drinks at -all hours, and food and coffee when nature’s sternest demands can be -positively no longer disregarded--but it did not invite his appetite. -Some further time he spent in gazing wondering at the vast walls of -vegetables and fruit being tirelessly built up and pulled down again, -pondering meanwhile the question whether he should breakfast before -eight o’clock, or at some indefinitely later hour. He partially solved -the problem at length by buying a small box of Algerian peaches, and -eating them where he stood. Then some exceptionally fine bananas tempted -him further, and he finished with a delicate little melon from Sicily. - -How it carried him back to the days of his youth--this early morning -fragrance of the fresh fruit! It was as if he were at Cannes again--only -buoyant now, and happy, and oh, so free! And in his pocket he could feel -whenever he liked the soft, munificent crackle of over four thousand -francs! The sapphire Mediterranean had surely never been so lovely to -his gaze as was now the dingy Strand below. - -The laggard hour came round at last. He descended to Arundel Street, and -discovered the house he wanted, and found just within the entrance two -or three of the flower-laden porters awaiting his arrival, For the rest, -the building seemed profoundly unoccupied. He led the way up to the -third floor, and had the plants set down beside the locked door which -bore the sign “Miss Bailey.” Other similarly burdened porters made their -appearance in turn, till the narrow hallway looked like a floral annex -to the Garden itself. - -He waited alone with his treasures for what seemed to him a very long -time, then descended and stood at the street door till he was tired, -then climbed the stairs again. The extraordinary quiet of the big -building, filled with business offices as it was, puzzled him. He had -no experience of early-morning London to warn him that English habits -differed from those of the continent. It occurred to him that perhaps it -was a holiday--conceivably one of those extraordinary interludes called -Bank Holidays--and he essayed a perplexing computation in the calendar -in the effort to settle this point. - -Finally there began the sounds of steps, and the opening and closing of -doors, below him. A tow-headed boy in buttons came up to his landing, -stared in vacuous amazement at him and the flowers and passed on to the -next floor. Noises of occupancy rose from the well of the staircase to -bear him countenance, and suddenly a lift glided up past him in this -well. He had not noticed the ropes or the iron caging before. He heard -the slamming of the lift doors above, and the dark carriage followed on -its smooth descent. Christian reproached himself for not having rung the -bell and questioned the lift-man. He considered the feasibility of doing -it now, but was deterred by the fear that the man would resent it. Then -the lift came up again--and was stopping at his floor. There was a sharp -note of girlish laughter on the instant of the halt, answered by a male -guffaw. - -A slight, erect, active young woman emerged from the lift, her -face alive with mirth of some unknown character. Behind her, in the -obscurity, Christian saw for an instant the vanishing countenance of -the liftman, grinning widely. This hilarity, somehow, struck in him an -unsympathetic chord. - -The young woman, still laughing, spread an uncomprehending glance over -Christian and his flowers. She moved past him, key in hand, toward the -door which he had been guarding, with a puzzled eye upon him meanwhile. -With the key in the lock she turned and decided to speak. - -“What might all this be--the Temple Flower Show or the Crystal Palace?” - she asked, with banter in her tone. - -“These are for Miss Bailey,” said Christian, quite humbly. - -“Must be some mistake,” said the girl decisively. “Did she order them -herself? Were you there at the time? Did you see her? Where do they come -from?” - -Christian advanced a little into the light. “She has not ordered them,” - he said, in his calmest voice. “I have not seen her for a long time. But -I have brought them for her, and I think you may take it from me that -they are hers.” - -“Oh, I beg your pardon,” she replied, lightly but with grace. “I didn’t -understand. Things are forever being brought here that belong somewhere -else. Men are so stupid in finding their way about! Well--I suppose we -must get them inside. That is your idea, isn’t it?” - -She spoke very rapidly, and with a kind of metallic snap in her tones. -Christian answered her questions by a suave assenting gesture. “Miss -Bailey is not likely to turn up much before half-past nine,” she went -on, as if he had made the inquiry. “She lives so far out, and just now -we’re not very busy. There’s nothing doing in new plays at this time of -the year, and the lady novelists are all getting their own typewriters. -If you’ll lend a hand, we’ll carry the things in.” Between them they -bore in the various pots, and the big bouquets loosely wrapped in blue -paper. The girl led the way through a large working-room to a smaller -apartment, fitted as an office but containing also a sofa and a tall gas -cooking-stove--and here on desk and center-table, chairs and windowsill, -they placed the flowers. Christian watched her as she deftly removed -their paper wrappings. She had a comely, small face of aspect at once -alert and masterful. The skin was peculiarly fair, with a tinge of rose -in the cheeks so delicately modulated that he found it in rivalry with -the “Mrs. Pauls” she was unpacking. Her light hair was drawn plainly -down over the temples in a fashion which he felt was distinguished, but -said to himself he did not like. Her shrewd eyes took calm cognizance of -him from time to time. - -“They are very beautiful indeed,” she remarked with judicial approval, -upon the completion of her task. Then, as upon an afterthought, she -moved rapidly about, peering under the branches of the growing plants, -and separating the cut flowers lightly with her hands. “There is no card -anywhere, is there? I suppose you will want to leave a message? Here are -pen and ink--if you wish to write anything.” - -“Thank you,” Christian began, smilingly but with obvious hesitation. He -looked at his watch. “If you don’t mind--if you’re quite sure I shan’t -be in the way--I think I should like to wait till Miss Bailey comes.” - -“Oh, you won’t be in the way,” the girl replied. She regarded him -meditatively, with narrowed eyes. “I shouldn’t dust this room in any -event--since the flowers are here; but you mustn’t come out into the -big room--unless you want to get choked with blacks. Would you like a -morning paper? I can send a boy out for one.” - -“Thank you--you are very good--no,” Christian answered. “There are some -books here--I shall amuse myself.” - -The girl turned to leave him, and then on second thought moved over -to the window and lifted the sash. “There’ll be no objection to your -smoking if you like,” she informed him. Then she went out, closing the -door behind her. - -Christian walked to the window in turn, and looked down over the flowers -to the narrow street below. It was full of young men in silk hats, -toiling up the granite ascent like black ants. He reflected that they -must be clerks and shopmen, going to their daily work from the Temple -station or the Embankment. The suggestion of monotonous bondage which -their swarming progress toward the wage-earning center gave forth, -interested him. He yawned pleasurably at the thought of his own superb -emancipation from duties and tasks of all descriptions. - -He strolled over to the bookcase above the desk, and glanced at the -volumes revealed through its glass doors. They seemed very serious -books, indeed. “Economics of Socialism,” “Capitalist Production,” “The -Ethics of Socialism,” “Towards Democracy”--so the titles ran that first -met his eye. There were other groups--mainly of history and the -essayists--but everything was substantial. His glance sought in vain any -lightsome gleam of poetry or fiction. The legend on a thin red book, -“Civilization: Its Cause and Cure,” whimsically caught his attention. He -put his hand to the key in the bookcase door to get out the volume; -then, hesitating, yawned, and looked over the shelves once more. There -was nothing else--and really he desired to read nothing. - -He would half recline in comfort upon the sofa instead, until his friend -came. As a pleasing adjunct to this plan, he drew the table up close, -and found room upon it, by crowding them together, for most of the -flowers that had been bestowed elsewhere. He seated himself at his ease, -with his head resting against the wall, and surveyed the plants and -blossoms in affectionate admiration. It was delicious to think how -naïve her surprise would be--how great her pleasure! Truly, since his -discovery of his birthright, remarkable and varied as had been his -experiences, he had done nothing else which afforded him a tithe of the -satisfaction he felt now glowing in all his veins. Here, at last, by -some curious and devious chance, he had stumbled upon the thing that was -genuinely worth doing. - -He could hear the cheerful girl in the next room, whistling gently to -herself as she moved the furniture about. There came presently the sound -of other female voices, and then a sustained, vibrant rattle, quaintly -accentuated like the ticking of a telegraph key, which he grew -accustomed to, and even found pleasant to the ear. - -He put his feet up on the edge of the sofa--and nestled downward till -his head was upon it as well. A delicate yet pervasive fragrance from -the table close beside him aroused his languid curiosity. Was it the -perfume of carnations or of roses? - -He closed his eyes the better to decide. - -In the outer room, Miss Connie Staples permitted herself numerous and -varied speculations as to the identity and purposes of the young man -with the flowers, the while she dusted the typewriters, distributed the -copy for the morning’s start and set the place in order. She had her -sleeves rolled up, and had wound a big handkerchief about her hair; -beneath this turban her forehead scored itself in lines of perplexed -wonderment as to this curious early caller--but when two other girls -arrived, she suffered them to put aside their things and begin work -without so much as hinting at what had happened. A third girl, coming a -little later, brought in a stray blossom which she had picked up in the -corridor outside. She mentioned the fact, and even laid stress upon it, -but got no syllable of explanation. - -This was all simple enough, but at half-past nine the arrival of still -another of the sex put Miss Connie’s resources to an unexpected test. - -A handsome, youngish woman, very well dressed indeed, appeared suddenly -upon the threshold of the workroom, knocking upon the door and pushing -it wide open at the same instant. She looked curiously about, and then -point-blank into the face of the girl who came toward her. It was a -glance of independent and impersonal criticism which the two exchanged, -covering with instantaneous swiftness an infinitude of details as to -dress, coiffure, complexion, figure, temperament and origin. Connie -wondered if the new-comer was really quite a lady, long before she -formulated an inquiring thought about her errand. Even as she finally -looked this question of business, she decided that it was an actress -with a play for the provinces, and asked herself if she did not seem to -recognize the face. The visitor, for her part, saw that Connie’s teeth -were too uneven to be false, and that her waist was overlong, and that -her hair was not thick enough to be worn flat over the temples, much -less to justify so confident a manner. In all, something less than a -second of time had elapsed. - -“I want to see Miss Bailey--Miss Frank Bailey,” explained the stranger, -graciously. - -Connie conveyed to her, with courteous brevity, the fact that Miss -Bailey had not yet arrived. “Is it something that I can do?” she added. - -The other shook her head, and showed an affable thread of white between -her freshened lips. “No, I will wait for her,” she answered, and threw -a keen glance about the place. “That’s her private room, isn’t it?” she -asked, nodding at the closed door to the right. “I will wait in there,” - she decided, in the same breath, and began moving toward it. - -Connie alertly headed her off. “If you will kindly take a seat here--” - she interposed, standing in front of her visitor. - -“It’s too noisy out here,” remarked the other; “those horrid machines -would give me a headache. That _is_ her private room, isn’t it?” - -“Unfortunately,” Connie began, lowering her voice, “the room belongs to -another office. Or rather, I should say, it is locked. Miss Bailey will -be here--with the key--very shortly now.” - -“Oh, it’s all right--I’m her sister,” explained the other, in no wise -resenting the ineffectual fabrications. She pushed forward past the -reluctant girl with a resolute step, and put her hand on the knob of the -tabooed door. “Make your mind quite easy, my dear,” she remarked over -her shoulder, sinking her voice in turn in deference to the situation; -“you’ve done all that could be expected of you--and I’ll tell her so.” - -Then, with a momentary gleam of good nature on her pretty face, which -the short transparent veil she wore to her chin seemed to accentuate -rather than mask, she opened the door, threw up her head with a swift, -puzzled glance at what she saw, and then tiptoed gracefully into the -room, closing the door with painstaking noiselessness behind her. - -Miss Frances Bailey entered her office not many minutes later, her -cheeks aglow with the morning air as the wheelwoman meets it. She nodded -cheerfully to Connie, and beyond her to the girls at the machines, as -her hand sought for a hat-pin at the back of her head. - -“Any word from the Lyceum?” she asked. “And what does that -Zambesi-travel manuscript make?” - -Connie ignored industrial topics. “There are people waiting in there to -see you,” she announced, in low, significant tones. - -The mistress was impressed by the suggestion of mystery. “People? What -people?” she asked, knitting her brows. - -“One of them says she’s your sister. And the other is a young -gentleman--he came first--and he brought--” - -“My sister?” interrupted Miss Bailey. “Cora! Something dreadful must -have happened--for she never got out so early as this before in her -life. Is she in mourning? Did she seem upset?” - -“_Not_ a bit of it!” said Connie, reassuringly. She added, following the -other toward the private office: “I tried my best to keep her out here.” - -“Why should you?” asked Frances, with wide-open eyes. - -“Oh, well--you’ll see,” replied the girl, evasively. “I told you there -was some one else in there.” - -Frances opened the door--and Connie noted that she too lifted her head -and stared a little, and then cautiously closed the door behind her. She -pondered this as she returned to her machine, and she curled her -thin lip when she took up the copies of the first act of an amateur’s -romantic play, to underscore the business directions with red ink, and -sew on brown paper covers. Intuition told her that a much better drama -was afoot, here under her very nose. - -Inside her office, Miss Bailey surrendered herself to frank astonishment -at what she beheld. - -Bestowed in obvious discomfort upon her sofa, behind an extraordinary -bank of potted plants and bright, costly greenhouse flowers, was a young -man fast asleep. Her eye took in as well her sister, who sat near the -head of the sofa, but she could wait. The interest centered in this -sleeping stranger, who made himself so much at home in the shelter -of his remarkable floral barricade. She moved round the better to -scrutinize his face, which was tilted up as if proudly held even in -slumber. Upon examination she recognized the countenance; and in a swift -moment of concentration tried to think what his presence might signify. -Then she turned to her sister, and lifted her calm brows in mute -inquiry. - -“Oh, my dear--what splendid business!” whispered Cora, her glance -beaming upward from the sofa to the standing figure. “And mind, Frank, -I’m in it! I’m in it up to my neck! I sent him to you, dear.” - -The girl looked down at them both, and deliberated before she spoke. -“If you brought him here,” she said, “I think you’d better take him -away again. I can let you out by this other door. Let us have no more -publicity than necessary.” - -“But you don’t in the least understand!” protested Cora, with her finger -raised in an appeal for quiet tones. - -“No, I don’t understand. I don’t want to understand,” replied Frances -coldly. “There’s one thing _you_ don’t understand either, Cora: This is -my typewriting office; it isn’t a greenroom at all.” - -“Then it well might be,” retorted the other, with a latent grin. -“Anything greener than its owner I never saw. Now listen--don’t be a -silly cuckoo! I met the youngster last night--and I worked him up till -he was mad to learn where you were to be found. I told him--and then -I went home, and I couldn’t sleep for thinkin’ of you, dear--and so I -turned out at some extraordinary hour this mornin’--it is mornin’ by -this time, isn’t it?--and I came here, just to tell you that he was -askin’ after you--and I come in here--and lo! here’s the bird on his -little nest!--and see the flowers he’s brought from Covent Garden for -you!--and so I sit here like Patience on a monument, afraid to wink an -eyelash, so’s not to wake him till you come. That’s what I’ve done for -_you_, dear--and presently, if you don’t mind, I’d like to hear what -you’ll do for me.” - -Frances put a knee upon the chair before her, and rested with her hands -upon its back. She sighed a little, and bit her lips. A troubled look -came into her gray eyes. - -“You might as well say all you have to say,” she said, slowly. “I don’t -in the least see what you’re up to--but then I never did.” - -“No, dear, you never did,” responded Cora, smiling as if in pleased -retrospect. “But that’s no reason why I shouldn’t be a good sister -to you. If it’s one’s nature to be a good sister, why, then one will -be--and there you are, don’t you see? I take no credit to myself for -it.” - -“Go on,” said the other. The two women spoke in hushed whispers, and -with each sentence stole glances of precaution toward the sleeper. - -“Well, Frank, I look to you not to forget what I’ve done. I spent two -or three very hard hours last night talkin’ him round, and singin’ your -praises to him--and I put Covent Garden into his head, too---and here -he is! And I kept Eddy and Gus off his back, too--they were frightfully -keen to get at him--but I said no, and I held ’em to heel. It was all -for you, dear. They might have queered the whole pitch, if I’d given -’em their heads. But now about myself. I’m tired, dead tired, of -bein’ poor. Of course we get a little something from Lord Julius. But -Eddy--you know what Eddy is! No sooner does he pick himself up from -Epsom than Ascot gives him a fair knockout, and if he lives through the -Sandown Eclipse there’s Goodwood waitin’ for him with a facer. I -can’t understand it; other men seem to win sometimes--you’d think the -unluckiest duffer would get a look-in once in a while--but no, he just -gets hammered one meeting after another. And I’m tired of it, Frank! If -I could only go back to work! But if I get an engagement, then Eddy will -go playin’ the goat--he’s jealous of everybody about the place from the -bandmaster down to the carpenter’s boy--and that makes me unpopular--and -there we are, don’t you see! I’m worn out with it. But if I could have -eight hundred a year, or even six hundred or five at a pinch--God knows, -my wants are simple enough!--and have it paid to me personally, do you -see--why, then, life would be worth livin’. Now, what do you say?” - -Frances looked moodily down at her distinguished sister, her lips -twisted in stormy amusement. “Why not say a thousand and be done with -it?” she demanded between set teeth, after an ominous pause. “One would -be as intelligent as the other. And oughtn’t I to set your Eddy up with -a racing stud while I’m about it? It’s true that I have about twenty -pounds a year for my own personal use, and Tom has a standing grievance -that I don’t give even _that_ to him--but don’t let that interfere with -your plans. Whatever you feel that you would like, just give it a name. -Couldn’t I lease one of the new Kaffir mansions in Park Lane for you? Or -would you prefer something in Grosvenor Square?” - -Cora gazed up with such intentness at her unnatural sister that a bright -little tear came to shine at the corner of each eye. She put up her veil -then, and breathed a cautious sigh. “I didn’t expect this of you, dear,” - she said, submissively. “Of course it’s the old story--La Cigale, and -‘go-to-the ant-thou-sluggard’ and all that. I don’t see myself why a -typewriting machine should make one so fearfully stony-hearted; you get -callouses on your fingers, I know, but you needn’t get ’em on your -sisterly affections, one would think. But however”--she wiped her -eyes, drew down her veil and allowed a truculent note to sound in her -voice--“however, if you won’t play, why then neither will I. I’ve been -at pains to put this youngster in your way, but it won’t be much -trouble to shunt him out again. You mustn’t think you can walk on me -indefinitely, Frank. I’m the best-natured woman in the world, but even I -draw the line somewhere.” - -“Draw it now then,” said the other, with stern promptitude. “Go away, -and take your friend with you and let me get to my work. I don’t know -what business either of you had coming here, at all.” As she spoke, she -moved to the outer private door, and turned the key in the lock. “You -can send for the flowers,” she added, “or I will have them taken over to -Charing Cross Hospital--whichever you like.” - -Cora rose, her veiled face luminous with a sudden inspiration. “You -can’t quarrel with me, dear, no matter how hard you try.” She spoke in -low, cooing tones--a triumph of sympathetic voice production. “You’re -hard as nails, but I know you’re straight. I will trust my interests -absolutely in your hands. I leave it to you to do the fair thing by me.” - -“The fair thing?” echoed Frances, in dubious perplexity. She puzzled -over the words and their elusive implication. “Your interests?” she -repeated--and saw Cora move round her to the unlocked door, and open -it--and still sought to comprehend what it was all about. Only when her -sister, smiling cordially once more, bent forward without warning and -pressed her veiled lips against her chin, and with a gentle “Goodbye, -dear!” stepped into the shadows without, did she recall the other -features of the situation. - -“Here!” she called, with nervous eagerness, yet keeping her voice down, -“you’re not to run off like this. Take your man with you.” - -“Softly, dear!” Cora enjoined her, from the dusk of the hallway. “Your -young women wouldn’t understand. No--I caught him for you, and I leave -him in your hands. I’m not in the least afraid to trust it all to you. -Bye-bye, dear.” - -Frances went out and glared down the staircase, with angry expostulation -on her tongue’s end. But there was nobody to talk to. She could hear -only the brisk rustle of Cora’s skirts on the stone steps, a floor -below--and even that died away beneath the clatter of the machines -inside. - -Returning over the threshold, she paused, and looked impatiently at -the flowers, and at the impassive, slumbering face beyond them. After a -little, the lines of vexation began to melt from her brow. In a musing -way, she put a hand behind her, and as if unconsciously closed and -locked the hall door again. Then she moved to the table, picked up some -of the loose blossoms and breathed in their fragrance, still keeping her -thoughtful gaze upon the young man. She found the face much older and -stronger than she remembered it--and in a spirit of fairness she said -to herself that it seemed no whit less innocent. But then perhaps all -sleeping faces looked innocent; she could recall that Cora’s certainly -did. Holding the carnations to her lips and nostrils, she examined in -meditative detail the countenance before her--delicately modeled, dark, -nervously high-spirited even in repose. Associations came back as she -gazed--the tender eagerness of the lad, the wistful charm with which his -fancy had invested England, the frank sweetness of the temperament he -had disclosed to her. He had been like a flower himself on that mellow -autumn day--as fresh and as goodly to the eye as these roses on -the table. But a winter had intervened since then--and what gross -disillusionments, what roughening and hardening and corroding -experiences had he not encountered! You could not tell anything by a -face in sleep; again she assured herself of that. - -Why, when one came to think of it, it was enough that Cora had brought -him--or sent him, it mattered not which. Whence had she dispatched -him?--from some theatrical dance or late supper. It was true that he was -not in evening dress--and the thought gave her pause for a moment. -But he had been at some place where those wretched cousins of his were -present--for Cora had spoken of keeping both Eddy and Gus “off his -back”--whatever that might mean. And it was Cora herself who had told -him to go to Covent Garden and buy these flowers! - -Frances, revolving these unpleasant reflections, discovered all at once -that the young man, without betraying by any other motion his awakening, -had opened his eyes and was looking placidly across the flowers into her -face. - -She caught a quick breath, and frowned slightly at him. - - - - -CHAPTER XIX - -I don’t think I like your being here,” Frances remarked to the young -man after a brief frowning inspection. She spoke slowly, and with a -deliberate gravity and evenness of tone. - -Christian’s wide-open eyes continued to gaze up at her with that -disconcerting look which had in it both remote abstraction and something -very intimately personal. His glance expressed a tender pleasure as it -maintained itself against hers. - -“Oh, but I like it so very much!” he murmured, with a pleading smile. - -Then, by a sudden movement, he sat up, flushing in a novel -embarrassment. “I beg you to pardon me,” he urged, faltering over his -words. “I was not wholly awake, I think; or I was trying to persuade -myself that it was still a dream. Do not think me so rude, I pray you!” - -She signified by a gesture and momentary facial relaxation that this -particular detail of the situation need not detain them. - -“But”--she began, in her stiffest and least amiable voice, and then -hesitated. She put her knee again upon the chair, and, resting her hand -on its back, looked dubiously at him. “I hardly know what to say,” she -started once more, and stopped altogether. - -“Oh, but it is I who must say everything,” he broke in, eagerly. “I am -quite awake now--I see, of course, it is all absurd, meaningless in your -eyes, till I explain it to you.” He rose to his feet and put forth his -hand as if to offer it in greeting. No responsive token being visible on -her set face, or in her rigid posture, as she confronted him, he waved -both hands in a deprecatory movement over the table laden with flowers -between them. “These are my peace-offering,” he said, with less -confidence. “I hoped they would say some things for me--some things -which I feel within me, and cannot easily put into speech. That is what -I expected they would surely do. But”--he finished with dejection, after -another glance into her face--“evidently they are as tongue-tied as I -am. I see it was not a happy thought in me to bring them--or to come -myself!” - -She had followed his words with rapt attentiveness--but at the end -seemed to remember only one of them. “The ‘thought,’” she said, coldly. -“Yes, that is what I do not understand. What was the thought?” - -He regarded her with some perplexity. “What was the thought--my -thought?” he repeated. “Oh--since it does not explain itself, what good -is there in talking about it? Let us say that there was no ‘thought’ at -all. I will make my compliments and apologies--and say good-morning--and -nothing at all will have happened.” - -“No,” she answered reflectively. “That would be stupid. You have been to -expense, and evidently to some inconvenience as well, to do this thing. -On second thoughts,” she went on, with an apparent effort to modify the -asperities of her tone and manner, “I dare say that I haven’t behaved -quite nicely to you. If you remember, I told you a long time ago that -bad manners was a failing of mine.” - -“I remember every little word that you spoke,” said Christian softly. - -Frances hardened her voice on the instant. “But that doesn’t help me to -understand why--what this is all about.” - -He responded slowly, searching for his words as he went along. The -rattle of machines in the next room for the first time came into the -conversation, and forced him to lift his voice. “You were my last friend -in France--my first friend in England,” he began. “I said I would not -forget you, and you have been always in my mind--always somewhere secure -and fresh and sweet in my mind. It was only last night that I learned -where I might find you. You will remember that when I begged you to tell -me, you laughed and would not. I must not make you believe that I did -not very soon find out your name or that I could not have learned your -whereabouts much earlier. All I say is that I did not forget--and that -last night, when the chance came naturally to me, I asked and learned -what I desired to know. And then--why, then--this knowledge spread -upward to be of more importance than all the other things I knew. I went -home--but never to think of sleeping, but only to change my clothes and -hasten out again, to get some new morning flowers for you, and to -come to you at the earliest moment. I did not know that London rose -so late--I arrived before the time, and, so it seems, waiting for your -coming, I fell asleep. That is the entire story. You see it is not very -complicated--it is by no means extraordinary.” - -Frances had listened with a dreamy gentleness in her gray eyes. She -started slightly when he stopped, and gave him a keen, cool glance. “The -entire story?” she queried. “I think you have forgotten to mention that -it was my sister who told you about me, and gave you my address.” - -Her prescience in no wise astonished Christian. Imagination had thrown -round the Minerva-like figure which personified her in his thoughts, -such a glamour of intellectual radiancy, that it seemed quite a natural -thing for her to divine the obscure, and comprehend the mysterious. He -smiled at her as he shrugged his shoulders. “It did not occur to me as -important,” he exclaimed. “It is true, however, that she told me. She -did not know the address when I asked her, but later she procured it -for me from her brother. It was at a supper at the Hanover Theater. -Afterward there was dancing on the stage. I fear it would have been -rather tiresome for me if I had not met your sister. She is a very -friendly lady, and she talked a great deal to me.” - -“About me?” demanded Frances, sharply. - -“Oh, no--about you only a few pleasant words; not more. It seems you do -not meet very often.” - -He spoke with such evident frankness that she hesitated over the further -inquiry her mind had framed. At last she put it in altered form. -“Then you would not say that she sent you here---that she told you to -come--and to come by way of Covent Garden, and buy these flowers?” The -question, as she uttered it, was full of significant suggestion about -the nature of the reply desired. Its tone, too, carried the welcome -hint of a softened mood, under the influence of which Christian’s face -brightened with joy. - -“Why, not at all!” he cried, lifting his voice gaily above the -typewriters’ clatter. “She did speak of Covent Garden, and the show of -flowers there in the early morning, but it was not in the least with -reference to you. It was my own idea long after she had gone. Oh, no one -would be more surprised than that good sister of yours to know that I am -here!” - -Frances, with a puzzling smile which ended in a long breath of relief, -took up some of the roses and held them to her face. - -“Sit down again,” she bade him, with a pleasant glow in the eyes -regarding him over the blossoms; “sit down, and let us talk. Or does -that noise bore you?” - -“Oh, I am too glad!” he assured her, beamingly. “If it were cannon -firing in the next room, it would be nothing to me.” Then, as he -continued to gaze with delight at her, an inspiration came to him. “Or -is it possible for you to come out? Would you walk a little while, -perhaps on the Embankment?” - -“I am not particularly busy this morning,” she made indirect answer. -Then a digression occurred to her. “But I am rather surprised,” she -observed, “to find that England hasn’t made more changes in your speech. -I would have expected a perfect Piccadilly accent, but you talk exactly -as you did on the train and the boat.” - -He laughed and clapped his hands for glee. “It is wholly because I am -with you again,” he declared. “Everybody has said for months that the -foreign traces had quite vanished from my tongue--but the first glimpse -of you--ah! they come instantly back! It is the association of ideas, -beyond doubt--that very sweet association,” he added, with trembling -softness, “of oh! such fond ideas.” - -She had taken up her hat. “We will go out for a little, if you like,” - she remarked rather abruptly. - -“And I am altogether forgiven?” he demanded in high spirits, as he rose. -“You consent to accept the flowers?” - -“Heaven only knows what I shall do with them,” she answered, with a -grimace of mock despair. “But it was ever so nice of you to get them, -and I thank you very much. Oh, I must tell Connie to sprinkle them -before I go.” - -She moved to the inner door, and as she opened it turned. “Wouldn’t you -like to come and see the factory at work?” she inquired, and he joined -her with alacrity. “It isn’t much to see at the moment,” she explained, -as they entered the large room. “We have nine machines, but only four -of them are needed just now. Until after the Jubilee, I’m afraid things -will be very dull with publishers and playwrights. However, one must -take the lean with the fat.” - -Christian looked somewhat nervously about him, while his friend stepped -aside to confer with the girl whom he remembered from the early morning. -Both this young lady and the three at their machines made a rapid, and -as it seemed to him, perfunctory survey of their mistress’s guest, -and bent their attention upon their duties again as if his presence -signified nothing whatever to them. He suspected that in reality they -were plunged in furious speculation concerning him; and this embarrassed -him so much that he turned and strolled back toward the open door and -even entered the office before Frances rejoined him. - -When she came back to him, she took from the table a couple of pale, -half-opened tea-rose buds, gave one to him to fix in his lapel and -pinned the other to the breast of her fawn-gray frock. “If you are -ready,” she said, smilingly, and led the way to the staircase. As she -descended before him, he noted the intelligent simplicity of this dress -she wore--how it fitted her as gracefully and as artistically as Poole -ever fitted Dicky Westland. About her hat, the carriage of her head and -shoulders, the free decision of her step, there was something individual -which appealed directly to him--a charm which would not be duplicated by -any other person in the world. He looked at his watch as he went down, -and found with surprise that it was nearly eleven. - -He stepped to her side at the street doorway, with a meaning gesture. -“Do you remember,” he said, gently--“on the boat you took my arm?” - -“I think London is a little different,” she answered, decisively enough, -yet with the effect to his ears of unreserved camaraderie. - -They walked slowly down to the end of the street. “Do you mind which way -we go?” she asked him, and turned eastward. “I haven’t seen the city in -an age,” she remarked, as if the choice needed explanation. Sauntering -along, they found little to say to each other at the outset. What words -they exchanged were about the mild, sunless sky of the London April, and -the wonderful pencilings and rubbings of soot upon the silver-gray of -London’s stone walls. Learning that he was a stranger to the Temple, she -led the way through the gate and lane, and then, by turnings which it -surprised him to find her knowing so well, to the curious little church. -The door in the sunken porch was ajar, and they went in. She pointed to -the circle of freestone Crusaders looking complacently up from the floor -at the Oriental dome which had caught their traveled fancy ages before, -and it occurred to her to say: “Is it not interesting to you to think -that there were Torrs who were friends and companions of these very -Magnavilles and Mareschalls, six hundred years ago?” - -He thrust out his lips a little. “I have not much interest in anything -concerning the Torrs,” he answered. - -She looked up at him with curiosity, but offered no comment. They left -the church, and she led him round to the spot where, amid the cracked -old flags from forgotten graves, Oliver Goldsmith’s tomb now finds -itself. A crumbling wreath of natural flowers showed that some kindly -soul had remembered the date of the poet’s death, three weeks before. - -Christian displayed scarcely more interest here. “I have not read his -‘Vicar of Wakefield,’” he confessed to her. “I had always the intention -to do so, but it--it never came off.” - -“That brings me to one thing I wanted to ask you,” she said, as they -retraced their steps. “What books have you been reading--since you came -to England? I am anxious to know?” - -“Not many,” he admitted with an attempted laugh which ended rather -shamefacedly. “Reading did not fit itself very readily into my time. At -Lord Chobham’s I read in some old books, and at Emanuel’s too, but -it was all about our own people--the Barons’ War, and the Wars of the -Roses, and the Civil War. I know something about these and about the -old families of the West, but not much else. I should have read more, I -know, but there was really not much opportunity. But you--I saw at your -office what serious books you read. It is what I should like to do, -too--sometimes. But there has been no one to talk with about any kind of -books.” - -They had come out again to the Embankment, and made their pace now even -more deliberate. “I have been thinking a great deal about you, and your -future, since we met,” she remarked, after a pause. “It has made me -wonder what you would do, when the opportunity came to you--and what it -would be open for you to do. That is why I began reading the books that -I take it you have in mind--but afterward I read them for their own -value. At the beginning”--she went on slowly, studying the sky-line in -an abstracted way as she walked--“at the beginning I thought I should -see you again sometime, and I had the idea that I wanted to be able to -advise--or no, not that, but to talk to you, and try to interest you in -the right sort of things. But it did not take me long to see how foolish -that was.” - -“No, no!” urged Christian; without, however, any convincing display of -enthusiasm. “There is no one in the world from whom I will so gladly -take advice as you.” - -She smiled fleetingly at him. “And there is no one in the world,” she -replied, “more firmly resolved not to offer you any.” - -“Ah, but if I beg it! You may not offer--but will you refuse to give?” - -“What is the good?” she broke forth in a louder tone, speaking as if in -annoyed reproof to herself. “No person can think or feel or decide for -another! It is nonsense to pretend otherwise. A man must think his own -thoughts, follow his own nature! We can ask nothing finer of a man than -to honestly be himself. I get so angry at all these ceaseless attempts -to run people all into one mold, to make everybody like everybody -else--and then, here I was, solemnly starting out to do the very trick -myself!” She laughed in ironical self-depreciation at the thought. - -Christian drew closer to her side. “I have very many things to say to -you,” he began gravely. “But I am in one way sorry that we went into the -churchyard, because it has made us melancholy, and I was going to tell -it all to you in the highest good spirits. We were both laughing like -merry children when we left your place--and now we are sad. I like -Emanuel’s idea--he will have no tombs to be seen upon his estate. Death -will come there as elsewhere, without doubt, but he will not be allowed -to remain hanging about, thrusting his ugly presence upon happy people -each time they walk in the street. At Emanuel’s there is cremation--and -that is the end of it. That is the portion of his System which pleases -me most. It is the best thing in it.” - -She looked into his face. “Then you are not wildly in love with his -whole System?” she asked. - -“Me? I grieve to say not. It is no doubt very admirable indeed--but--how -shall I say?--it does not appeal to me. You are displeased with me for -confessing it--but--” - -“Displeased?” she interrupted him, with a meaning laugh. “Nothing could -displease me less!” - -“Oh, you do not love the System?” he cried, with dancing eyes. - -“I hate it!” she answered, briefly. - -“Capital!” He halted, to shake her by the hand with gay effusion. “Let -us abuse it together! You shall say it all, however, because I only -dislike it, and cannot give any reasons why--but you will know them -every one. Oh, this is splendid! I had the right instinct when I came to -you! I have a great deal to tell you--but first you must tell me: what -do you say about my cousin’s System? I am burning to hear that.” - -It was impossible to evade the contagion of his sparkling face. She -laughed in turn. - -“Oh, it would be too long a story,” she half protested. “But to put -it briefly, this is my idea. Emanuel seems to me to be a magnificent -character, with one extraordinary limitation. I think it must be a -Jewish limitation--for I have seen it pointed out that they do not -invent things. That is Emanuel’s flaw; he has not an original thought -in his head. He merely carries to a mathematical point of expansion and -development the ready-made ideas which he finds accepted all about him. -What you see in him is a triumph of the Semitic passion for working a -problem out to its ultimate conclusion. When you consider it, what -has he done? Merely discovered, by tremendous labor and energy, the -smoothest possible working arrangement of the social system which his -class regards as best for itself, and hence for all mankind--the system -which exalts a chosen few, and keeps all the rest in subjection. My dear -sir, things do not rise higher than their source! How did the Torrs come -by their estates? By stealing the birthright of thousands of dumb human -beasts of burden, and riveting the family collar round their necks with -no more regard for their wishes or their rights than as if they had -been so many puppies or colts. And what was the origin of the Ascarel -fortune? The most frightful and bloodstained human slavery in the -poisonous jungles of the Dutch East Indies--that, and an ancient family -business of international usury, every dirty penny in which if you -followed it far enough, meant the flaying alive of a peasant, or the -starvation of his little children. These are the things which your -cousin inherits. He is fine enough to be ashamed of them, but he is not -broad enough to repudiate them. He makes himself believe that they -were wrong only in degree. He will admit that the Torrs were too brutal -toward their serfs, the Ascarels too selfish with their millions. That -is all. And he sets himself to proving that with the right kind of chief -at their head these systems of theirs can be made not only respectable, -but even profitable to the slaves as well as the master. He does not see -that the systems themselves are crimes! ” - -“Yes, I am glad that I came to you,” said Christian, in low, earnest -tones, in the pause which followed. The girl, breathing deeply under -the fervor of her mood, looked fixedly before her toward the copper-haze -above Paul’s dome. He watched the noble immobility of her profile and -thrilled at its suggestion of strength. - -“To do him justice,” she went on, musingly, “he does not pretend that it -is progress. He is honest, and he describes it as reaction--a long -step backward. It is just that kind of honesty and devotion, plus -wrong-headedness, which keeps us all at sixes and sevens. If we agree -that there is no better-intentioned man alive than Emanuel--still he -would do more harm than the most atrocious blackguard, if he had his way -with the world. But fortunately, he will not have it. A vastly greater -and loftier Jew has said that you cannot pour new wine into old -bottles.” - -They walked on for a little in silence. “Have you been to Emanuel’s -place then?” Christian asked at last. - -“No; I know it only from hearsay, and from his books. A woman novelist -for whom I do work has been there, and she has told me a good deal about -it. She is going to use it in a book, and would you believe it? she is -crazy with enthusiasm about the whole thing. I tried to point out to her -what she was doing, but you might as well talk to the east wind. The -way women run after the hand that smites them, and beslaver it with -kisses--that is the thing that enrages me most of all. Why, the very -corner-stone of Emanuel’s System is the perpetual enslavement of women. -I am always surprised, when I hear about his mediæval arrangements, that -he hasn’t set up a ducking-stool for his women-folk. I’m sure it’s a -pure oversight on his part. Well, what are you to expect when cultivated -women like Mrs. Sessyl-Trant turn up as frantic admirers of that sort of -thing? However, thank goodness, women are not forever to be sold out by -the fools of their own sex. It is impossible not to see that the tide -has turned at last. There _is_ a change--and I think something genuine -and lasting is going to come out of it. I really think it!” - -“Ah, that is what I feel,” put in Christian, with confused eagerness. -“I have no clear thoughts about it, but it is my deep feeling -that--that--what shall I say?--we are most at fault in the matter of the -women.” - -Frances pursued her thought, in frowning meditation. “It is the new -professional class, who earn their own living, who will help us out. -These women, who have come through the mill of self-responsibility, will -not accept the old nonsense invented for them, and imposed upon them by -the women parasites. The younger women who take care of themselves have -all begun to ask questions: ‘Why should I do this?’ ‘Why shouldn’t I -do that?’ ‘And whose business but my own is it if I do the other?’ -Unfortunately, they are too ready to accept the first answer that comes -to them. Oh, that is the woeful trouble! Men have slowly built up for -themselves a good deal of machinery by which they can find out what -is true. I don’t say they are not continually deceived, or that they -invariably recognize the truth when they see it, but still they have -certain facilities for protecting themselves against falsehoods. But -women have practically none at all. They are systematically lied to -from their cradle to their grave. They read so hard!--they are _the_ -consumers of novels, religious books, weekly newspapers, magazines, and -the rest of it--but never a word of actual truth is allowed to reach -them out of it all. Wherever they turn to inquire about themselves, -about their rights and their duties in this world that they have been -born into, they encounter this vast, unbroken conspiracy of liars. That -is the gravest of all the disadvantages they labor under. Why, take even -the ‘New Woman’ fiction of a few years ago. There was a great hullabaloo -raised over certain novels; at last, they cried, the truth was -being-revealed by women, for women, of women. But what nonsense! It -turned out not to be the truth at all, but only the old falsehood, -disguised in hysterics and some shocking bad manners. There seems no -escape for women anywhere. They are lied to by their parents, their -parsons, their doctors, their authors--and of course they lie to -one another. They have a whole debased currency of insincerities and -flattering falsehoods which they pass among themselves, keeping straight -faces all the while as if it were honest money.--But as I said, I think -a change is coming. However, don’t let’s talk any more about it. I get -too angry!” - -“I like you to be angry--only not with me,” commented Christian with -a sprightly smile. Then he added, more gravely, “Oh, I can see how the -women who work will make a change. It was very curious to me to see -those girls at the machines in your office. It was one of them who let -me in, before you came. She was quite different from any of the English -women I have been meeting. One saw that she had thoughts of her own--an -atmosphere of her own. I should not like to tell lies to her; I think -she would detect them more rapidly than I could get them out.” - -“Oh, Connie,” laughed Frances. “Yes, she has a head on her shoulders. -They are all fairly bright girls, and they get on together extremely -well. It’s quite their own idea to divide up the work equally among the -lot, and when there is not much doing to take turns in working alternate -days. I think it was rather fine of them.” - -“Ah, that is the class of women one would like to help,” he declared. -“That is what I will devote myself to.” - -“But it is the class which prefers to help itself,” she explained -quietly. “I see no way in which you could ‘help’ them, as you call it. -They don’t want any help. Men in their position might take tips, but -these girls won’t.” As he received the rebuff in silence, she changed -the subject. “I am meeting now some other young women who would interest -you. They are doing newspaper work--and doing it on its merits, too, -and not by the favoritism of editors and proprietors--and one or two -evenings a week we all get together at my office and talk things over. -Sometimes there are as many as twenty of us, including my girls. In a -year or two, perhaps it will run to a club-room of our own. I don’t know -that I told you--I am getting into newspaper work myself. If I saw how -to combine it with my office business, I could have a place on a regular -daily staff. I’m puzzling a good deal to find some way of making the two -things go together.” - -“Oh, I envy you!” broke in Christian, impulsively. “You have work to do! -You are interested in your work! You find in it not only occupation, but -the opportunities of being useful to others, and of making your life, -and other people’s lives, worth living. But think of me! I have nothing -in the wide world to do, except wait for a very strong old man to die. -And when he dies, then still I have nothing to do worth doing. Don’t -you see that it is the most miserable of existences? I am filled with -disgust for it. I cannot bear it another day. And that is what I was -going to tell you. I have decided to leave it all--and go away.” - -Frances paused for a moment to scrutinize, with slightly narrowed -eyes, the excited face he turned to her. “How will going away improve -matters?” she asked him, upon reflection. - -He put out his lips, and shrugged his shoulders. “At least I shall be a -free man,” he affirmed. - -Unconsciously she imitated his gesture in turn: “It does not follow that -a deserter is necessarily a free man.” - -He pushed and winced visibly under the words, and turned away biting his -lips. Then, the vexation clearing from his face, he wheeled again, and -regarded her with calm gravity. - -“There is no one else who could say that to me and not injure me,” he -answered, simply. “But that is the characteristic of you--when you say -such a thing to me, then it becomes a thing that should have been said. -Yet perhaps it is not the final word, after all. Ask yourself what it -is that I am deserting! Consider whether I should give up or gain -something. Here in England it is possible for me to be one of two -things--the conventional person of position like all the others, or the -exceptional kind of being which Emanuel desires to make of me. I have -been at school for half a year learning what it is that society in -general expects a man in my situation to do. Now that I have learned -it, frankly it makes me sick at heart. But then I have been at another -school for a month, observing and studying what it is that Emanuel -wishes me to undertake. We have agreed that that is not to be thought -of, either. Then what am I to do?” - -“But how does running away solve the difficulty?” She put the question -to him with gentle persistency. - -“Ah, but, you see,” he rejoined, argumentatively, “it is not alone a -moral difficulty. There are practical questions, too. When I announce to -Emanuel that I reject his plans for my future, then I am left to myself -to be that most ridiculous of objects--a man with a great station and -no money to keep it up. That is what I must be here in England. But in -other countries, that will not be the case. There will always be enough -money for me to live like a prince upon--so long as I travel about, in -my own yacht if I like, or reside simply and happily in the beautiful -places of the earth, here and there, as the fancy possesses me. Thus I -can put to use the prestige of my title, when it is of advantage to do -so--but only in so far as it is needful at the moment--and at the -same time it does not become a burden to me in any degree. Now think -carefully of this--is it not the wisest course for me?” She seemed -not to pause for thought at all. “Oh, that depends upon how you define -wisdom,” she replied, promptly. “There is the wisdom of the serpent, -but fortunately there are many other kinds. No, I must say, you haven’t -convinced me in the least. However, you mustn’t think that is of -importance. You are under no obligation to convince me, surely!” - -“Ah, but that is everything to me,” he insisted. “There are -reasons--which I wish to explain to you.” - -He could not keep a new meaning out of the glance with which he enforced -this assurance. They had strolled round to Ludgate Circus, and come to a -halt on the corner, with their backs turned upon a window full of droll -phrenological charts and symbols. He consulted his watch once more. “I -breakfasted so lightly, and so early,” he said--“it is not luncheon time -quite, but that will give us a table to ourselves. You will come across -with me, will you not? There are truly important things which have not -been said--which I much wish to say.” - -After a moment’s reflection she nodded her assent. - - - - -CHAPTER XX - -Christian and Frances ate their luncheon in an upper chamber, close to -a kind of balcony window, which gave upon one of the city’s most crowded -thoroughfares. An unceasing and uniform uproar--overridden from time to -time by the superior tumult of a passing railway train on a bridge -near by--rose from this indefatigable street. They had the room to -themselves; the portentous din magnified the effect of the solitude -in which they regarded each other, crumbling the bread on the table -absent-mindedly, and waiting for the inspiration of speech. - -“When I get back,” the girl said at last with a smile, “the racket of -my typewriters will seem like the murmur of a gentle breeze down a leafy -country lane.” - -They laughed--but they had discovered it was not so hard to make oneself -heard as they had supposed. Their voices intuitively found a level which -served their personal needs, yet did not incommode the waiters yawning -at the head of the stairway outside. - -“Have you taken to the bicycle?” she was moved in sheer irrelevance to -ask him. When he shook his head, she went on: “It is a wonderful thing -for women. It has done more for them in three years, than all the -progressive intellectual movements of civilization did in three hundred. -We all use them, coming to and from the office. We have to store them -down in the area, now--but I am going to find a better place.” - -Christian rolled his bread crumbs into balls and stared at them in a -brown study, from which this topic was powerless to arouse him. - -“I wish,” he said, finally--“I wish very much that I knew how to -convince you. But I seem never to produce any impression upon you. You -are unyielding to the touch. It is I who get molded and kneaded about -whenever I come close to you. And I don’t say that it is not for the -best. Only--only now, you will not accept my own ideas of what I should -do, and you will not tell me what your ideas are.” - -“I am not sure that I have any ideas,” she assured him. “It is merely -that, on general principles, I don’t care for the people who settle -difficulties by turning tail and running away from them.” - -“Very well,” he began, as if an important premise had been accepted. -“But as to my special case, I have stated what must be my -position if I remain in England. To me it seems that it must be -impossible--intolerable. But you have some different view, evidently. -That is what I beg you to explain to me. If I am to remain in England, -what is it your idea that I should do?” She knitted her brows a little, -and took time to her reply. “You seem to think so entirely of yourself,” - she said, slowly, “it is very hard to know what to say to you. I cannot -put myself, you see, so completely in your place, as you are always -able to do.” He opened his eyes wide, and informed their gaze with -a surprised reproach. “There you are surely unjust to me,” he urged, -pleadingly. “I do not know anyone who thinks more about other people -than I do. One hesitates to say these things about oneself--but truly -you are mistaken in this matter. In fact, I wonder sometimes if it is -not a fault, a weakness in my nature, that I am so readily moved by the -sufferings and wrongs of unhappy people. Whenever I see injustice, I am -beside myself with a passion to set it right. I grow almost sick with -indignation, and pity, when these things come before me. Last night, for -example, at the Empire----” - -Christian stopped abruptly, with the sudden consciousness that the -ground was not clear before him. He saw that he was entirely without a -clue as to what his companion’s views on the subject might be. That was -her peculiarity: he knew concerning her thoughts and inclinations only -what she chose to reveal to him. It was beyond his power to predict -what her attitude would be on any new topic. Looking at her thoughtful, -serene-eyed face, it decidedly seemed to him that the Empire, as an -ethical problem, might with advantage be passed by. He hesitated for -a moment, in the friendly shelter of the street noise, and then gave -another termination to his speech: “It puzzles me that you should have -that view of my temperament.” - -“Ah, that is just it--you have put the word into my mouth. It is -‘temperament’ that you are thinking of--and about that you are -perfectly right. Your temperament is as open to the impulses of the -moment--kindly, generous, compassionate and all that--as a flower is -to the bees. But character is another matter. What good do your fine -momentary sentiments, these rapid noble emotions of yours, do you or -anybody else? You experience them--and forget them. The only thing -that abides permanently with you is consideration for your own personal -affairs.” - -“This is all very unjust,” he said, disconsolately. “I come to you for -solace and friendship, and you turn upon me with beak and claws.” He -sighed, with the beginning of tears in his bright eyes, as he added: -“There is more reason than ever, it seems to me, why I should go away -from England! It is not kind to me!” - -His doleful tone and mien drove her to swift repentance. “Oh, I have -only been saying the disagreeable things first, to get them out of the -way,” she sought to reassure him. “There isn’t another unpleasant word -for you to hear, not one, I promise you.” - -“It is my opinion that there have been enough,” he ventured to comment, -with a rueful little smile. A measure of composure returned to him. “But -if they must be said, I would rather they come from you than from any -one else, for I think that you have also some pleasant thoughts about -me.” - -She nodded her head several times in assent, regarding him with an -amused twinkle in her eyes meanwhile. “Yes--the right kind of editor -could make very interesting stuff indeed out of you,” she said, and -smiled almost gaily at his visible failure to comprehend her figure. -“What I mean is--you are too much sail, and too little boat. You -drift before every new wind that blows. There is lacking that kind -of balance--proportion--which gives stability. But, dear me, it is a -thousand times better to be like that, than to have an excess of the -other thing. The man of the solid qualities, without the imagination, -simply sticks in the mud where he was born. But with you--if the right -person chances to get hold of you, and brings the right influences -steadily to bear upon you, then there is no telling what fine things you -may not rise to.” - -“You are that right person!” - -He lifted his voice to utter these words, with the air of feeling them -to be momentous. His eyes glowed as they reaffirmed the declaration to -her inquiring glance. But she seemed to miss the gravity of both words -and look. - -“Oh, there you’re wrong,” she said, half jestingly. “I’m too bad -tempered and quarrelsome to exert any proper influence over any one. -Why, I should nag all the joy and high spirits out of you in no time -at all. No--you need an equable and happy person, really very wise -and strong and sensible, but above all with an easy, smooth -disposition--such a person, for example, as Emanuel’s wife is described -to be.” - -“No--I need no one but you!” he repeated with accentuated deliberation. - -This time she appeared to feel something of his intention. She looked -into the gaze he was bending upon her and then withdrew her eyes -precipitately, and made a show of active interest in her food. - -“I am asking you to think of joining your life to mine,” he went on, in -low, yet very distinct tones. “You cannot know a hundredth part as well -as I do, how profoundly I need such help as you can give. You are the -one woman in the world who means strength as well as happiness to me. -If you could only dream with what yearning I long always to lean upon -you--to be supported by your fine, calm, sweet wisdom! To be upheld by -you--to be nourished and guided by you--oh, that is the vision which -I tremble with joy to think of! I am my own master for the first time -to-day--I have taken my life into my own hands--and I lay it at your -feet--dear lady--at your feet.” - -She rose abruptly while his last words were in the air, and turning, -moved to the window. She had contrived by a gesture to bid him not to -follow, and he could only gaze in mingled apprehension and hope at her -back, the while she stood professing to scrutinize the shifting throng -below. - -The waiter brought in another dish, methodically rearranged the plates -and went away again. To Christian’s bitter disgust, two men entered and -took seats at a table at the other end of the small room--and still she -did not turn. He meditated calling her, or joining her on the pretense -of announcing the cutlets--and only stared in nervous excitement -instead. - -Then, as suddenly as she had left him she returned, and resumed her -chair as if nothing unusual had happened. His strenuous gaze swept her -face for tokens of her mood--of her inclination or decision--but beyond -a spot of vivid red on each smooth cheek, there was no sign of any sort. -Her frank, calm gray eyes met his with unruffled directness; they had in -them that suggestion of benignant tolerance which he had discerned there -more than once before. - -“You do not answer me!” he pleaded, after a few mouthfuls. As his back -shielded the action from the strangers, he put forth a cautious hand to -touch the nearest of hers, but she drew it gently away beyond his reach. -They automatically adjusted their voices to the conditions created by -the newcomers. - -“There could be only one possible answer,” she told him, softly, almost -tenderly. “It is a very flattering dream--? to me--but it is a mere -empty dream, none the less. I hope you will not want to talk about it -any more.” - -“But I swear that it is not empty at all!” he urged, in earnest tones. -“Who has a right to say that it is a dream? I am my own master--so are -you. We are of age--we are intelligent people. I deliberately come to -you, and say to you that you are the one woman on earth whom I desire -with all my heart for my wife. I open my mind to you. There is only the -image of you inside it. You know my sincerity. You must feel how supreme -is the place you have in my thoughts. It is the logical end toward which -I have been walking ever since I first saw you! You are all that there -is of true friendship, of true womanhood, for me! I put out my hands to -you, I pray to you! And why will you not come to me, dear, dear Frank?” - There was a touch of pathos in the smile she gave him. “It isn’t the -least bit of good, I assure you,” she made answer, in the confidential -murmur that was necessary. “One can’t talk here--but please let us speak -of something else. Or can we not go now?” He went on as if she had not -spoken, his big, dark eyes challenging hers to an encounter which she -evaded. “Do not think we need go away from England, if you want to stay; -there will always be money enough--with your wisdom in controlling it. -Perhaps we may even be able to restore Caermere. But if we are not, -still it can be one of the noblest and most beautiful residences in -England, when we learn together to understand its charm, and make it our -home. Oh, when you see the magnificent hills and forests shutting it -in on all sides--and the grim, fine old walls and towers of the castle -itself! But there we need live only when we choose to do so--and -whenever the mood comes to us, off we can roam to the Alps or Algiers, -or the wonderful India which one always dreams of. And we shall sail in -our own yacht and you shall be the queen there, as everywhere else. And -all our lives we will spend in doing good to others: do you not see what -extraordinary opportunities for helping those who need help you will -have? Where now you are of service to one person, then you can assist a -hundred! An army of grateful people will give thanks because of you--and -I will always be the chief of them--your foremost slave, your most -reverent worshiper! And then--think of the joy of a life in which no one -has a share who is not pleasant and welcome to us! We will have no one -near us who is not our friend. Oh, I have not told you: that is why, -this very morning, I decided to leave it all, and to make a new life for -myself, and to spend it wholly with my real friends. It is loneliness, -heart and soul loneliness, that has driven me to revolt. And in my -despair I come to you--and I say to you that it is friendship that I -cannot live without, and you are my oldest friend, my dearest, truest, -most precious friend, and I beg you to come with me and we will go -through the world together, hand in hand----” - -She interrupted him by pushing back her chair and half rising. “If -you will excuse me now,” she said, nervously, “I think I must go. You -mustn’t trouble to come--I will say good-bye here.” - -He had risen as well, and now in trembling earnestness protested against -her proposal. At the risk of attracting the attention of the strangers, -he displayed such resentful opposition that she yielded. The waiter was -summoned--and remained bowing in dazed meditation upon the magnitude of -the change he had been bidden to keep for himself, after they had passed -out and down the staircase. - -She led the way at a hurried pace back across the Circus and to -Blackfriars. At the rounded beginning of the Embankment she paused, and -for the first time spoke. “Really I would rather go back by myself,” - she told him. “It is only unhappiness to both of us--what you insist on -talking about.” - -“But I do not think it is to be treated in this way,” he declared with -dignity. “If we speak of nothing else it is the highest and most solemn -honor that a man can pay to any woman, that I have paid to you. I have -the feeling that it should be more courteously dealt with.” - -“Yes, I know,” she admitted, nodding her ready compunction. She -tightened her lips and looked away from him toward the bridge, her brows -drawn together in troubled lines. “I don’t say the right thing to -you--I know that better even than you do. You must not think I fail to -appreciate it all--the honor, and the immense confidence, and all the -rest of it. But when I have said that much--then I don’t know in the -least how to say the rest. Why can’t we leave it unsaid altogether? I -assure you, in all seriousness, that it can’t be--and mayn’t we leave it -like that? Please!” - -He regarded her with a patient yet proud sadness, waiting to speak till -she had turned, and his glance caught hers. “I do not wish to become a -nuisance to you,” he said, his voice choking a little, “but I think it -would be better if you said everything to me. Then I shall not put my -mind on the rack, to try and imagine your reasons.” He let his lip curl -with a lingering ironical perception of the fantastic with which his -tragedy was veined. “It is very sweet,” he went on--“your consideration -for my feelings. But I have heard so many plain truths to-day, I think -my sensibilities are in good training now--they will not suffer for a -few more.” Suddenly, as if the sound of his voice had unnerved him, he -seized her arm, and confronted her surprised gaze with a reddened and -scowling face. “What are you afraid of?” he demanded hoarsely. “Why not -say it? I heard it only last night! It is forty years old, it is true, -but they have wonderful memories in England. You are the one whom I have -held to be my dearest friend--but go on! Say it to me! A little thing -like friendship does not prevent you from thinking it! Why, then, you -should have the courage to speak it out!” - -Dimly, while she stared in his distracted countenance, the meaning, of -the wild talk dawned upon her. With a startled exclamation, she -dragged her arm from his clutch, and drew back a step. Trembling in her -agitation, her gray eyes distended themselves out of all likeness to -their tranquil habit. - -“Oh-h-h!” she murmured in dismay at him, and wrung her hands. “Oh-h! -Stop! Stop! That is too horrible for you to think!” - -Gaining coherence of thought and purpose, she moved impulsively to him, -and in turn clasped her hand upon his arm. “Put that out of your mind!” - she adjured him. “I could not look anybody in the face if you thought -_that_ of me. Oh, it is too terrible of you! How could you suppose that -I could harbor such a thought? To blame you for something years before -you were born!--to throw it into your face. And _me_ of all people! Why, -I have cried to myself at remembering what you said about your father -when we first met--how your little-boy memory clung affectionately to -the soldier-figure of him in the door-way! Look at me--I cry now to -think of it! Why, it is the one thing about you that is sacred to -me!--the one thing that you are perfect in--and then you imagine that -I am capable of insulting you about it! Oh, heavens, why wouldn’t you -leave me when I told you to?” - -She threw his arm from her in a gust of physical impatience, but the -glance with which, on the instant, she corrected this demonstration, -was full of honest compassion. He groveled before this benign gaze, with -bowed head and outstretched, pleading hands. - -“Forgive me! Forgive me!” he groaned, brokenly. “I could not--at -all--know what it was I said. I am too unhappy!” - -“Well,” she began, with a vehement effort at calmness, “let us say -good-bye here. There are some Germans watching us from the hotel -windows. Or it is better perhaps--will you walk on past the school?” As -they moved forward, she recovered more of her self-possession. “I hope -you will be able to remember something pleasant out of our morning,” she -said, and with a joyless laugh added, “but for the life of me, I don’t -know what it can be. Or yes, you can remember when you woke up, and I -stood and scolded you, from above the flowers. I pretended to bully -you, but really all the while I was thinking how sweet of you the entire -thing was. And later, too--oh, there were several intervals in which I -behaved civilly to you for whole minutes at a time.” - -He looked wistfully at her. Beneath the forced playfulness of her tone -it seemed to him that something hopeful sounded. “Ah, dear friend,” he -murmured, drawing close to her--“think!--think tenderly in my behalf! -Ask yourself--your kindest self--if I must be really driven away. Why is -it that I may not stay? I plead with you as if it were for my life--and -is it not indeed for my life?--my very life?” - -“No--Christian,” she said, gravely, “it is not your life, nor anything -like your life. You give big labels to your emotions, but in good time -you will see that the things themselves are not so big, or so vital. And -you mustn’t yield so readily to all these impulses to mope and despair -and to think yourself ill used. You must try to make for yourself a -thicker skin--and to view things more calmly. And I don’t want you to go -away thinking hard things of me. Is it true that I always nag you--there -is something in you which calls out all the bully in me--but I wish you -would think of me as your friend. It gives me great pleasure when you -speak of me as your oldest friend in England--for I have always liked -you, and I am interested in you, and--” - -“And why will you not marry me?” He interposed the question bluntly, and -with a directness which gave it the effect of an obstacle in her path, -isolated but impassable. - -She halted, and studied the pavement in consideration of her reply. When -she looked up, it was with the veiled elation of a disputant who has his -counter-stroke well in hand. “You said to-day that you had become your -own master, and that you were a free man, with your life in your own -hands. Very well. I also am my own master, and I am a free woman. My -life is exclusively my own personal property, to live as I choose to -live it. I value my liberty quite as highly as if I were a man. It does -not suit me to merge any part of it in something else. There could be -many other reasons given, no doubt, but they would be merely individual -variations of this one chief reason--that I am a free woman, and intend -to remain a free woman. I know what I want to do in the world, and I am -going to try to do it, always my own way, always my own master.” - -He regarded her thoughtfully, bowing his head in token of comprehension. -“But if----” he began, and then checked himself, with a gesture of -pained submission. - -“There are no ‘ifs,’” she said, with resolute calmness, and held out -her hand to him. Her control of the situation was undisputed. “We say -good-bye, now--and we are friends--good friends. I--I thank you--for -everything!” - -He stood looking at her as she walked away--a sedately graceful figure, -erect and light of step, receding from him under the pallid green -shelter of the young trees. Musingly, he held up the hand which still -preserved the sense of that farewell contact with hers--and upon a -sudden impulse put it to his lips and kissed it. Something in the action -wrought an instantaneous change in his thoughts. All at once it was -apparent to him that many things which should have been said to her he -had left unsaid. In truth, it seemed upon reflection that he had said -and done everything wrong. The notion of running after her flamed up in -him for a moment. She was still in sight--he could distinguish her -in the distance, stopping to buy a paper from a boy near the Temple -station. But then the memory of her unanswerable, irrevocable “No” swept -back upon him--and with a long sigh he turned and strode in the other -direction. - -***** - -Frances, hastening mechanically toward her office, found relief from the -oppressive confusion of her thoughts in the fortuitous spectacle of -two small newsboys fighting in the gutter just at the end of the Temple -Gardens. For the first time in her life, the sight aroused nothing -within her save a pleased if unscientific interest. She paused, and -almost smilingly observed the contest. She found something amusingly -grotesque in the pseudo-Titanic rage on these baby faces. The dramatic -fury of the embattled infants was in such ridiculous disproportion to -the feather-weight blows they exchanged! She found herself chuckling -aloud at some incongruous comparison which rose in her mind. - -Then, as the combatants parted, apparently for no better reason than the -general volatility of youth, she remembered that she had it in mind to -look at the “Star.” One of her friends, Mary Leach, had sent to that -paper some days before an article on “Shopgirls’ Dormitories,” and she -was interested in watching for its appearance. It happened that one of -the boys had a “Star.” Acting upon some obscure whim, she gave them each -a penny, quite in the manner of a distributor of prizes for conspicuous -merit--and grinned to herself at the thought when she had turned her -back on them and moved on. - -There was no sign of what she sought on the front page. Opening the -sheet, her eye fell, as it were, upon a news paragraph in a middle -column: - -***** - -“Death of the Oldest Duke.--The Shrewsbury correspondent of the -‘Exchange Telegraph’ announces the death at Caermere Castle, at an early -hour this morning, of the Duke of Glastonbury. His Grace, who was in his -ninetieth year, had until last summer enjoyed the most vigorous health, -and only now succumbs to the prostration then occasioned by the group -of domestic bereavements which at the time created such a sensation. The -deceased nobleman, who for the great part of his prolonged life, was -one of the best known sportsmen in Shropshire, succeeded his father as -eighth duke in his minority, and had been in possession of the title for -no less than seventeen years when Her Majesty ascended the throne, thus -constituting a record which is believed to be without parallel in the -annals of the peerage. His successor is stated by Whitaker’s Almanac to -be his grandson, Mr. Christian Tower, but the current editions of Burke, -Debrett and others do not mention this gentleman, whose claims, it would -appear, have but recently been admitted by the family.” - -***** - -Frances read it all, as she stood at the corner, with a curious sense -of mental sluggishness. Her attention failing to follow one of the -sentences, she went back, and laboriously traced its entire tortuous -course, only to find that it meant no more than it had at first. - -It seemed a long time before she connected the intelligence on the -printed page with the realities of actual life. Then she turned swiftly, -and strained her eyes in the wild hope of discovering Christian still on -the Embankment. She even took a few hurried steps, as if to follow and -overtake him--but stopped short, confronted by the utter futility of -such an enterprise. - -Then, walking slowly, her mind a maze of wondering thoughts, she went -her way. - - - - -CHAPTER XXI - -Christian strolled aimlessly about for a long time in the closely -packed congeries of streets, little and big, behind St. Paul’s. It -happened to be all new ground to him, and something novel was welcome to -his troubled and restless mind. He loitered from one window to another, -examining their contents gravely; at the old book stalls he took down -numbers of volumes and looked laboriously through them, as if conducting -an urgent search for something. - -His jumbled thoughts were a burden to him. He could get nothing coherent -from them, It was not even clear to his perception whether he was really -as dejected and disconsolate as he ought to be. - -He had only recently been plunged into despairing depths of sadness, and -it was fitting that he should still be racked with anguish. Yet there -was no actual pain--there was not even a dogged insensibility to the -frivolous distractions of the moment. He became exceedingly interested -in an old copy of Boutell, for example, and hunted eagerly through the -multitude of heraldic cuts to see if the white bull on a green ground -of the Torrs was among them. His disappointment at not finding it was so -keen that for the instant it superseded his abiding grief. His discovery -of this fact entertained him; he was almost capable of laughing in -amusement at it. Then, in self-condemnation, he sought to call up before -his mental vision the picture of Frances, as she had looked when they -had said good-bye. The image would not come distinctly. Her face eluded -him; he could only see her walking away, instead, under the feeble green -of the young trees. None the less, he said deliberately to himself that -he was unhappy beyond the doom of most men, and that the hope had gone -out of his life. - -The day had turned out unexpectedly warm. In the middle of his shapeless -musings, the ornate sign of a Munich brewery on a cool, shaded doorway -suddenly attracted him. The dusky, restful emptiness of the place inside -seemed ideally to fit his mood. He went in, and seated himself with a -long sigh of satisfaction at one of the tables. Here, in this mellow -quiet, over the refreshing contents of the big, covered stone mug, he -could think peacefully and to advantage. He lit a cigar, and leaning -back in comfort, gave the signal to his thoughts to arrange and -concentrate themselves. - -What should he do next? Yes--that was far more to the point than mooning -over the irrevocable past. He had left Duke Street with hardly any plan -beyond not returning thither. Luggage of some sort he would have to -have--changes of linen and the like, and the necessary articles of the -toilet. It was his intention to buy these as the need of them arose--and -the character of his purchases would also depend a good deal, of course, -upon the decision he should come to concerning his movements. He had -said that he would leave England--and now he asked himself whether there -was anything to prevent his departure that very evening. One of the -deepest charms of travel must be to start off on the instant, upon the -bidding of the immediate whim, and descend upon your destination before -there has been time to cheapen it by thinking about it. Why should he -not eat the morrow’s breakfast in the Hague--and dine at Amsterdam? -Similarly, he could within twenty-four hours be watching the marriage of -Mosel and Rhine at Coblenz--or gazing upon the wide, wet, white sands of -the Norman shore from the towering battlements of St. Michel. A hundred -storied towns, vaguely pictured in his imagination, beckoned to him -from across the Channel. Upon reflection, it seemed to him that Holland -offered the most wooing invitation. He asked the waiter for Bradshaw, -and noted the salient points of the itinerary from Queen borough. - -It was now three o’clock. There was plenty of time for all purchases, -and a leisurely dinner before going to Victoria. It occurred to him that -the dinner must be very good--a luxurious kind of farewell repast. - -He would make a memorandum now of the things he ought to buy here in -London. Holland was by all accounts a dear place--and moreover he had -heard that the Dutch customs examination was by no means troublesome. -It would be more intelligent to complete practically his outfit here. -He took out a pencil, and began feeling in his coat-pocket for a bit of -paper. The hand brought out, beside Lady Milly’s note about the Private -View, three or four unopened letters. He had entirely forgotten their -existence--and stared at them now in puzzled indecision. It was not a -sensible thing, or a fair thing either, to tear up and destroy unread -the message which some one else had been at pains to transcribe for -you. But on the other hand, these missives belonged to the stupid and -intolerable life in Duke Street, with which he had definitely parted -company. It might even be said, in one sense, that he was not the person -to whom they were addressed. - -By some whimsical freak of the brain, he suddenly asked himself whether -he should not go to Greece instead of Holland, and enlist as a volunteer -in the war against the Turks. He became on the instant immersed in -adventurous military speculations. He had not fallen into the English -habit of following the daily papers with regularity, and he was -conscious of no responsibility whatever toward the events of the world -at large, as Reuter and the correspondents chronicled them. Something -of this new war in Thessaly, however, he had perforce read and heard. Of -the circumstances and politics surrounding this latest eruption of -the Eastern Question he knew little more than would any of the young -Frenchmen of education among whom he had spent his youth. But in an -obscure way, he comprehended that good people in Western Europe always -sympathized with the Christian as against the Moslem. It seemed that -some generous-minded young Englishmen were already translating this -sympathy into action; somewhere he had seen an account of a party of -volunteers leaving London for Athens, and being cheered by their friends -at the station. Now that he thought of it, the paper in which he had -read the report had ridiculed the affair as an undesirable kind of a -joke--but the impulse of the volunteers seemed fine to him, none the -less. - -There ought to be some martial blood in his veins; the soldier-figure of -his father rose before him in affirmation of the idea. - -But no--what nonsense it was! If ever there had been a youth bred and -narrowed to the walks of peace, he was that young person. He who -had never struck another human being in his life, that he could -remember--what would such a tame sheep be doing in the open field, -against the unknown, ferocious Osmanli Turk? The gross absurdity of the -picture flared upon him, momentarily--and then the whole notion of armed -adventure had vanished from his mind. - -His attention reverted to the letters--and now it seemed quite a -matter of course that he should open them. The first three were of no -importance. The fourth he regarded with wide-open eyes, after he had -grasped the identity of the writer. He read it over slowly, more than -once: - -“27A Ashley Gardens, S. W., Monday. - -“My Dear Mr. Christian Tower: I have taken this little place in town for -the time being, and I shall be glad to see you when you are this way. -To-morrow, Tuesday, is a day when I shall not be at home to other -people--if you have nothing better to do. - -“Yours very sincerely, - -“Edith Cressage.” - -Nothing better to do? Christian’s thoughts lingered rather blankly upon -the phrase--until all at once he perceived that there could not possibly -be anything better to do. He rose with decision, hurriedly gulped what -remained of his second pot of beer, paid his bill and marched out with -the air of a man with a mission. - -In the hansom, he read the letter still again, and leaned backward to -see as much as possible of himself in the little mirror at the side. -His chin could not be described as closely shaven, and his garments were -certainly not those of the afternoon caller. The resource of stopping -at Duke Street occurred to him--but no! that would be too foolish. The -whole significance of the day would be abolished, wiped out, by such a -fatuous step. And he repeated to himself that it _was_ a day of supreme -significance. By comparison with the proceedings and experiences of this -long and crowded day, the rest of his life seemed colorless indeed. And -what was of most importance in it, he declared to himself, was not its -external happenings, but the fine and novel posture of his liberated -mind toward them. He was for the first time actually a free man. His -enfranchisement had not been thrown at him by outsiders; it proceeded -from within him--the product of his own individuality. - -That was what people would discern in him hereafter--a complete and -self-sufficient personality. He would no longer be pointed out and -classified as somebody’s grandson--somebody’s cousin or grand-nephew. -The world would recognize him as being himself. He felt assured, -for example, upon reflection that Lady Cressage would not dream of -questioning the fashion of the clothes in which he came to see her. She -would perceive at once that he had developed beyond the silly pupilary -stage of subordination to his coat and hat. She was so clever and -sympathetic a woman, he felt intuitively, that these symbols of his -emancipated condition would delight her. It was true, he saw again from -the mirror that his collar might be a little whiter; his cuffs, too, had -lost their earlier glow of starched freshness. But these were trifles to -serious minds. And besides, was it not all in the family? - -There was a momentary block at the corner of Parliament Street, and here -a newsboy thrust a fourth edition upon Christian with such an effect -of authority that he found a penny and took the paper. It was the -“Westminster Gazette,” and when he had looked upon the second page for -a possible drawing by Gould, and had skimmed the column of desultory -gossip on the last page, which always seemed to his alien conceptions of -journalism to be the kind of matter he liked in a newspaper, he laid the -sheet on his knee, and resumed his idle reverie. To his great surprise -the cabman’s shouts through the roof were necessary to awaken him at -Ashley Gardens. He shook himself, laughingly explained that he had been -up all night as he paid his fare, and ascended the steps of 27A, paper -in hand. - -The servant seemed prepared for his coming, for upon giving his name in -response to her somewhat meaning inquiry, she led him in at once. He -sat waiting for a few moments in a small and conveniently appointed -drawing-room, and then stood up, at the rustle of rapid skirts which -announced Lady Cressage in the half-open doorway. - -She entered with outstretched hand, and a radiant welcome upon her face. - -Christian noted that beyond the hand there was a forearm, shapely and -cream-hued, disclosed by the lace of her flowing sleeve. There were -billows of this lace, and of some fragile, light fabric which seemed -sister to it, enveloping the lady, yet her tall, graceful figure was in -some indefinable way molded to the eye beneath them all. The pale hair -was as he had first seen it, loosely drawn across her temples; there -were warm shadows in it which he had not thought to see. The face, too, -had some unexpected phase, here in the subdued light of the curtained -room. There was a sense of rosiness in the rounded flesh, a certain -reposeful elation in the regard of the blue eyes, which put quite at -fault the image of harrowed restlessness and nerves he had retained from -Caermere. It was in an illuminating second that he saw all this, -and perceived that she was very beautiful, and flushed with the deep -consciousness that she read his thoughts like big print. - -“It was the greatest cheek in the world--my summoning you like this,” - she said, as they shook hands. “Yes--sit here. Put your hat and paper -on the sofa. This is my only reception room--but we might have a little -more light.” - -She moved to the window, to pull back the curtains, and then about the -room, lightly rearranging some of the chairs and trinkets--all with a -buoyant daintiness of motion which inexpressibly charmed him. “These -are not my things, you know,” she explained over her shoulder. “I am -not trying in the least to live up to them, either. I take the place, -furnished, for three months, from the widow of an Indian officer. You -would think she would have some Indian things--but it might have all -come direct from Tottenham Court Road. It’s impossible to get the -slightest sensation of being at home, here. One could really extract -more domesticity out of four bare cottage walls. Or no, what am I -saying?”--she had returned, and sinking into the low chair opposite him, -pointed her words with a frank smile into his face---“it _is_ a bit like -home--to see you here!” - -“I am very glad to be here,” he assured her, nodding his unfeigned -pleasure. “But it seemed as if you would never tell me I might come.” - -“Oh, I was worried to death. There were all sorts of things to see about -when I first came up,” she explained with animation. “And I had the -feeling that I didn’t want you to come till I had smoothed some of my -wrinkles out, and had achieved a certain control over my nerves. It was -not fair to myself--the view you had of me at Caermere.” - -The view of her that was afforded him here brought a glow of admiration -to his eyes. - -“To think of your being my cousin!” he said, with some remote echo in -his own voice of the surprise which he recalled in Dicky Westland’s -tone. It seemed wonderful indeed as he looked at her, and smiled. He -shook his head presently, in response to her question whether he had -any recent news from Caermere, and continued to observe her with a rapt -sense of the miraculous being embodied before his eyes. - -“But the duke is very low indeed,” she told him in a hushed voice. “I -had it yesterday from--from one of the household.” - -The tidings barely affected him. That side of his mind was still fast in -the rut of last night’s mutiny. - -“I have quite decided to go away,” he announced, calmly. “I get no good -out of the life here. It does not suit me. Whatever comes to me, why, -that I shall accept, but to use it in my own way, living my own life. -Now that I am a free man, it astonishes me that I did not rebel long -ago.” - -“Rebel--against what?” she asked him, with a kind of confidential candor -which put him even more at his ease. - -“Oh, against everything,” he smiled back at her. “This existence -that they arranged for me--it is like being embalmed and wrapped in -mummy-cloths. Personally I do not survive a thousand years--but I am but -one link in a long chain of respectable people who have lived like that, -without living at all, for many thousands. It is being buried alive. -Why, you will see what I mean--a man is a creature different from other -human creatures. He has an individual nature of his own. His tastes, his -inclinations, his impulses and ideas, are not quite like those of the -people about him. He would be happy to follow these according to his own -wishes. But then everybody seizes upon him and says: ‘No, you must -be and do just like the rest. You will be noticed and disliked if you -indulge in even the slightest variation. These are the coats you are to -wear, and the hats and caps and neckties. This is Duke Street, which -you must live in. This is the hour to get up, this is the hour to make -calls, this is the corner of your card to turn down, this is the list of -people at whose houses you must dine, these are your friends ready-made -for you out of a book.’ And truly what is it all?--utter, utter -emptiness. You are really not alive at all! You have no more personal -sensation of your own existence than an insect. It is all this that I -rebel against.” - -She reclined a little in her chair, and covered him with a meditative -gaze. “I know the feeling,” she commented thoughtfully. “I used to -have sharp spasms of it--oh, ages ago--whenever a shopwoman showed me -something, and said, ‘This is very much worn just now,’ or, ‘We are -selling a great deal of this.’ Then I would not have that particular -thing if I died for it. But do you really feel so earnestly about it?” - She put the question in deference to a gesture by which he had signified -the inadequacy of her comparison. “Ah, the real life, as you call it, is -a more complicated thing than one fancies.” - -“But that is precisely the point,” with vivacity. “I have thought much -about that. Is it not the artificial life which is complicated instead? -Do we not confound the two? If you consider it, what can be more simple -that the natural life of a man? If an astronomer, for example, has a -difficult problem to work out, he first busies himself in discovering -and putting aside all the things which seem to be factors in it but -really are not. One by one he gets rid of them, until at last he has the -naked equation before him--and then a result is possible. But with us, -it seems that we go quite the other way about it. We take the problem of -life--which is extraordinarily simple to begin with--and we pile upon it -and around it thousands of outside rules and conventions and traditions, -and we confuse it with other thousands of prejudices, and insincerities, -and old mistakes that no one has had the industry to examine--and then -we look with embarrassment at what we have done, and shake our heads, -and say that the problem is too hard, that it passes the wisdom of man -to solve it.” - -“I wish you joy of solving it,” she remarked, after another reflective -survey of his face. “I am sure I wish some one would do it. But you -spoke of going away. How would that help matters?” - -The recurrence of the question startled him. He looked at her with -lifted head, recalling swiftly meanwhile the tone in which Frances -had uttered those same words. A blurred, imperfect retrospect of the -morning’s events and talks passed fleetingly across his mind--and its -progress disquieted him. Some tokens of perturbation on his face seemed -to warn her, for she went on without waiting for an answer. - -“I am not surprised to find you feeling like this,” she said. “It is -quite the effect that I imagined London would produce upon you. I have -no right to say so, perhaps, but it seemed to me from the start that it -was being badly managed--I mean the way you were sent here by yourself, -and given nothing to do except follow about where Lord Lingfield led. -It is not what I should have done--but the truth is that Emanuel knows -nothing at all about the characters and temperaments of human beings. -If men agree with him, he thinks they are good men, and if they disagree -with him, they are bad men--or at least not worth thinking about at -all.” - -“I had quite resolved not to commit myself to his System,” Christian -informed her, “even before I made up my mind to--to take other steps.” - -His closing euphemism seemed to attract her attention. “What is it you -intend to do?” she asked of him, softly. She sat upright again, with an -air of friendly curiosity. - -In the face of this query, he discovered that his intentions were by no -means so clear to himself as they had been. “It is still rather in the -air,” he said vaguely. “But we talk always of myself! Tell me, instead, -about yourself! It is an infinitely more pleasing subject. You are here -in London for only three months? And you are alone here?” - -She smiled in an indefinite fashion, and leaned back in her chair. -“Ought I to have a chaperon? I dare say. But there is no room for her -here. The flat accommodates just one solitary elderly lady and here you -behold her. Oh, I am a hundred years old, I assure you!” - -He could only wave his hand at her in genial deprecation. “Oh, who is -younger than you?” he murmured. - -She sighed. “By the almanac I am four-and-twenty,” she went on, with a -new note of gentle melancholy. “But by my own feelings, I seem to have -been left over from the reign of William the Fourth. And really, it is -not my own feelings alone--when I go out, I observe that very old -men take me down to dinner, and talk to me precisely as if I were a -contemporary of theirs.” - -“When we were together at Caermere,” interposed Christian, “you -confessed to me that you were not happy--and it was my great delight to -pledge myself that if ever there was anything I could do--” - -“Oh, there is nothing at all,” she interrupted him to declare. “My -case will not come up. It has all been settled. The accounts, or -settlements--or whatever you call them--have been made up, and my share -of my husband’s share of his father’s interest in _his_ father’s estate -has been ascertained. I have six hundred a year for life. It is a mild -and decorous competence. I do not complain. It will keep a genteel roof -over my head here in London, or a small house and a pony-trap in the -country. It will run to a month at a pension in the cheaper parts of -Switzerland, or perhaps even to a lodging and a bath-chair at Brighton, -when it is not quite the season. Oh, I shall get on very well indeed--at -all events,” she added with a touch of bitterness, “much better than I -deserve to do.” - -Christian lifted his brows in protesting inquiry. “You always speak in -that tone of yourself! It pains me to hear you. I cannot think of any -one who deserves the kindness and friendly good offices of fortune more -than you.” - -Lady Cressage gave an uncertain little laugh. “You are too -generous-minded--too innocent. You do not know. Me? My dear friend--I -have committed the unpardonable sin! I humiliated and degraded myself -to win a great prize in the world’s lottery--and I did not bring it off. -That is my offense. If I had won the trick--why, they would be burning -incense before me! But I lost instead--and they leave me quite by myself -to digest my own disgust. I don’t talk about it--I have never said as -much to any living soul as I am saying to you--I don’t know why I am -telling you--” - -“Is there any one else who would listen with such sympathy?” Christian -heard himself interjecting. - -“But it is too cruel,” continued Lady Cressage, “too shameful a story! I -was not happy at home. It was nobody’s fault in particular; I don’t know -that we were more evil-tempered and selfish among ourselves than most -other middle-class households with four hundred a year, and three -daughters to marry off. I was the youngest, and I had the sort of good -looks which were in fashion at the moment, and mamma worked very hard -for me--pretending to idolize me before people though we yapped at -each other like fox-terriers in private--and I was lucky in making -friends--and so I went swimming out on the top of the wave that season, -the most envied poor fool of a girl in London. And when Cressage wanted -to marry me--I was dizzy with the immensity of what seemed to be offered -me. My parents were mad with pride and ecstasy. Everybody around me -pretended a kind of holy joy at my triumph. I give you my word!--never -so much as a whisper came to my ears of any shadow of a reason why I -should hesitate--why I should think a second time! Do you see? There -was not an honest person--a single woman or a man with decency enough to -warn an ignorant girl of her danger--within reach of me anywhere. They -all kept as silent as the grave--with that lying grin of congratulation -on their mean faces--and they led me to be married to the beast!” - -She had sat erect in her chair as she spoke, and now she rose to her -feet, motioning him not to get up as she did so. She took a restless -step or two, her shoulders trembling with excitement, and her hands -clenched. “Ah-h! I will never forgive them the longest day of my life!” - she called out. - -Then, with a determined shake of her head, she seemed to master herself. -Standing before a small mirror in the panel of a cabinet against the -wall, she busied her beautiful hands in correcting the slight disorder -of her hair. When she turned to him, it was with a faint, tremulous -smile surmounting the signs of stress and agitation upon her face. She -sank into the chair again, with a long-drawn breath of resignation. - -“But it isn’t nice to abuse the dead,” she remarked, striving after an -effect of judicial fairness in her voice. “I didn’t mean to speak like -that. And for that matter, why should I speak at all of him? One -doesn’t blame a wolf for man-eating. You execrate instead the people -who deliberately throw a helpless human being to the wolf. I even say to -myself that I have no quarrel with Cressage. He was as God made him--if -the thought isn’t blasphemous. He was a great, overgrown, bullying, -blubbering, ignorant boy, who never got beyond the morals of the stables -and kennels, and the standards of taste of the servants’ hall. One could -hardly call him vicious; that is to say, he did not deliberately set -out to cause suffering. He did not do anything on deliberation. He acted -just as his rudimentary set of barbaric impulses prompted him to act. -Some of these impulses would have been regarded as virtues in a more -intelligent man. For example, he was wildly, insanely jealous of me. It -took the most impossible and vulgar forms, it is true, but still----” - -“Oh, need we talk of him?” It was with almost a groan of supplication -that Christian stopped her. “He is too unpleasant to think about. -Nothing that I had heard of him before made me sorry that he was -dead--but this--it is too painful. But now you are a free woman--you see -your path well before you, to travel as you choose. And what will you -do?” - -She sighed and threw up her hands with a gesture of contemptuous -indifference. “What does any English lady with six hundred a year do? -Devote her energies to seeing that she gets--let me see, what is the -sum?--to seeing that she gets twelve thousand shillings’ worth of -respectable discomfort, and secures reasonable opportunities for making -those about her uncomfortable also. Oh, I don’t in the least know what -I shall do. The truth is,” she added, with a sad smile, “I have lived -alone with my dislikes so long, and I have nourished and watered them -so carefully, that now they fill my whole garden. They have quite choked -out the flowers of existence--these thick, rank, powerful weeds. And I -haven’t the energy--perhaps I haven’t even the desire--to pull them up. -They seem appropriate, somehow--they belong to the desolation that has -been made of my life.” - -Christian bent forward, and made a movement as if to take one of the -hands which lay dejectedly in her lap. He did not do this, but touched a -projecting bit of lace upon one of the flounces of her gown, and twisted -it absent-mindedly in his fingers instead. - -“You are still unhappy!” he said reproachfully, his eyes glowing with -the intensity of his tender compassion. “I do not forgive myself for -my inability to be of help to you. It is incredible that there is not -something I can do.” - -“But you are going away,” she reminded him, in a soft monotone. “You -have your own unpleasantnesses to think of--and you are occupied with -plans for rearranging your life on new lines. I only hope that you will -find the happiness you are setting out in search of. But then men can -always get what they want, if they are only sufficiently in earnest -about it.” - -“It is not entirely settled that I shall go away,” said Christian. -He twisted the lace in the reverse direction, and hesitated over his -further words. “That was only one of several alternatives. I am clear -only about my resolve to make a stand--to break away. But if I remained -here in England--in London?”--He looked with mingled trepidation and -inquiry into her face. “If I did not go abroad--is there anything I -could do?” - -She regarded with attentiveness the hand which was playing havoc with -her flounce--and it straightway desisted. She continued to study the -little screwed-up cone of lace, in meditative silence. At last she shook -her head. “You must not give it another thought,” she said, but with no -touch of dictation in her musing tone. Her eyes dwelt upon him with a -remote and ruminating gaze. “I belong to a past generation. My chances -in the lottery are all exhausted--things of the past. You must not -bother about me. And I think you ought to give up those ideas of yours -about breaking away, as you call it. London hasn’t been made pleasant -for you, simply because the wrong people have gone the wrong way about -it to arrange matters for you. But there are extremely nice people among -the set you know, if you once understood them. With your position, you -can command any kind of associations you wish to have. After it is all -said and done, I think England has its full share of cultivated and -refined people of intelligence. I have not seen much of the Continent, -but I do not believe that it possesses any superiority over us in that -respect.” - -“But in your own case,” urged Christian, somewhat hazily; “you said that -there were no honest people about you to warn you--though you were in -the best society. That is my feeling--that you do not get the truth from -them. They do not lie to you--but they are silent about the truth.” - -“Is it different elsewhere?” she asked, gravely. “Is not the young -girl sold everywhere? Do you think that marriage is a more sacred and -ethereal thing among the great families of France or Austria or Germany -than it is with us? I have heard differently.” - -“Oh, we are all equally uncivilized about women,” he admitted. “I feel -very strongly about that. But you, who have such knowledge and such -clear opinions--would you not love to do something to alter this -injustice to women? The thought has been much in my mind, of late.” He -paused to reflect in fleeting wonderment upon the fact that only this -morning he had been absorbed in it. “And my meaning is,” he stumbled -on, “there is nothing I would rather devote my life to than the task of -making existence easier and broader and more free for young women. Could -there be any finer work than that? I know that it appeals to you.” - -She looked at him with an element of doubt in her glance. “Nothing -appeals very much to me--and I’m afraid my sex least of all. I do not -like them, to tell the truth. I never get over the surprised disgust of -waking up in the morning and finding that I am one of them. But this is -rather wandering from the point, isn’t it? I was urging you to give -over the notion of making a demonstration. You have waited thus long; be -content to wait just a little longer. My private belief is that the Duke -will not live the week out.” - -Still, the assurance seemed to suggest nothing to him. “But if he dies,” - he protested, “how then will I be different? I am lonely--I am like a -forlorn man escaped on a raft from a shipwreck--I eat my heart out in -friendless solitude. And if I have a great title--why, then I shall be -more alone than ever. It is that way with such men--I have seen that -they hold themselves aloof--and others do not come freely near them. -It frightens me--the thought of living without friends. I say to you -solemnly that I would give it all--the position, the authority and -dignity, the estates, Caermere, everything--for the assurance of one -warm, human heart answering in every beat to mine! Has friendship -perished out of the world, then? Or has it never existed, except in the -books?” - -Her beauty had never been so manifest to him, as now while he gazed at -her, and she did not speak. There seemed the faint, delicate hint of -a tenderness in the classical lines of the face that he had not seen -before. It was as if his appeal had brought forth some latent aptitude -of romance, to mellow the direct glance of her eyes, and soften in some -subtle way the whole charm of her presence. A new magic was visible in -her loveliness--and the sense that his words had conjured it into -being thrilled him with a wistful pride. No woman had thus moved -him heretofore. The perception that she was plastic to his mental -touch--that this flower-like marvel of comeliness and grace, of -exquisite tastes and pure dignity of soul, could be swayed by his -suggestion, would vibrate at the tone of his voice--awed him as if he -were confronted by a miracle. His breath came and went under a dull -consciousness of pain--which was yet more like pleasure. A bell sounded -somewhere within the house, and its brief crystal resonance seemed -somehow to clarify the ferment of his thoughts. All at once, as by the -flooding of sunlight into a darkened labyrinth, his mind was clear to -him. He knew what he wanted--nay, what all the years had been leading -him up to desire. - -With his gaze maintained upon her face--timidly yet with rapturous -intentness, as if fearful of breaking the spell--he rose to his feet, -and stood over her. A confusion of unspoken words trembled on his lips, -as her slow glance lifted itself to his. - -“It was like the pleasantry of a beautiful, roguish little girl”--he -began, smiling nervously down at her--“your saying that you belonged -to a generation earlier than mine. Do you think I do not know my -generation? And am I blind, that I do not see what is most precious in -it? This is what----” - -An extraordinary outburst of disputing voices, in the little hallway -close at hand, broke in upon his words. He stopped, stared inquiringly -at Lady Cressage, and beheld her rise, frowning and hard-eyed, and step -toward the door. A vague sense of the familiar came to him from the -louder of the accents outside. - -The door was opened, and the domestic, red-faced, and spluttering with -wrath, began some stammered explanation to her mistress. What she sought -to say did not appear, for on the instant the door was pushed farther -back, and a veiled lady took up her energetic stand upon the threshold. - -“Don’t blame her,” this lady cried, in high, rapid tones. “I forced my -way in--something told me that you were at home. And when you hear my -news----” - -“Oh, since you are here”--Lady Cressage began, coldly. “But, really, -Mrs. Torr----” - -“Oh, no--call me Cora!” the other interrupted, vivaciously. - -She went further, and bustling her arms against Edith’s shoulders, -purported to kiss her on both cheeks. Then, drawing back her head, she -went on: “My dear, the duke died at two this morning! It’s in all the -papers. But what isn’t in any of the papers is that the heir is missing. -It’s a very curious story. Mr. Westland here”--by her gesture it seemed -that Dicky was behind her in the hallway--“went to Duke Street this -noon, and found Christian’s man in great alarm. The youngster had -bolted, leaving a note saying merely that he was called away. Mr. -Westland’ then hunted me up, and we started out, for I had a kind -of clue, don’t you see. I knew where he was at ten o’clock this -forenoon--and we drove to Arundel Street, and there we found----” - -Christian hurriedly stepped forward. “Oh, I think you may take it that -I am not lost,” he called out, revealing himself to the astonished Cora. -For the moment the chief thing in his mind was satisfaction at having -interrupted her disclosures about Arundel Street. - -Then, as other thoughts crowded in upon him, he straightened his -shoulders and lifted his chin. “It’s all right,” he said, with a -reassuring wave of the hand toward the womenfolk of his family. - - - - -PART IV - - - - -CHAPTER XXII - -On the morning of the funeral, six days later, Christian rose very -early, and took coffee in his library shortly after seven. Then, -lighting a cigarette, he resumed work upon several drawers full of -papers, open on the big table, where it had been left off the previous -evening. The details of the task seemed already familiar to him. He -scanned one document after another with an informed eye, and put it -in its proper pile without hesitation. He made notes suggested by the -contents of each, on the pad before him, with a quill pen and corrected -the vagaries of this unaccustomed implement, in the matter of blots and -inadequate lines, with painstaking patience. There were steel nibs in -abundance, and two gold stylographic pens, but he clung resolutely to -the embarrassing feather. - -After a time he rested from his labors, and rang the bell beside his -desk; almost upon the instant Falkner appeared in the doorway. - -“If Mr. Westland is up,” said Christian, “you may ask him to join me -here.” - -“Yes, Your Grace,” the smooth-voiced, soft-mannered man replied, and -vanished. - -The young duke rose, yawned slightly and moved to the window nearest -him. It opened, upon examination, and he stepped out on a narrow balcony -of stone which skirted the front of the square tower he had quitted. The -outlook seemed to be to the northeast, for a patch of sunshine lay upon -the outer edge of the balcony at the right. Breathing in delightedly the -fresh Maymorning air, he gazed upon the bold prospect of hills receding -in lifted terraces high against the remote sky-line. He had not seen -just this view from Caermere before--and he said to himself that it was -finer than all the others. Above each lateral stretch of purplish-gray -granite, to the farthest distance, there ran a band of cool green -foliage--the inexpressibly tender green of young birch trees; their -thin, chalk-white stems were revealed in delicate tracery against -indefinable sylvan shadows. - -Through the early stillness, he could hear the faint murmur of the -Devon, gurgling in the depths of the ravine between him and the nearest -hill. “To-morrow,” he thought, “will begin the true life! All this will -be my home--mine! mine! and before anybody is up in the morning I will -be down where that river of black water runs, and fish in the deep pools -for trout.” - -Some one touched his elbow. He turned with a quick nod and smile to -greet Dicky Westland. “I am up ages before you, you see,” he said -genially. “It was barely daylight when I woke--and I suffered tortures -trying to remain in bed even till six. Oh, this is wonderful out here!” - -“Awfully jolly place, all round,” commented Dicky. He blinked to -exorcise the spirit of sleep and gazed at the prospect with determined -enthusiasm. “I haven’t looked about much, but I’ve found out one thing -already. There’s a ghost in my room--and I think he must have been a -professional pedestrian in life.” - -“Splendid!” cried Christian, gaily. “Have you had coffee--or it is tea -you people drink, isn’t it? Then shall we get to work? I want the papers -out of the way before Emanuel comes. They will all be here between nine -and ten. I wanted to send carriages to Craven Arms, but it seemed there -were not horses enough, so hired traps are to be brought up from the -station.” - -“Do you know who are coming?” - -“Lord Julius, and Emanuel and his wife; the captain and his wife and -brother; Lord Chobham, and Lord Lingfield--I don’t know if any of their -women will come--and Lady Cressage. Then there are some solicitors, -and perhaps some old acquaintances of my grandfather’s. At all events, -Welldon has ordered four carriages and a break. There is to be breakfast -at ten, and I shall be glad when it is all over--when everything is -over. Do you know?--I have never been to a funeral in my life--and I -rather funk it.” - -“Oh, they’re not so bad as you always think they’re going to be,” said -the secretary, consolingly. “The main thing is the gloves. I never could -understand it--but black gloves are invariably about two sizes smaller -than ordinary colors. You want to look out for that. But I dare say your -man is up to the trick--he looks a knowing party, does Falkner.” - -“I fancy I shall give him back to Emanuel,” remarked Christian, -thoughtfully. - -“He is an excellent servant, but he reminds me too much of Duke Street. -Did you notice the old butler yesterday afternoon?--he stood at the head -of the steps to meet us--that is old Barlow. I have a great affection -for him. I shall have him valet me, I think.” - -“Isn’t he rather venerable for the job?” suggested the other. “And -wouldn’t it be rather a come-down for a head butler? They’re awfully -keen about their distinctions among themselves, you know.” - -Christian smiled with placidity. “I think that the man whom I pick out -to be nearest me will feel that he has the best place in the household. -I shall be very much surprised indeed if that isn’t Barlow’s view. And -of course he will have his subordinates. But now let us take Welldon’s -statement for the last half of ’95, and the two halves of ’96. -Then we can get to the mine. Unless I am greatly mistaken, that is most -important. I find that the mining company’s lease falls in early next -year. And won’t you ring the bell and have Welldon sent up when he -comes?” - -***** - -Upon mature reflection Christian decided not to descend to meet his -guests at breakfast. When he had dismissed the estate agent, Welldon, -after a prolonged and very comprehensive interview, he announced this -decision to Westland. “You must go down and receive them in my place,” - he said. - -“I will say that you have a cold,” suggested Dicky. - -“By no means,” returned Christian, promptly. - -“It is not necessary to enter into details. You receive them--that is -all. I have spoken with Barlow; he knows what to do with them in the -matter of rooms and so on. I am breakfasting here. And afterward--say at -eleven o’clock--I will see some of them here. There is an hour to spare -then, before we go to the church. I am not clear about this--which ones -to see first. There is that stupid reading of the will after we get -back----” - -“By George! do they do that still?” interrupted Dicky. “I know they did -in Trollope and George Eliot--but I thought it had gone out.” - -“It is kept up in old families,” replied Christian, simply. “In this -case it is a pure formality, of course. There is no mystery whatever. -The will was made in 1859, after the entail was broken, and merely -bequeaths everything in general terms to the heir-at-law. My grandfather -covenanted, at the same time, to Lord Julius to make no subsequent will -save by his advice and consent--so that there can be no complications -of any kind. I am thinking whether it would be better to see Lord Julius -and Emanuel before the reading of this will or after. Really it makes no -difference--perhaps it is better to get it over with. Yes--say to them -that I beg they will come to me here at eleven. You might bring them up -and then leave us together--or no, they know the way. Let them come up -by themselves.” - -Through the open window there came the grinding sound of wheels upon -the gravel of the drive, around at the east front. At a gesture from the -other, Dicky hurried away. - -Left to himself, Christian wandered again to the casement, and regarded -the spacious view with renewed interest. Falkner entered presently, -bearing a large tray, and spread some covered dishes upon a cloth on the -library table. - -“How many carriages have come?” the master asked from his place at the -window. - -“Four, Your Grace--and a break with some wreaths and Lord Chobham’s man -and a maid--I think it is Lady Cressage’s maid.” - -“Who has come--outside the family?” - -“Three gentlemen, Your Grace--one of them is Mr. Soman. Barlow thinks -they are all solicitors.” - -Christian mused briefly upon the presence of Lord Julius’s man of -business. Since that first evening of his on English soil, at Brighton, -he had not seen this Mr. Soman. He remembered nothing of him, indeed, -save his green eyes. And now that he thought of it, even this was not a -personal recollection. It was the remark of the girl on the boat, about -his having green eyes, which stuck in his memory. He smiled, as he -looked idly out on the hills. - -The girl on the boat! Was it not strange that his mind should have -applied to her this distant and chilling designation? Only a few days -ago--it would not be a week till to-morrow--she had seemed to him the -most important person in the world. A vision of his future had possessed -him, in which she alone had a definite share. How remote it seemed--and -how curious! - -He recalled, quite impersonally, what he had heard in one way or another -about her family. Her father was some sort of underling in the general -post office--a clerk or accountant, or something of the kind. There was -a son--of course, that would be the brother Cora had spoken of--and -the ambition of the family had expended itself in sending this boy to -a public school, and to the university. The family had made great -sacrifices to do this--and apparently these had been wasted. He had the -distinct impression of having been told that the son was a worthless -fellow. How often that occurred in England--that everything was done -for the son, and nothing at all for the daughters! Then in fairness he -reflected that it was even worse in France. Yes, but somehow Frenchwomen -had a talent for doing for themselves. They were cleverer than their -brothers--more helpful, resourceful--in spite of the fact that the -brothers had monopolized the advantages. Images of capable, managing -Frenchwomen he had known rose before his mind’s eye; he saw them again -accomplishing wonders of work, diligent, wise, sensible, understanding -everything that was said or done. Yet, oddly enough, these very paragons -of feminine capacity had a fatal unfeminine defect; they did not know -how to bring up their sons. Upon that side they were incredibly weak and -silly; it was impossible to prevent their making pampered fools of their -boys. - -Suddenly his vagrant fancies were concentrated upon the question of how -Frances Bailey would bring up a boy--a son of her own. It was an absurd -query to have raised itself in his mind--and he put it away from him -with promptitude. There remained, however, a kind of mental protest -lodged on her behalf among his thoughts. He perceived that in his -ruminations he had done her an injustice. She was not inferior in -capability or courage to any of the self-sufficient Frenchwomen he had -been thinking of, and in the matter of intellectual attainments was -she not immeasurably superior to them all? The translucent calm of her -mind--penetrating, far-reaching, equable as the starlight--how queer -that it should be coupled with such a bad temper! She always quarreled -with him, and bullied him, when they were together. Even when she was -exhibiting to him the sunniest aspects of her mood, there was always a -latent defiance of him underneath, ready to spring forth at a word. He -remembered how, at the close of their first meeting, she had refused to -tell him her name. He saw now that this obstinacy of hers had annoyed -him more than he had imagined. For an instant it assumed almost the -character of a grievance--but then his attention fastened itself at -random upon the remarkable fact that he had seen her only twice in his -life. Upon reflection, this did seem very strange indeed. But it was the -fact--and in the process of readjusting his impressions of the past six -months to fit with it, the figure of her receded in his mind, grew less -as she moved away under a canopy of dull yellowish-green, which vaguely -identified itself with the trees on the Embankment. She dwindled thus -till he thought of her again, with a dim impulse of insistence upon the -phrase, as the girl on the boat. The transition to thoughts of other -things gave his mind no sort of trouble. - -He pondered some of these other things--formlessly and -light-heartedly--while he stood at the library table, and picked morsels -here and there from the dishes laid for him. His absence of appetite he -referred tacitly to the warmth of the day, as it was sunnily developing -itself outside. Here on this shaded side of the castle, it was cool -enough, but there was the languor of spring in the air. He scrutinized -this new library of his afresh. Until Barlow had opened it for him, -shortly after his arrival yesterday, it could not have been used for -years. Most of its appointments had a very ancient look; no doubt they -must date back at least to the seventh Duke’s time. It was incredible -that his grandfather, the eighth Duke, should have been inspired to -furnish a library. There were many shelves of apparently very old books -as well, but there was also a vast deal of later rubbish--stock and -sporting annuals, veterinary treatises, county directories and the -like--which he would lose no time in putting out. He saw already how -delightful a room could be made of it. It had the crowning merit of -being connected with the suite of apartments he had chosen for his own. -From the door at the side, opposite the fine old fireplace, one entered -the antechamber to his dressing-room. This gave to the library an -intimate character, upon which he reflected with pleasure. Here he would -come, secure from interruption, and spend among his books the choicest -and most fruitful hours of his leisure. It was plain to him that -henceforth he would do a great deal of reading, and perhaps--why -not?--of writing too. - -There was a rap upon the door, and then Falkner, opening it, announced -Lord Julius and his son. They came in together, diffusing an impalpable -effect of constraint. The elder man seemed in Christian’s eyes bigger -than ever; his white beard spread over the broad chest like a vine run -wild. Emanuel, who lapsed in the wake of his father, was unexpectedly -small by comparison. The shadows, where the two stood, emphasized the -angular peculiarities of his bald head. His thin face took an effect of -sallow pallor from his black clothes. Already he had his black gloves in -his hands. - -Christian stepped forward to meet them--and was suddenly conscious of -the necessity for an apology. “I did not come down,” he murmured, as he -shook hands with a grave smile--“I am not quite master of myself yet. It -is still strange to me. But come to the window, and let us sit down.” - -They followed him, and took the chairs he pushed out for them. He -perched himself on the corner of the big table, and lightly stroked the -glazed boot of the foot which was not on the floor. “I am glad to hear -that Kathleen has come,” he said to his cousin. “I hope she is very -well.” - -“Extremely so,” replied Emanuel. Then, upon reflection, he added, “We -had hoped that you would come to us, on your way down from London.” - -“There was so much to do in town,” explained Christian, hazily. “My -grandfather’s lawyers came up at once from Shrewsbury, and it was -necessary to see a good deal of them--and then there were the tailors -and outfitters. It was all I could do to get away yesterday morning. And -of course--by that time I was needed here.” He turned to the other. “And -you are very well, Uncle Julius?” - -“I am well,” said the elder man, with what Christian suspected for the -instant to be significant brevity. The father and son had exchanged a -look, as well, which seemed to have a meaning beyond his comprehension. -But then he forgot these momentary doubts in the interest of the -discovery that there were tears in his great-uncle’s eyes. - -Lord Julius unaffectedly got out a handkerchief, and wiped them away. -He looked up at the young man as through a mist. “I never dreamed that -I should feel it so much,” he said, huskily. “I am amazed at myself--and -then ashamed at my amazement--but Kit’s death has somehow put me about -and upset me to a tremendous extent. There was thirteen years between -us--but when you get to be an old man, that seems no more than as many -weeks. And Emanuel”--he addressed his son with the solemnity befitting a -revelation--“I am an old man.” - -Emanuel frowned a little in his abstracted fashion. “You are less old -than any other man of your years in England,” he protested. - -Christian, listening, somehow found no conviction in these reassuring -words. It dawned upon him suddenly that Lord Julius had in truth aged a -great deal. The perception of this disarranged the speech he had in his -mind. - -“There are a thousand things to be talked over,” he began, with an eye -upon Emanuel, “but I do not know if this is quite the opportune time. I -wished to lose no time in seeing you both, of course--but you will not -be hurrying away. No doubt there will be a better opportunity.” - -“I don’t think it will be found that there is so very much to say,” - remarked Emanuel. A gentle but persistent melancholy seemed to pervade -his tone. - -“There is the complication”--Christian began again, and hesitated. “That -is to say--you know even better and more fully than I do, to what a -great extent I am in your hands. And there the complication, as I said, -arises. I have been working very hard on the figures--with the lawyers -in London, and here since I arrived--but before we touch those at all, -I ought to tell you frankly, Emanuel: I do not see my way to meeting the -conditions which you suggested to me last autumn, when we met first.” - Emanuel seemed in no wise perturbed by the announcement. His nervous -face maintained its unmoved gravity. “It was never anything more than a -pious hope that you would,” he commented. “I may add,” he went on, -“that even this hope cannot be said to have survived your first visit. -Otherwise, I should have tried to have you see London under different -auspices--through different eyes.” - -The calmness with which the decision he had regarded as so momentous -met acceptance disconcerted Christian. He had mentally prepared for -the defense of his hostile attitude toward the System--and, lo! not a -syllable of challenge was forthcoming. - -“But there remains, all the same, the principal difficulty,” he said, -thinking hard upon his words. “It does not lessen my obligations to -you as my chief creditors.” He looked from one to the other, as if in -uncertainty as to which was the master mind. “You have both been very -open with me. You have told me why it was that you devoted a large -fortune to buying up the mortgages on the estate which is now mine--and -to lending always more money upon it--until now the interest eats up -the income like a visitation of locusts. But my knowledge of the motives -does not help me. And you must not think, either,” his confidence was -returning now, and with it a better control over his phrases--“that I -am begging for help. I look the situation in the face, and I do not feel -that I am afraid of it. I see already many ways in which I can make a -better fight of it than my grandfather made.” - -Lord Julius held up a hand. “Is there not a misconception there?” - he asked, pleasantly enough. “A fight involves antagonists--and I -intervened in poor Kit’s affairs as a protector, not as an assailant.” - -Christian stood erect, and knitted his brows in puzzled thought upon -both the manner and the matter of these words. - -“But it is still the same,” he persisted. “You were his good friend--as -I know you are mine--or hope very sincerely that you are--but none the -less you were his overwhelmingly big creditor, as now you are mine. If -one is greatly in debt, then one struggles to get out. It is in that -sense that I meant the word ‘fight.’ And, to repeat, I see many ways of -making progress. I find that Welldon is not exclusively my man. He is -the agent of three other estates as well, because we could not pay him -enough here for all of his services. That I will alter at once. I find -that we have no mineral bailiff. The company at Coalbrook has paid such -royalties as it pleased, without check of any sort. We have the right -to examine their books, but it has never been exercised. Next week my -secretary and Welldon go to Coalbrook. I find that the company’s lease -of twenty-one years expires next February. Eh bien! It will be strange -if I do not get ten thousand pounds hereafter, where less than four has -come in hitherto. My lawyers already know of capitalists who desire to -bid for the new lease--and the estimate of increase is theirs, not mine. -But these are details. I mention them to you only to show you that I am -not afraid. But anxious, I do not deny that I am. I have not been bred -to these things--and I may easily make mistakes. It would take a great -load off my mind if--if, in some measure, you would be my advisers as -well as my creditors.” - -“Why should you ever have doubted that?” asked Emanuel, in a tone of -somber kindliness. - -“Ah, but I do not mean advice about the management of the estate,” put -in Christian, with an over-eager instinct of self-defense. “I do not -shrink from taking that completely on my own shoulders. I would not -trouble you with anything of that sort. But of larger matters----” - -“There is one large matter,” interrupted Lord Julius, speaking with -great deliberation, “which I find outweighing all others in my mind. It -is not new to my mind--but to-day it pushes everything else aside. It -is the thought of the family itself. I have told you this before--let -me say it to you again. Everything that I have done--every penny that I -have laid out--has been with this one end in view--the family. Yet this -morning I have been thinking of it--and I am frightened. While poor old -Kit lingered along, it was not so easy to grasp it, somehow--but his -going off makes it glaring. There are too few of us. I am alone in my -generation--and so is Emanuel in his--and so are you in yours, save for -those rowdy simpletons Eddy and Gus. And beyond you, there is only that -little girl baby of Cora Bayard’s! I want you to marry, Christian. I -want to see sons of yours growing up here at Caermere--hearty, fine boys -to carry the name of Torr along. That I am really in earnest about. By -comparison with it, nothing else on earth matters--for us.” - -“Oh, I shall marry,” Christian replied, in smiling seriousness. “Of -course, that is the obvious thing to be done. And now”--he looked at his -watch--“it is time for me to dress. It is arranged that you and Emanuel -and Kathleen drive to the church in the carriage with me. It is not -quite orthodox precedence, I know, but I could not bear to--to have it -otherwise. And we will think no more about those other matters until -tomorrow.” - -“Other matters,” repeated Lord Julius, and exchanged a look with his son -as they rose. “My dear Christian, there are no other matters.” - -“No--not till to-morrow,” answered Christian, with a doubtful smile. -“But then I am afraid there are a good many.” - -Emanuel filled in the pause. “Mr. Soman has brought all the papers,” he -said, with a flitting return to his lighter manner. “It is my father’s -meaning that the mortgages are extinguished.” - -Christian gazed from one to the other with a face full of stupefaction. -His knees shook and sought to bend under him. Tremblingly he essayed to -speak--and his lips would make no sound. - -Lord Julius laid his big hand on the young man’s shoulder--and -Christian, dimly recalling the effect of this touch in the days when -he had first known it, thrilled at the novel restfulness it somehow now -conferred. - -“Only show me a son of yours,” said the old man, with tender gravity. -“Let me see an heir before I die.” - -Without further words, the two left him. Christian, staring at the -shadowed door through which they had vanished, remained standing. His -confused brain quailed in the presence of thoughts more stupendous than -the ancient hills outside. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIII - -Several thousand people caught that day their first curious glimpse of -the new master of Caermere. At the most there were but a handful of aged -persons, in the throng clustered along the sides of the road winding -down from the Castle to the partially restored medieval collegiate -church in the valley, who could remember any other duke than the one -being borne now to lie among his fathers. The fact that these venerable -folk, without exception, were in the enjoyment of a day’s holiday from -the workhouse, might have interested a philosopher, had it been pressed -upon his attention. - -Quite two hundred horsemen, mounted in their own saddles on their own -beasts, rode in the long procession which descended from Caermere toward -the close of the noon hour. Clad in decent black for the greater part, -with old silk hats or other formal and somber headgear, they jogged -sedately in unison as the curbed horses stepped with caution down the -hill. Their browned and large-featured faces wore a uniform mask of -solemnity--distinguished chiefly by a resolute contraction of brows and -lips, and eyes triumphantly cleared of all traces of speculation. They -looked down, as they passed, upon the humbler dalesmen and laborers -of the hillsides, and their womenfolk and swarming children, with an -impassive, opacated gaze. - -On the green, before the little covered gateway to the churchyard, dull -murmurs spread through this cortege, propelled sidelong from mouths -which scorned to open; the main principles of a proposed evolution came -slowly, in some mysterious way, to be comprehended among them: after -almost less backing and pushing into one another than might have -been expected, they perceived themselves emerging into an orderly -arrangement, by which they lined the two sides of the carriage-way -crossing the green. They regarded each other across this significant -strip of gravel with a gloomy stolidity of pride: the West Salop -Yeomanry could scarcely have done it better. Then another rustle of -whispered sounds along their ranks toward the church--and the civic side -of their demonstration came uppermost. With a tightened left hand upon -the reins, they removed their hats, and held them so that they could -most readily read the names of the makers inside. - -The carriages bearing the family of Torr, preceded by the curtained -hearse, and followed by a considerable number of broughams and closed -landaus recognizable as the property of the neighboring gentry, moved -silently forward along this lane of uncovered horsemen. The distant -swelling moan of the organ floated on the May air, in effect a comment -upon the fact that the tolling of the bell in the tower had ceased. - -The intermittent noise of carriage-doors being sharply shut, and of -wheels getting out of the way, proceeded from the head of the procession -at the gate--and tenants and other undistinguished people on foot began -to press forward between the ranks. The horsemen, with furtive glances -to right and left, put on their hats again, and let the restive animals -stretch their muscles in the path. A few, dismounting, and giving their -bridles over to boys, joined those who were moving toward the church. -The majority, drawing their horses aside into groups formed at random, -and incessantly shifting, lent their intellects, and in some restrained -measure their tongues, to communion upon the one great problem of the -day:--would the new Duke set the Hunt on its legs again? - -The question was so intimately connected with their tenderest emotions -and convictions, that no one liked to speak of it thoughtlessly or upon -hasty impulse. Even those who doubted most, shrank from hearing the -prophecies of evil they felt prone to utter. Men who nourished almost -buoyant hopes still hesitated to create a confidence which must be so -precarious. While the faint sustained recitative of the priest in the -church could be heard, insistent and disturbing like the monotone of -a distant insect, and then the sounds of the organ once more, and of -singing, fell upon the sunlit green, the horsemen spoke cautiously about -the hounds. Even before Lord Porlock’s death, things had not been what -they should have been. The pack was even then, as one might say, falling -between two stools. The Torrs hadn’t the money to keep the thing up -properly themselves, but they showed their teeth savagely the minute -mention was made of getting in some outside help. But since Porlock’s -death--well, the condition of affairs had been too painful for words. -The horsemen shook their heads in dumb eloquence upon this tragic -interval. The Kennels had lapsed into a state hardly to be thought of, -much less discussed. There had been no puppy-walk. Were there any young -dogs at all? And, just heavens! if there were, what must they be like! - -And yet the country-side, outraged as it felt itself to be in its finest -feelings, beheld itself helpless. The old Duke--but really this was not -just the time and place for saying what they felt about the old Duke -They glanced uneasily toward the church when this theme suggested -itself, and nodded with meaning to one another. It could be taken for -granted that there were no illusions among them concerning _him_. But -what about the new man? Eyes brightened, lips quivered in beseeching -inquiry, at the mention of this omnipotent stranger. What was he like? -Had anybody heard anything that Welldon had said about him? It seemed -that he was French bred, and that, considered by itself, might easily -involve the worst. But then, was there not a story that he had ridden -to the hounds in Derbyshire? Perhaps the younger generation of Frenchmen -were better fellows than their fathers--but then, there was the reported -fact that the Duke of Orleans fell off his horse and broke his leg -whenever he tried to ride. Sir George had been informed in Paris that he -would have been King of France by this time if he had been able to -stick in a saddle. Yet, when one thought of it, did not this very -fact indicate a fine new public sentiment in France, on the subject of -horsemanship--and perhaps even of sport in general? - -Christian, at the door of the church, had thought most of clenching -his teeth, and straining his upper-arms against his sides, to keep from -trembling. He had not pictured himself, beforehand, as entering this -burial place of his ancestors alone. Yet, in the churchyard, that was -how the matter arranged itself. His first idea had been to lead, -with Kathleen on his arm--but she had said her place was with Emanuel -instead. Then the alternative of walking arm-in-arm with Lord Julius -had seemed to him even more appropriate--but this too, in the -confused constraint of the moment, had gone wrong. Stealing an anxious -half-glance over his shoulder, he discovered that Lord Julius had -placed himself at Kathleen’s other side. The slight gesture of appealing -invitation which he ventured upon did not catch the old man’s eye. There -was nothing for it but to stand alone. - -To be the strange, unsupported central figure in such a pageant unnerved -him. He stood tremulously behind the pall--a burden draped with a -great purple embroidered cloth, and borne upon the shoulders of eight -peasant-laborers from the estate--and noted fleetingly that, so stunted -and mean of stature were these poor hinds, he looked with ease above -them, over their load, into the faces of the two priests advancing down -the walk toward him. - -These persons, an elderly, dark man, with a red hood folded upon his -shoulders, and a thin-faced fair young man, seemed to return the gaze -with meaning. He caught himself feeling that their eyes deferred to -him; yes, if they had bowed to the ground, the effect of their abasement -before him could not have been more palpable. Looking perfunctorily -across the chasm of death, their glances sought to, make interest with -the living. He hated them both on the instant. As they wheeled, and by -their measured steps forward drew slowly in their wake the bearers -of the pall, the chant of the elder--“I am the Resurrection and the -Life”--came vaguely to his ears, and found them hostile. - -The interior of the old church--dim, cool, cloistral--was larger than -Christian had assumed from its outer aspect. Many people were present, -crowded close in the pews nearest the door--and strangely enough, it was -his perception that these were chiefly women, of some unlabeled -class which at least was not his own, that brought to him of a sudden -self-command. He followed the bier up the aisle to its resting-place -before the rail, took tacit cognizance of the place indicated to him by -some man in professional black, and stood aside to let Kathleen pass in -before him, all with a restored equanimity in which he was himself much -interested. Through the reading of the Psalm and the Epistle he gave but -the most vagrant attention to their words. The priests read badly, for -one thing; the whining artificiality of their elocution annoyed -and repelled him. But still more, his thoughts were diverted by the -suggestiveness of everything about him. - -Especially, the size of the funeral gathering, and of the mounted and -wheeled procession, had impressed him. There need be no pretense that -affection or esteem for the dead man had brought out, from the sparsely -populated country round about, this great multitude. Precisely for that -reason, it became a majestic fact. The burial of a Duke of Glastonbury -had nothing to do with, personal qualities or reputation. It was -like the passing away of a monarch. People who cared nothing for the -individual were stirred and appealed to by the vicissitudes of an -institution. Inset upon the walls around him were marble tablets, and -more archaic canopies of stone over little carved effigies of kneeling -figures; beyond, at the sides of the chancel, he could see the dark, -rectangular elevations of the tombs, capped by recumbent mail-clad -statues, with here and there a gleam of gilt or scarlet retained from -their ancient ornamentation; even as he had walked slowly up the aisle, -his downcast eyes had noticed the chiseled heraldry of stones beneath -his feet. Everywhere about him was the historic impact of the Torrs. -Their ashes were here--their banners and shields and tilting-helmets, -their symbolical quarterings of the best arms of the West, their -own proudest device of all. Their white bull on the green ground was -familiar in England long before the broom-corn of the Angevins had been -thought of. The clerkly pun on Tor and Taurus was as like as not older -than the English language itself. All this made something mightier, -more imposing and enduring, than any edifice to be reared by man alone. -It was only in part human, this structure of the family. The everlasting -hills were a part of it, the dark ranges of forests, the spirits and -legends of the ancient Marches. - -“_In the morning it is green, and groweth up; but in the evening it is -cut down, dried up and withered,_” droned the young clergyman. - -But if man seemed to count for but little in this tremendous, forceful -aggregation of tradition and custom, yet again he might be all in all. -The tall old man under the purple pall, there--it was easy to think -contemptuously of him. Christian recalled, in a kind of affrighted -musing, that one view of his grandfather that he had had. The disgust -with which he had heard the stupid, violent words from those aged lips -revived within him--then changed to wonder. Was it not, after all, the -principle of strength which most affected men’s minds? There had been -discernible in that grandfather of his a certain sort of strength--dull, -unintelligent, sinister, half-barbarous, but still strength. Was it not -that which had brought forth the two hundred horsemen? And if this -one element, of strength--yes, you might call it brute strength--were -lacking, then would all the other fine qualities in the world avail to -hold the impalpable, intangible combination together? - -“‘_He shall have put down all rule, and all authority, and power_.’” It -was the old parson who was reading now. - -“‘_For He must reign, till He hath put all enemies under His feet_.’” - -Yes, even in this Protestant religion to which he had passively become -committed, force was the real ideal! Christian’s wandering mind fastened -itself for a moment upon the ensuing words of the lesson, but got -nothing from their confusing reiterations. He lapsed into reverie again, -then started abruptly with the sudden perception that everybody in the -church behind him must be looking at him. In the pew immediately behind, -there would be Captain Edward and his wife, and Augustine; in the one -behind that Lady Cressage, Lord Chobham and his son; beyond them scores -and scores of others seated in rows, and then a throng in the aisle and -the doorway--all purporting to think of the dead, but fixing their eyes -none the less on the living. And it was not alone in the church, but -through the neighborhood, for miles round about: when men spoke of the -old Duke who was gone, their minds would in truth be dwelling upon -the new Duke who was come. A thrill ran through his veins as the words -spelled themselves out before his inner vision. The new Duke! He seemed -never to have comprehended what it meant before. - -No; and till this moment no genuine realization had come to him of this -added meaning--this towering superstructure which the message of Julius -and Emanuel had reared. It was only now that he hit upon the proper -mental focus with which to contemplate this amazing thing. Not only was -he a territorial ruler, one of the great nobles of Europe, but he was -the master of wealth almost beyond counting as well! - -Those nearest to him were rising now, and he, obeying imperative -impulses within him, lifted himself proudly to his feet. While the air -throbbed with deep-voiced organ notes, in the pause which here -ensued, his gaze rested upon the pall before him. There was a sense -of transfiguration in the spectacle. The purple mantle became imperial -Tyrian to his eyes--and something which was almost tenderness, almost -reverence, yearned within him toward that silent, incased figure hidden -beneath it. The mystic, omnipotent tie of blood gripped his heart. - -With a collected sidelong look he surveyed the profiles of Emanuel and -Lord Julius to his left. Theirs were the lineaments of princes. As if -he had eyes in the back of his head, he beheld Edward and Augustine, -as fancy revealed them standing in the pew behind him. Tall, slim, -athletic, fair--the figures his imagination made of them appealed to the -new patriarchal spirit in his heart. Perhaps they were not wholly nice, -these young men, but they also were princes, and they were of his race, -and no one should persecute them, or despitefully use them. - -The uncouth little bearers of the dead had come forward again, and taken -up their burden. In a small lady-chapel, extending from the transept -at the left, the interment was to take place, and thither Christian now -followed the pall, leading the menfolk of his family and the male guests -of position who attached themselves to the group. Thus some score of -black-clad figures clustered round the oblong opening in the old stone -floor, and Christian, standing at its head, glanced impassively over the -undefined throng of spectators gathered at the doorway. - -“‘_Man that is born of woman hath but a short time to live, and is full -of misery_,’” proclaimed the younger priest, with a sudden outburst -of high-pitched, nasal tones which pierced the unexpectant ear. “‘_He -cometh up and is cut down, like a flower; he fleeth as it were a shadow, -and never continueth in one stay._’” - -Christian, watching abstractedly the impersonal wedge of faces at the -door, all at once caught his breath in a sharp spasm of bewildered -amazement. The little book he had been holding fell from his hands, -balanced on its edge for an instant and toppled over into the dark vault -below. He seemed unconscious of the incident--but stared fixedly, with -parted lips and astonished eyes, at the image of something he had seen -outside of the chapel. The thing itself had apparently vanished. He -perceived vaguely that people were looking at him--and with a determined -effort regained control of his face and bearing. The puzzling thought -that it might have been an illusion--that perhaps he had seen nothing at -all--brought mingled confusion and solace to his mind. He put his hand -to the open book which Lord Julius at his side held toward him, and -pretended to look at it. - -The coffin, now bereft of its purple covering, had been lowered to its -final place. One of the bearers, standing over the cavity, crumbled -dry earth from his tanned and clumsy fingers, and it fell with a faint -rattle upon some resonant, unseen surface. - -The phrase, “‘_Our dear brother, here departed_,’” stuck out with -awkward obtrusiveness from among the words of the priest. “‘_Earth to -earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust_.’” the sing-song went on. Then they -were repeating the Lord’s Prayer together in a buzzing, fitful murmur. -There were other prayers--and then Christian read in the faces of those -about him that the ceremony was finished. Accepting the suggestion of -Lord Julius’s movement, he also bent over, and looked blankly down into -the obscurity of the vault. But when he lifted his head again, it was to -throw a more searching and strenuous glance than ever over the knot -of people outside the door. And yes!--he had not been deceived. He -distinctly saw the face again, and with lightning swiftness verified its -features. Beyond a shadow of doubt it was Frances Bailey whom he beheld, -mysteriously present in this most unlikely of places. - -He withdrew his eyes and did not look that way again. The question -whether she knew that he had recognized her, occupied his mind to the -exclusion of all else, as he returned at the head of his followers to -the body of the church. It still possessed his thoughts when he had -joined the family group of chief mourners, loosely collecting itself -in the aisle before the front pews, in waiting for the summons to the -carriages. To some one he ought to speak at once, and for the moment his -eye rested speculatively upon Cora. He identified her confidently, not -only by her husband’s proximity, but by the fact that her mourning -veil was much thicker and longer than any of the others. Some unshaped -consideration, however, restrained him, and on a swift second thought he -turned to Kathleen. - -“I want you to look,” he whispered to her, inclining his head--“on the -other side of the church, just in a line between the second pillar and -the white-bearded figure in the window--there is a tall young woman, -with the gray and black hat. Do you see her? In a kind of way she -belongs to us--she is Cora’s sister, but I’m afraid if Cora asked her, -she would not come to the Castle.” - -“Yes--once you talked to me about her,” Kathleen reminded him. - -“Well, will you do this for me?” he continued, in an eager murmur. “Go -to her, and make sure that she promises to come up with the rest. It -would be unforgivable--if we let her go away.” - -He had an uneasy feeling that Mrs. Emanuel’s veil did not prevent her -shrewd glance from reading him through and through--but he did not seek -to dissemble the breath of relief with which he heard her assent. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIV - -It was not a very easy task,” Kathleen found opportunity to say to -Christian, half an hour later, as the family were assembling in his -library. They stood together by the window nearest the table, and -watched the embarrassed deportment of Lord Lingfield under the -conversational attentions of Cora, as they talked in low tones. - -“But she is here in the Castle: that is the principal thing.” He did not -shrink now from the implication of his words. - -“Yes, she finally consented to come,” explained the other. “I told her -that you insisted upon it--and then--then I used some persuasion of my -own.” - -“I thank you, Kathleen,” he said, simply. “It seems that she is to write -an account of the funeral for some London newspaper. She said frankly, -however, that that of itself did not account for her coming. It will -pay her expenses--so she said--but the paper would not have sent her -specially. And there is no doubt about it--she was really annoyed at -being discovered.” - -The solicitors from Shrewsbury, entering the room now, gave at once -an official air to everything. The elder of them, with oppressive -formality, drew a formidable parchment from a bag held by his junior, -and bowed elaborately to Christian. Then, as if he had received some -mandate to do so from His Grace, he untied the tape, and cleared his -throat. Those who had been seated, rose to their feet. - -The will came to them unaltered from 1859--and contained, wrapped in a -surprising deal of pompous verbiage, a solitary kernel of essential -fact. No legatee was mentioned save an impersonal being called -the heir-at-law. The absolutism of dynastic rule contemplated no -distribution or division of power. This slender, dark-eyed young man, -standing with head inclined and a nervous hand upon the table, had not -come into being until long after that will was made, and for other long -years thereafter his very existence had been unknown to the family at -large. Yet, as the lawyer’s reading ended, there he stood before their -gaze, the unquestioned autocrat. - -“This may be the best time to say it.” Christian straightened himself, -and addressed his family for the first time, with a grave smile, and a -voice which was behaving itself better than he feared it would. “There -are no minor bequests, owing to the circumstances under which the will -was drawn, but I have taken it upon myself to supply such omissions, in -this matter, as shall commend themselves to my consideration. Upon this -subject we may speak among ourselves at our leisure, later on.” With -distinguished self-possession he looked at his watch. “I think luncheon -is at two.” - -There followed here an unrehearsed, and seemingly unpremeditated, -episode. Lord Julius advanced with impressive gravity across the little -open space, and taking the hand which Christian impulsively extended to -him, bent over it in a formal and courtly bow. When Emanuel, following -his father, did the same, it was within the consciousness of all that -they had become committed to a new ceremonial rite. Kathleen, coming -behind her husband, gave her cheek to be kissed by the young chief of -her adopted clan--and this action translated itself into a precedent as -well. - -Edward and Augustine, after the hesitation of an awkward instant, -came forward together, and in their turn, with a flushed stiffness of -deportment, made their salutation to the head of the house. To them, -conjointly, Christian said something in a whisper. He kissed Cora upon -each cheek, with a faint smile in his eyes at her preference for the -foreign method. His remoter cousins, the Earl of Chobham and Lord -Lingfield, passed before him, and he vaguely noted the reservation -expressed in their lifeless palms and frigid half-bow. They seemed to -wish to differentiate themselves from the others--to express to him the -Pickwickian character of their homage. They were not Torrs; they did not -salaam to him as their over-lord. They had a rival dynasty of their own, -and their appearance here involved nothing but the seemly courtesy of -distant relationship. He perceived in a dim way that this was what their -manner was saying to him--but it scarcely diverted his attention. His -glance and his thoughts passed over their heads, to fasten upon the -remaining figure. - -Lady Cressage, unlike the other two women, had retained the bonnet -and heavy veil of mourning. The latter she held drawn aside with -a black-gloved hand as she approached. It flashed suddenly across -Christian’s brain that the year of her mourning for her own dead was not -over--yet in her own house she wore gay laces and light colors. But it -was unkind to remember this--and senseless, too. He strove to revivify, -instead, the great compassionate impulse which formerly she had stirred -within him. A pallid shadow of it was all that he could conjure up--and -in the chill of this shadow he touched her white temple with his lips, -and she moved away. There lingered in his mind a curious, passive -conflict of memories as to whether their eyes had met or not. Then this -yielded place to the impression some detached organ of perception had -formed for him, that in that somber setting of crape her face had looked -too small for the rest of her figure. - -Then, as the whole subject melted from his mind, he turned toward the -two young men who, upon his whispered request, had remained in the -library after the departure of the others. He looked at his watch, and -beckoned them forward with a friendly wave of his hand. - -“Pray come and sit down,” he said, with affability upon the surface of -his tone. “We have a quarter of an hour, and I felt that it could not be -put to better use than in relieving your minds a little--or trying to do -so. Let me begin by saying that I do not think I have met either of -you before. In fact, now that I reflect, I am sure that we have not met -before. I am glad to see you both.” - -The two brothers had drawn near, and settled uneasily into the very -chairs which Lord Julius and Emanuel had occupied some hours before. -Again Christian half seated himself upon the corner of the table, -but this time he swung his leg lightly as he surveyed his guests. It -flattered his prophetic judgment to note that Augustine seemed the first -to apprehend the meaning of his words, but that Edward, upon pondering -them, appeared the more impressed by their magnanimity. Between them, -as they regarded him and each other doubtfully, the family likeness was -more striking than ever. Christian remembered having heard somewhere -that their father, Lord Edward, had been a dark man, as a Torr -should be. Their flaxen hair and dull blue eyes must come from -that unmentionable mother of theirs, who was living in indefinite -obscurity--if she was living at all--upon the blackmail Julius paid -her for not using the family name. The thought somehow put an added -gentleness into his voice. - -“How old are you--Eddy?” he asked, forcing himself into the use of the -diminutive as a necessary part of the patriarchal rôle he had assumed. - -“Nine-and-twenty in October,” answered the Captain, poutingly. It seemed -on the tip of his tongue to add something else, but he did not. - -“There’s two years and a month between us,” remarked Augustine, with -more buoyancy. - -“And you’ve been out of the army for five years,” pursued Christian. “It -seems that you became a Captain very early. Would there be any chance of -your taking it up again, where you left off?” - -Edward shook his head. “It couldn’t be done twice. I got it by a lucky -fluke--a friend of my father’s, you know. But they’re deuced stiff now,” - he answered. “You have to do exams and things. An old johnnie asks you -what bounds Peru on the northeast, and if you can’t remember just at the -minute, why, you get chucked. Out you go, d’ye see?” - -“What is your idea, then? What would you like to do?” - -Captain Edward knitted his scanty, pale brows over this question, and -regarded the prospect through the window in frowning perplexity. “Oh, -almost anything,” he remarked at last, vacuously. - -Christian permitted himself the comment of a smiling sniff. “Think it -over,” he said, and directed his glance at the younger brother. “You’re -in Parliament,” he observed, with a slight difference in tone. “I’m not -sure that I quite understand-What is it that attracts you in a--in a -Parliamentary career?” - -Augustine lifted his pale, scanty brows in surprise. The right kind -of answer did not come readily to him. “Well,” he began with -hesitation--“there was that seat in Cheshire where we still had a good -bit of land--and Julius didn’t object--and I had an idea it would help -me in the City.” He recovered confidence as he went on. “But it is -pretty well played out now, I came in too late. The Kaffir boom spoiled -the whole show. Five years ago an M P. could pick and choose; I knew -fellows who were on twenty boards at a time, and big blocks of stock -were flying about them like--like hailstones. But you can’t do that now. -M. P.s are as cheap as dirt; they won’t have ’em at any price. A -fellow hardly makes his cab-fares in the City nowadays. And even if you -get the very best inside tips, brokers have got so fearfully nasty about -your margins being covered----” - -“Oh, well,” interposed Christian, “it isn’t necessary that we should go -into all that. I do not like to hear about the City. If you get money -for yourself there, you have taken it away from somebody else. I would -rather that people of our name kept away from such things.” - -“If you come to that, everybody’s money is taken from somebody else,” - said Edward, unexpectedly entering the conversation. His brother -checked him with a monitory hand on his arm. “No, you don’t understand,” - Augustine warned him. “I quite see what the Duke means.” - -“If you see what I mean,” returned Christian, quietly, “perhaps you -will follow the rest that I have to say; Do you care very much about -remaining in Parliament?” Augustine’s face reflected an eager mental -effort to get at his august interlocutor’s meaning. “Well--that’s -so hard to say,” he began, anxiously. “There are points about it, of -course--but then--when you look at it in another way, why of course----” - -“My idea is this,” Christian interposed once more. “I hope you won’t -mind my saying it--but there seems to me something rather ridiculous -about your being in the House. Parliament ought not to be treated as a -joke, or a convenience. It is a place for men who will work hard in the -service of the country, and who have the tastes and the information and -the judgment and the patriotic devotion to make their work of value to -their country. I dare say that there are members who do not entirely -measure up to this standard, but after all there _is_ a standard, and -I do not like to be a party to lowering it. England has claims upon us -Torrs; it deserves something better at our hands than that. So I think I -would like you to consider the idea of resigning your seat--or at least, -dropping out at the end of this Parliament. Or no--that would be waiting -too long. You would better think of retiring now.” - -“Do you mean that _I_ am to stand for the seat, instead?” asked Edward, -looking up with awakened interest. - -Christian stared, then sighed smilingly and shook his head. - -“No, that doesn’t seem to have been in my mind,” he replied with -gentleness. He contemplated the elder brother afresh. - -“Have you thought yet what you would like to do?” he asked again, almost -with geniality. - -“How d’ye mean ‘do’?” inquired Edward, with a mutinous note in his -voice. “Is it something about a business? If you ask me straight, I’m -not so fearfully keen about doin’ anything. No fellow wants to do -things, if he can rub along without.” - -Christian found himself repressing a gay chuckle with effort. He had not -dreamed he should like this one of his kinsmen so much. - -“No--no; you shall not do things,” he promised him, with a sparkling -eye. “That would be too bad.” - -Captain Edward turned in his chair, and recrossed his legs. “It’s a -trifle awkward, all this, you know,” he declared, with an impatient -scowl. “It doesn’t suit me to be made game of. You’ve got the whip hand, -and you can give me things or not, as you like, and I’ve got to be civil -and take what you offer, because I can’t help myself--but damn me if I -like to be chaffed into the bargain! I wouldn’t do it to you, d’ye see, -if it was the other way about.” - -Christian’s face lapsed into instant gravity. A fleeting speculation as -to that problematical reversal of positions rose in his mind, but he -put it away. “Ah, you mustn’t think that,” he urged, with serious tones. -“No, Cousin Edward, this is what I want to say to you.” And then, all -unbidden, the things he really wished to say, yet which he had not -thought of before, ranged themselves in his mind. - -“Listen to me,” he went on. “You have been a soldier. You were a soldier -when you were a very young man. Now, you had an uncle who was also -a soldier when he was a mere youth--a very loyal and distinguished -soldier, too. He died a soldier when he was in his fortieth year--far -away from his family, from his wife and son, and much farther away still -from the place and country of his birth. Once, in his youth, he was -mixed up in an unpleasant and even disgraceful affair. How much to blame -he personally was--that I do not know. It was very long ago--and he was -so young a man--really I refuse to consider the question. I could insist -to myself that he was innocent--if I felt that it mattered at all, one -way or the other--and if I did not feel that by doing so, somehow he -would not be then so real a figure to me as he is now. And he is very -real to me; he has been so all my life.” - -He paused, with a momentary break in his voice, to blink the tears -from his eyes. It was not ducal, but he put the back of his hand to his -cheeks, and dried them. - -“I show you how it affects me,” he continued, simply. “No matter what he -did in some stupid hour in London, he was a brave soldier before that, -and after that. He fought for many losing causes; he died fighting for -one which was most hopeless of all. I am proud that I am his son. I am -proud for you, that you are his nephew. And something has occurred to -me that I think you will like to do--for me and for him. When I stood -to-day over our vault--where we are all buried--it cut me to the heart -to remember that one of us lies alone, a great way off--in a strange -land by himself. I propose to you that you go to Spain for me--it is at -Seo de Urgel, in the mountain country of the Catalans--and that you find -his grave, and that you bring him back here to sleep with his people. He -would not return in his lifetime--but I think he would be pleased with -us for bringing him back now.” - -Edward had looked fixedly up at his cousin, then glanced away, then -allowed his blank gaze to return, the while these words were being -spoken. It was impossible to gather from his reddened, immobile face, -now, any notion of their effect upon him. But after a moment’s pause, -he rose to his feet, squared his shoulders and put out his hand to -Christian. - -“Quite right; I’ll go,” he said, abruptly. - -The two men shook hands, with a sense of magnetic communion which -could have amazed no one more than themselves. Then, under a recurring -consciousness of embarrassed constraint, they turned away from each -other, and Edward wandered off awkwardly toward the door. - -“Oh--a moment more,” called Christian, with a step in his cousin’s -direction. Then on second thoughts he added: “Or shall we let that wait? -I will see you again--some time to-day or to-morrow. Yes--leave me now -for a minute with your brother.” - -When the door had closed upon Edward, Christian turned slowly to -Augustine, and, as he leaned once more against the table, regarded him -with a ruminating scrutiny. - -“I am puzzled about you,” he remarked, thoughtfully. - -Augustine returned the gaze with visible perturbation. - -“I think,” pursued Christian, “that it rather annoys me that you don’t -tell me to puzzle and be damned.” - -The other took the words with a grimace, and an unhappy little laugh. -He, too, rose to his feet. “I funked it,” he said with rueful candor. - -“Well, don’t funk things with me,” Christian advised him, with a -testiness of which, upon the instant, he was ashamed. “Look here,” he -continued, less brusquely, “I could take it from your brother that he -did not want to do things. That fits him: he is not the kind of man -to apply himself in that way. But I have the feeling that you are -different. There ought to be performance--capacity--of some sort in you, -if I could only get to know what it is. You are only my age. Isn’t there -something that particularly appeals to you?” - -Augustine balanced himself meditatively upon his heels. “You say you bar -the City”--he remarked with caution. “Would you have any objection to -Johannesburg? It’s not what it was, by any means, but it’s bound to pick -up again. I might do myself very well there--with a proper start.” - -“But you are thinking always of money!” broke in Christian, sharply once -again. “Suppose that there was no question of money--suppose, what shall -I say? that you had twelve hundred a year, secure to you without any -effort of your own--what would you do then?” - -This seemed very simple to Augustine. “I would do whatever you wanted me -to do,” he replied, with fervor. - -Christian shrugged his shoulders, and dismissed him with a gesture. “We -will speak again about it,” he said coldly, and turned away. - -Descending the great staircase a few minutes later, Christian entered -the door which Barlow had been waiting to open for him--and made his -first public appearance as the dispenser of Caermere’s hospitality. - -The guests, after the old mid-day fashion of the place, were already -for the most part gathered in the large dining-hall, and stood or sat in -groups upon the side pierced by the tall windows. These guests did -not dissemble the interest with which they from time to time directed -glances across to the other side, where a long table, laid for luncheon, -put in evidence a grateful profusion of cold joints and made-dishes. - -A pleased rustle of expectancy greeted Christian’s advent, but it seemed -that this did not, for the moment at least, involve food and drink. He -strolled over to the company, and, as he exchanged words here and there, -kept an attentive eye busy in taking stock of its composition. There -were some forty persons present, of whom three-fourths, apparently, were -county people. A few casual presentations forced themselves upon him, -but the names of the new acquaintances established no foothold in his -memory. He smiled and murmured words which he hoped were seasonable--but -all the while he was scanning the assemblage with a purpose of his own. - -At last he came to Kathleen, and was able to have a private word in her -ear. “I do not see her anywhere,” he whispered. - -“I could not prevail upon her to come in to lunch,” she answered; “I -imagine it is partly a question of clothes. But she is being looked -out for. And afterward I will take charge of her again, if you -like--though----” - -The sentence remained unfinished, as she took the arm Christian offered -her, at Barlow’s eloquent approach. - - - - -CHAPTER XXV - -During the progress of the luncheon, Christian found no opportunity for -intimate conversation with Emanuel’s wife. The elderly and ponderously -verbose Lord Chobham sat upon her right; there was the thin-faced, -exigeant wife of some clerical person in gaiters--a rural dean, was it -not?--full of dogmatic commonplaces, on his left. The other people did -not seem to talk so much. The scene down the table--with so much black -cloth offset garishly against the white linen in the daylight--presented -an effect of funereal sobriety, curiously combined with a spontaneous -reaction of the natural man against this effect. The guests ate -steadily, and with energy; Christian noted with interest how freely they -also drank. For himself, he could not achieve an appetite, but thirst -was in the air. He lifted his glass bravely to Lord Julius, whose -massive bulk and beard confronted him at the other end of the table--and -then to others whose glance from time to time caught his. - -Once he found the chance to murmur to Kathleen: “When this is over, I -hope you will manage it so that I may speak with you.” - -She nodded slow assent, without looking at him. He, observing her -profile, realized all at once that something was amiss with her. It came -back to him now that a certain intensity of sadness had dwelt in the -first glance they had exchanged that morning, upon meeting. At the time -he had referred it to the general aspect of woe which people put on at -funerals. He saw now that it was a grief personal to herself. And now -that he thought of it, too, there had been much the same stricken look -upon Emanuel’s face. It was incredible that they should be thus devoured -by grief at the fact of his grandfather’s death. No one had liked that -old man overmuch--but surely they least of all. The emotion of Lord -Julius was more intelligible--and yet even this had a quality of -broken dejection in it which seemed independent of Caermere’s cause for -mourning. - -The disquieting conviction that these dearly beloved cousins of -his--these ineffably tender and generous friends of his--were writhing -under some trouble unknown to him, took more definite shape in his mind -with each new glance that he stole at her. - -Once the thought sprang up that they might be unhappy because such a -huge sum of money had been given to him, but on the instant he hated -himself for being capable of formulating such a monstrous idea. The -wondering solicitude which all this raised within him possessed his -thoughts for the rest of the meal. He was consumed with impatience to -get away so that he might question Kathleen about it. - -Yet when at last he found himself beside her, standing before an old -portrait in one of the chain of big rooms through which the liberated -company had dispersed itself, this was just the question for which it -seemed that no occasion would offer. - -She began speaking to him at once. “The young lady--Miss Bailey, I -should say--has gone for a walk--so Falkner learns from some of the -women. They have the impression that she is coming back--but I don’t -know that I feel quite so sure about it.” Christian’s face visibly -lengthened. “It’s very awkward,” he said, with vague annoyance. “They do -not arrange things in a very talented fashion, these people of mine.” - -“But what could they arrange?” she argued. An indefinable listlessness -in her tone struck him. “It is a free country, you know, and this is the -nineteenth century. They cannot bodily capture a young woman and keep -her in the Castle against her will. As I told you, I had difficulty in -persuading her to come at all.” - -“Ah, what did you say to her?” he asked, eagerly. - -“I can hardly tell you. She is not an ordinary person--and I know only -that I tried not to say ordinary things to her. But what it was that I -did say----” She broke off with an uncertain gesture, and a sigh. - -“Ah, you saw that she was not ordinary!” said Christian, admiringly. “I -should love dearly to hear what you really think of her--the impression -that she makes upon you.” Kathleen roused herself and turned to him. “Do -you truly mean it, Christian?” she asked him, gravely. - -“Do you blame me?” he rejoined, with uneasy indirection. - -She pressed her lips together, and stared up at the picture with a -troubled face. “I know so little of her,” she protested. “You put too -big a responsibility upon me. It is more than I am equal to.” - -With a sudden gust of self-reproach, he perceived afresh the marks of -suffering in her countenance, and recalled his anxiety. “Take my arm,” - he said, softly, “and let us go on into the next room. There is a -terrace there, I think. Forgive me for troubling you,” he added, as they -moved forward. “I ought to have seen that you are not well--that you -have something on your mind.” - -She did not answer him immediately. “It is Emanuel who is not well.” she -said, after a pause. - -Christian uttered a formless little exclamation of grieved astonishment. -“Oh, it is nothing serious?” he whispered imploringly. - -She shook her head in a doubtful way. “No, I think not--that is, not -irrevocably. But he has worked too hard. He has broken down under the -strain. We are going away for a long journey--to rest, and forget about -the System.” - -He bent his head to look into her eyes--trusting his glance to say the -things which his lips shrank from uttering. A window stood open, and -they passed out upon a broad stone terrace, shaded and pleasant under a -fresh breeze full of forest odors. - -“Oh--the System”--he ventured to say, as they stood alone here, and she -lifted her head to breathe in the revivifying air--“I felt always that -it was too much for one man. The load was too great. It would crush the -most powerful man on earth.” - -She nodded reflective assent. “Oh, yes--I’m afraid I hated it,” she -confessed to him, in a murmur full of contrition. - -“But he is going away now,” urged Christian, hopefully. “You will -have him to yourself--free from care, seeing strange and beautiful new -places--as long as you like. Ah, then soon enough that gaiety of yours -will return to you. Why, it is such a shock to me to think of you as -sad, depressed--you who are by nature so full of joy and high spirits. -Ah, but be sure they will all return to you! I make no doubt whatever of -that. And Emanuel, too--he will get rested and strong, and be happy as -he never was before--the dear fellow!” - -She smiled at him in wan, affectionate fashion. “All the courage has -gone out of me,” she said. “Will it be coming back again? God knows!” - -“But surely----” Christian began, with hearty confidence. - -She interrupted him. “What I am fearful of--it is not so much his -health, strictly speaking--but the terrible unsettling blow that all -this means to him. It is like the death of a beautiful only child to the -fondest of fathers. It tears his heart to pieces. He loved his work so -devotedly--it was so wholly a part of his life--and to have to give it -up! He says he is reconciled. Poor man, he tried with all his strength to -make himself believe that he is. I catch him forcing a smile on his face -when he sees me looking at him--and that is the hardest of all for me -to bear. But I don’t know”--she drew a long breath, and gazed with a -wistful brightening in her eyes at the placid hills and sky--“it -may work itself out for the best. As you say--when we get away alone -together, ah, that is where love like ours will surely tell. I do wrong -to harbor any doubts at all. When two people love each other as we -do--ah, Christian, boy, there’s nothing else in all the world to equal -that!” - -He inclined his head gravely, to mark his reverential sympathy with her -mood. - -“Ah, but you know nothing of it at all,” she went on. “You’re just a -lad--and love is no more to be understood by instinct than any other -great wisdom. Millions of people pass through life talking about -love--and they would stare with surprise if you told them they never had -had so much as a glimmer of the meaning of it. They use the name of -love in all the matings of young couples--and there’s hardly once in a -thousand times that it isn’t blasphemy to mention it. Do you know what -most marriages are? Life-sentences! If you have means and intelligence, -you make your prison tolerable; you can get used to it, and even grow -dependent upon it--but it is a prison still. The best-behaved convict -eyes his warder with a cruel thought somewhere at the back of his mind. -Do you remember--when you left us the first time, I begged you to be in -no haste to marry?” - -He bowed again. “Oh, yes, I remember it all,” he said, soberly. - -“I have come to feel so strongly upon that subject,” she explained. -“It seems to me more important than all others combined. It is the last -thing in the world that should be decided upon an impulse, or a passing -fancy--yet that is just what happens all about us. The books are greatly -to blame for that. They talk as if only boys and girls knew what love -meant. They flatter the young people, and turn their empty heads, with -the notion that their idlest inclinations are very probably sacred -emotions--which they may trust to burn brightly in a pure flame all -their lives. The innocent simpletons rush to light this penny dip that -is warranted to blaze eternally, and in a week or a month they are in -utter darkness. We trembled lest you, coming so suddenly into a new -life, should meet with that misfortune.” - -He smiled faintly at her. “You see, I have not,” he commented. - -She regarded him thoughtfully. “It is impossible to make rules for -others in these matters,” she observed, “but there is this thing to be -said. True love must be built upon absolutely true friendship; there can -be no other foundation for it You will often see two men who are fond -of each other. They delight in being together. Very often you cannot -imagine what is the tie between them--and they would not be able to tell -you. They just like to be together--even though they may not speak for -hours, and may be as different in temperament as chalk and cheese. That -is the essence of friendship--and you cannot have love without it. -The man and the woman must have the all-powerful sense of ideal -companionship between them. They must be able to say with truth to -themselves that the world will always be richer to them together than -apart. There may be many other elements in love, but there can be no -love at all without this element. But you wonder why I am saying all -this to you.” - -He made a deprecatory gesture of the hands. “I am always charmed when -you talk to me. I have been remembering that dear home of yours, and how -inexpressibly good you were to me. I prize that memory so fondly!” - -She smiled with an approach to her old gaiety of manner. “You were -like a son of our own to us. And so we think of you now--as if you were -ours.” - -“And with what munificence you have treated me!” he exclaimed, -fervently. - -“And why not? For whom else would we be laying up our money? Oh, there -was no difference of opinion about that. Months ago it was decided that -when you came into Caermere you should come into everything.” - -“I feared that Emanuel would be angry--disappointed--at my not taking -up his work--but truly I could not. It wouldn’t be easy to explain to -you--but----” - -“No--let us not go into reasons. He had no feeling about it whatever. -How should he? It would have been as reasonable to be vexed because -the lenses of his spectacles did not fit your eyes. And Emanuel is -reasonableness itself. No--the experiment was quite personal to himself. -Without him, it could not have gone on at all. It will not go on now, -when he leaves it to others. We make some little pretense that it -will--but we know in our hearts that it won’t. And there was a fatal -fault in it. To begin with, that would have killed it sooner or later, -in any case.” - -“I know what you mean,” he interposed, with sensitive intuition. “There -was no proper place in it for women. ‘The very corner-stone of the -System was the perpetual enslavement of women’--or rather, I should -say”--he stumbled awkwardly as the sweeping form of the quotation -revealed itself to him--“I should say, it did not provide women with the -opportunities which--which----” - -Kathleen also had her intuitions. “May I ask?--it sounds as if you -were repeating a remark--was it Miss Bailey who said that about the -corner-stone?” - -Christian bit his lip and flushed confusedly. “Yes--I think those were -her words,” he confessed. “But you must remember,” he added, eager to -minimize-the offense--“it was in the course of a long discussion on the -whole subject, and she----” - -“The dear girl!” said Kathleen, with a sigh of relief. - -“Ah, but you would love her!” he cried, excitedly perceiving the -significance of her words. “She has the noblest mind--calm and broad and -serene--and so fine a nature--I know you would love her!” - -Kathleen put a hand on his arm, with motherly directness. “But do _you_ -love her?” she asked. - -To his own considerable surprise he hesitated. “I have that feeling -of deep friendship that you described,” he said, slowly. “The charm of -being where she is is like nothing else to me. I cannot think that it -would ever lose its force for me. I get the effect of drawing strength -and breadth of thought and temper from her, when I am with her. I would -rather spend my life with her for my companion than any other woman I -have ever seen. That is what you mean, is it not?” - -“Partly,” she made enigmatic response. “But--now you mustn’t answer -me if I ask what I’ve no business to ask--but the suspicion came to me -while you were speaking--I am right, am I not, in thinking that you have -said all this to her?” - -“Yes,” he admitted with palpable reluctance, “and she would not listen -to me. Only a few hours before I heard the news of my grandfather’s -death, I asked her to be my wife, and she refused. She seemed very -resolute. And yet she has some of that same feeling of friendship for -me. She said that she had always a deep interest in me. She had read -books--very serious books--in order to be able to advise me, if the -chance ever came. All that bespeaks friendship, surely! And her coming -here, to look on and still not be seen--you said yourself that she was -distressed at being discovered--is not that the act of warm friendship?” - -Kathleen pondered her reply. She looked away at the nearest hills across -the river for some moments, with her gaze riveted fixedly as if in an -absorption of interest. Without moving her head, she spoke at last: “You -have a good deal to say about friendship. It is my fault--I introduced -the word and insisted on it--but did you also lay such stress upon this -‘friendship’ to her?” - -“You do not know her nature,” he assured her. “There is nothing weak or -commonplace in it. One does not talk to her as to an ordinary woman--as -you yourself said. I begged her to join her life to mine, and I put the -plea on the highest possible grounds. All that I have repeated to you, -and much more, I said to her--how great was my need of her, how lofty -her character seemed to me, how all my life I should revere her, and -gain strength and inspiration from being with her.” - -“H--m,” said Kathleen. - -“Do you mean--?” he began, regarding his companion wonderingly--“was -that not enough? Remember the kind of woman she is--proud of her -independence, occupied with large thoughts, not to be appealed to by -any but the highest motives--a creature who disdains the sentimental -romances of inferior women--do you mean that there should have been -something more? I do love her--and should I have told her so in so many -words?” - -“I’m afraid that’s our foible,” she made answer. On the face that she -turned to him, something like the old merry light was shining. “You -goose!” she scolded at him, genially. - -His eyes sparkled up as with a light from her own. “Oh, I will make some -excuse, and get away from these people, and find her,” he cried. “She -will be returning, if not here, then to the inn, down below the church, -don’t you think? There would be nothing out of the way in my riding -down, would there? Or if I sent a man down with a letter, appealing to -her not to go away--telling her why? There is no earthly reason why she -should not stop here at the Castle. Her sister is here--why, of course, -she belongs quite to the family party. How dull of me not to have -thought of that! Of course, Cora can go and fetch her.” - -“I think I would leave Cora out of it,” Kathleen advised him. “There is -nothing that you cannot do better yourself. Come here! Do you see that -patch of reddish stain on the hill there, above the poplars where the -iron has colored the rock? Well, look to the right, on the ledge just a -bit higher up--there is Miss Bailey. I have been watching her for some -minutes. She has been round the hill; the path she is on will lead her -to the Mere Copse--and to the heath beyond the orchards.” - -His eyes had found the moving figure, microscopic yet unmistakable in -the sunshine against the verdant face of the hill--and they dwelt upon -it for a meditative moment. - -Then he turned to Kathleen, and took her hand, and almost wrung it in -his own. “Do let us go in!” he urged her, with exultant eagerness. - - - - -CHAPTER XXVI - -Christian, professing to himself momentarily that the chance to get -away from his guests was at hand, discovered that his escape, all the -same, was no easy matter. - -Kathleen had disappeared somewhere, and without her he seemed curiously -helpless. He did not as yet know the house well enough to be sure about -its exits. The result of one furtive attempt at flight was to find -himself in the midst of a group of county people, who fell back -courteously at his approach and, as if by design, let him become -involved in a quite meaningless conversation with a purple-faced, -bull-necked old gentleman whose name he could not remember. This person -talked at tremendous length, producing his words in gurgling spasms; his -voice was so husky and his manner so disconcerting--not to mention the -peculiarities of the local dialect in which he spoke--that Christian -could make literally nothing of his remarks. He maintained a vapid -listener’s-smile, the while his eyes roamed despondently about the room, -and what he could see of the next apartment, in search of some relief. -If he could hit upon Dicky Westland--or even Edward or Augustine! - -It became apparent to him, at last, that his interlocutor was -discoursing on the subject of dogs. Of course--it would be about the -Caermere hounds. On the grave faces of those about him, who stood near -enough to hear the sounds of this mysterious monologue, he read signs -that they considered themselves a party to it. It was on their behalf -as well as his own that the old gentleman was haranguing him--and he -swiftly perceived the necessity of paying better attention. - -“The hounds--yes,” he said, after a little. “I have been making -inquiries about them. I am advised that they cannot be kept up properly -for less than four thousand five hundred a year.” - -“Up to Lord Porlock’s death, we had something like twenty-four hundred -pounds from the Castle, and we made a whip-round among ourselves,” the -other replied, “for the rest. With corn what it is, and rents what -they are, we’re all so poor now that it’ll be harder than ever to get -subscriptions, but we’ll try to do our share if the Castle’ll meet us -half-way.” - -Christian felt that he liked being referred to as “the Castle.” - Moreover, an idea suddenly took shape in his mind. “My uncle, Lord -Porlock, was the Master,” he said. “And before him my grandfather, I -believe. But what has been done since Lord Porlock’s death--about a new -Master, I mean?” - -Out of the complicated response made to this question he gathered -vaguely that nothing had been done--that nothing could have been done. - -“My cousin, Captain Torr, is a hunting man, I think.” He threw out the -question with some diffidence, and was vastly relieved to see the faces -brighten about him. - -“None better, by God!” affirmed the old gentleman, with vehemence, -and there followed a glowing and spluttering eulogium of Edward’s -sportsmanlike qualities and achievements, in the middle of which -Christian recalled that the speaker was Sir George Dence. - -“I like the Mastership to continue in the family, Sir George,” he -replied, suavely proud of the decision he had leaped to. “I think I -shall suggest to you that Captain Edward take the hounds, and that, for -a time at least, you allow the Castle to be at the entire expense. At -all events, you have my annual subscription of five thousand pounds to -begin upon.” - -He made a dignified half-bow in the silence which ensued, and boldly -moved away. The murmur of amazed admiration which rose behind him was -music in his ears. - -Visions of possible escape rose for the moment before him. He walked -with an air of resolution through the next room, trying to remember -whither the corridor outside led--but at the doorway he stopped face to -face with Lord Lingfield. - -“Ah,” said his cousin, amiably, “I did not know if I should see you -again. I thought perhaps that you had gone to lie down. Funerals take -it out of one so, don’t they? My father is quite seedy since lunch, and -poor Lady Cressage has the most wretched headache! I think myself she’d -do better not to travel while it lasts, but she’s anxious to get away, -and so we’re all off by the evening train.” - -“Oh, I didn’t dream of your hurrying off like this,” exclaimed -Christian, sincerely enough. “But if you are set upon it--come, let’s -find your father. It will seem as if I had neglected him.” - -“He’s in his room,” explained Lord Lingfield, as they moved away -together, “getting into some heavier clothes. The evenings are chilly -here in the hills, and we’re to start almost immediately, and take the -long drive round through the forest. Lady Cressage has talked so much of -it, and we’ve never seen it, you know.” - -“But this is all too bad!” urged Christian. “You rush away before I have -had time to have a word with any of you. There is no urgent reason for -such haste, is there now, really?” - -“Lady Cressage seems anxious to go,” answered the other, with a kind of -significance in his solemn voice. “And of course--since she came with -us----” - -Christian stole a quick glance at his kinsman, and as swiftly looked -away. “If she prefers it--of course,” he commented with brevity. - -“Do you think she is very strong?” asked Lord Lingfield. “I have a kind -of fear, sometimes, that her health is not altogether robust. She seemed -very pale to-day.” There was a note of obvious solicitude in his voice. - -“She has a headache,” Christian reminded him. - -“Yes, that would account for it, wouldn’t it?” The young man was visibly -relieved by this reflection. “They may say what they like,” he went on, -“she is the most beautiful woman in London to-day, just as she was when -she was married. Let me see--I am not sure that I ever knew her precise -age. Do you happen to know?” - -“She is four-and-twenty.” - -“Not more! I should have said six, or at least five. Hm-m! -Four-and-twenty!” The reiteration, for some reason, seemed to afford him -pleasure. “I am nearly thirty myself,” he added meditatively, “and I’m -practically sure of being in the next Government. Shall you go in much -for politics, do you think? It wouldn’t be of any great use to you, -except the Garter, perhaps, and it’s so fearfully slow waiting for that. -My father had the promise of it as long ago as Lord John Russell’s time, -and it hasn’t come off yet. But then that Home Rule business was so -unfortunate--it sent us all over to the Tory side, where there were -already more people waiting for things than there were things to go -round. If I were you, I would keep very quiet for a year or two--not -committing myself openly to either side. I can’t help thinking there -will be a break-up. It’s a fearful bore to have only twenty or thirty -people on one side and five hundred on the other. They won’t stand it -much longer. It doesn’t make a fair distribution of things. Of course, -I’m a Unionist, but if I were in your shoes, I’d think it over very -carefully. The Liberals haven’t got a single Duke--and mind you, though -people don’t seem to notice it, it is a fact that a party practically -never succeeds itself. The Liberals are bound to come in, sooner or -later--and then, if you were their only Duke, why, you’d get your -Garter shot at you out of a gun--so to speak. Of course, -I mustn’t be mentioned as saying this--but you think it over! And it -needn’t matter in the least--our being in different parties.. We can -help each other quite as well--indeed, sometimes I’m tempted to think -even better. Of course, I dare say there won’t be much that I can do -for you--for the next two or three years, at least--except in the way of -advice, and tips, and that sort of thing--but there may be a number of -matters that you can help me in.” - -Christian nodded wearily--with a nervous thought upon the time being -wasted. “I am not likely to forget your kindness--or our family ties,” - he said, consciously evasive. - -“You never saw Cressage, of course; awful beast!” remarked the other, -with an irrelevancy which still struck the listener as having a certain -method in it. “It makes a man furious to think what she must have -suffered with him. And a mere child, too, when she was married. Only -four-and-twenty now! These early marriages are a great mistake. Of -course, when a man gets to be nearly thirty, and there is a family and -property and so on to be handed along, why, then marriage becomes a -duty. That has always been my view. And I try invariably to do my duty, -as I see it. I think a man ought to, you know.” - -Christian sighed, and restrained an impulse to look at his watch. They -had sauntered forward into the central hallway; through the open door -could be seen a carriage and pair drawn up before the steps. A rustle on -the stairs behind him caught his ear, and turning, Christian beheld Lady -Cressage descending toward him, with Lord Chobham looming, stately and -severe, in the shadows above her. - -Christian moved impulsively to her. “It was the greatest surprise to -me--and disappointment, too--to hear that you were going like this,” he -declared, with outstretched hand. - -She smiled feebly, and regarded him with a pensive consideration. Her -heavy mourning of an earlier hour had been exchanged for a black -garb less ostentatiously funereal, yet including the conventional -widow’s-fall, which he had not seen her wear before. The thought that -here at Caermere, last autumn, she had not even worn a widow’s-cap, rose -in his mind. It carried with it a sense of remissness, of contumacy as -against the great family which had endowed her with one of its names. -But at least now she exhibited a consciousness that her husband was less -than a year dead. And her pallid face was very beautiful in its frame of -black--a delicately strong face, meditative, reserved, holding sadness -in a proud restraint. “I am not very well,” she said to him, in tones -to reach his ear alone. “The crowd here depressed me. I could not bring -myself to appear at luncheon. It seems better that I should go away.” - -“But it is such a fatiguing journey--for one who does not feel wholly up -to it!” he urged upon her. “All these strangers will be going--I think -some of them have gone already. I don’t know what their rule is here -about stopping after luncheon--but surely they must clear out very soon. -Then we shall be quite by ourselves--so that if that is your only reason -for going--why, I can’t admit that it is a reason at all.” - -He paused, and strove to cover with a halting smile his sudden -perception that they were not talking with candor to each other. There -were things in her mind, things in his mind, which bore no relation to -the words they uttered. She was looking at him musingly--and he felt -that he could read in her glance, or perhaps gather from what there -was not in her glance, that she would not go if he begged her with -sufficient earnestness to remain. Nay, the conviction flashed vividly -uppermost in his thoughts that even a tolerable simulation of this -earnestness would be enough. It was as if a game were being played, in -which he was not quite the master of his moves. In this mere instant -of time, while they had stood facing each other, he had been able to -reproduce the whole panorama of his contact with this beautiful woman. -From that first memorable day when she had come into his wondering, -distraught vision of the new life before him, to that other day but a -week ago when he had stood trembling with passionate emotions in her -presence, his mental pictures of her rose connectedly about him. They -exerted a pressure upon his will. They left him no free agency in the -matter. By all the chivalric, tenderly compassionate memories they -evoked, he must bid her to remain. - -“I am very sorry that you feel you must go,” was what he heard himself -say instead. - -“Good-bye,” she answered simply, and gave him her gloved hand with an -impassive face. “Lord Chobham and Lord Lingfield are good enough to see -me back to London again. We are driving round through the forest. Our -people are to join us at the station with the luggage. Goodbye.” - -He accompanied the party out to the carriage door, despite some formal -doubts about its being the proper thing to do. Both father and son made -remarks to him, to which he seemed to himself to be making suitable -answers, but what they were about he never knew. The tragedy of Edith’s -final departure from Caermere--she who had been the hostess here when -he came; she who was to have worn the coronet on her lovely brow as the -mistress of it all--seized upon his mind and harrowed it. A vehement -self-reproach that his thoughts should have done her even momentary -injustice stung him, as he beheld her seated in the carriage. She smiled -at him--that wistful, subdued smile of the headache--and then, as the -horses moved, his eyes were resting upon another smile instead--the -beaming of fatuous content upon the countenance of Lord Lingfield, who -sat facing her. - -Christian, regarding this second cousin of his as the carriage receded -from view, suddenly breathed a long sigh of relief. - -All at once remembering many things, he wheeled with the impulse to run -up the steps. Upon reflection, he ascended them sedately instead, -and gave orders in the hall that Mr. Westland should be sent to him -forthwith. Two or more groups of departing guests came upon him, while -he stood irresolutely here, and he bade them farewell with formal -gravity. The two parsons whom he had seen at the church were among -them--attired now in black garments with curiously ugly little round, -flat hats--and he noted with interest that their smirking deference now -displeased him less than it had done in the morning. He perceived that -his lungs were becoming accustomed to the atmosphere of adulation, and -smiled tolerantly at himself. How long would it be, he wondered with -idle amusement, before it would stifle him to breathe any other air? - -Augustine had sauntered out from some unknown quarter into the hall, -and Christian beckoned to him. A shapeless kind of suspicion, born of a -resemblance now for the first time suggesting itself, had risen in his -brain. He took the young man by the arm, and strolled aside with him. - -“Am I wrong,” he asked carelessly, “or did I see you at the supper at -the Hanover Theater? Let us see--it would be a week ago to-night? I -thought so. Why I asked--I was curious to know whom you were with. It -was a young man; you were standing together between some scenery as I -passed you.” - -“Oh!” said Augustine, with visible reassurance. “That was Tom -Bailey--Cora’s brother, you know.” - -“What sort is he?” Christian pursued, secretly astonished at the -inspired accuracy of his intuition. - -“Well”--replied the other, hesitatingly--“it’s rather hard to say. He -got sent down from Cambridge for something or other, and his governor -got the needle over it, and put him on an allowance of a pound a week, -or something like that, and so what could he do? It’s jolly hard on a -young fellow round town to have less money than anybody else. He’s bound -to get talked about, if he only owes half-a-crown to some outsider or -other, and that makes other fellows turn shirty. But I think he always -pays when he can.” - -“You like him, then, do you?” - -“Oh, yes--I like Tom well enough,” answered Augustine, dubiously -pondering the significance of the interrogatory. “He’d be all right -if--if he had a proper chance.” With a sigh, he ventured to add: “He’s -like the rest of us--that way.” - -At sight of Dicky Westland’s approach. Christian dropped his inquiries -abruptly. “All right,” he said, with enigmatic brevity, and turned to -his secretary with a meaning gesture. “I want to get away from here--out -of the Castle,” he murmured to the newcomer, “without a minute’s delay. -I have a--kind of appointment, and I am already late. If you will get -our hats, we will walk out together, as if we were discussing some -private matter, and then no one will interrupt us.” - -This confidence was only partially justified by events. The two made -their way unmolested into the open air, and across some long stretches -of lawn to the beginning of the series of gardens. It was within -Christian’s memory that one reached the orchards and the opening upon -the heath by traversing these gardens. But in the second of them, where -remarkable masses of tulips in gorgeous effulgence of bloom occupied -the very beds in which he believed the dahlias must have been last year, -there was some one on the well-remembered path in front of him. - -A little child of two or three years, still walking insecurely at least, -was being led along the edge of the flower-border by a woman in black -whose back was turned. - -The infant had caught the notion of bending over the hyacinths, one by -one, laboriously to smell their perfume, and the woman indulgently lent -herself to the pastime, halting and supporting the little one by the -hand. - -Christian wondered vaguely what child this could be, before observation -told him that the person they were approaching was a lady. He took -Dicky’s arm then, and quickened their step. “We will be very much -engaged as we pass,” he admonished him. After a few paces, however, -the futility of this device made itself apparent. The lady, glancing -indifferently over her shoulder at the sound, of their tread, turned on -the instant with a little cry of pleasure. - -It was Cora who came toward them, now radiant of face and with an -extended hand. She dragged the surprised child heedlessly along at her -side with the other arm. - -“Oh, Duke!” she cried. “I did so long to burst in upon you, wherever you -were to be found, and thank you when I heard. It was Sir George Dence -who told us. And Eddy, he’s quite off his head with joy! He wanted to -look you up, too, but I told him to put off thanking you till to-morrow; -between ourselves, I don’t fancy he’ll be seen quite to the best -advantage later on to-day. But I know you’ll think none the worse of -him for that; and there’s a good bit to be done, he says, in the way of -pulling the Hunt together again to work like one man. He’s begun already -promoting the right sort of feeling. He’s got Sir George and old General -Fawcett and about a dozen more of ’em in the billiard-room, and I -told him everything would be all right so long as they didn’t sing. On -account of the funeral, you know. And--why, you’ve never seen my oldest -unmarried daughter! Look up and say, ‘How-de-do?’ Chrissy. Why, she’s -your namesake! Yes, her baptismal name is Christiana or Christina--which -is it? We always call her Chrissy. And you haven’t told me what an -effective family group I make. You never would have believed that I -could be so domestic, now, would you?” - -She had gathered the child up into her arms, and under the influence of -her jocund mood Christian smiled cheerfully. “You are very wonderful -as a mother,” he assured her, and extended a tentative finger toward -Chrissy, who, huddled in awkward and twisted discomfort under her -mother’s elbow, regarded him with unconcealed repulsion. - -“She seems an extremely healthy child,” he remarked, and the words were -not so perfunctory as they sounded. The robust, red cheeked heartiness -of Chrissy raised musing reflections in his mind. If this infant, with -its stout mottled arms and legs, had been a boy, it would be at this -moment his heir. No one could ask for a finer child--and she was very -closely akin to him. And Cora was her mother--and Cora’s sister! - -“Oh, but where _are_ we going to live?” she broke in upon his -meditations. “I said to Eddy that I’d lay odds you were thinking of -David’s Court for us. You know the kennels used to be there before -Porlock’s time.” - -“All that we can arrange,” said Christian, shaking off his reverie, and -lifting his hat. “Rest easy in your mind about everything.” - -She nodded with an expansive geniality which freely included Dicky as -well, and then walked away. It slowly occurred to Christian that she had -said nothing about her sister’s presence in the neighborhood, although -it was impossible to suppose her ignorant, of it. Upon consideration, he -decided that her reticence was delicate. He felt that he liked Cora, and -then uneasily speculated upon the seeming probability that his liking -for her was in excess of her sister’s. - -“Westland,” he said, with a new thought in his busy brain, “you know -about geography--about where the different British colonies are on -the map, and what they are distinguished for. I want to know of a good -place, a very long way off, where two young men with a moderate capital -might do well, or-at least have the chance to do well.” - -“Fellows like that generally go to South Africa, nowadays,” replied -Dicky, “though I believe it’s gone off a bit. It’s not as far away as -Australia, but it’s livelier, apparently. They don’t seem to come back -as much.” - -“No; I have a prejudice against that Johannesburg. It is not a good -atmosphere, and it is too easy to get into trouble there.” - -“There are great reports about British Columbia just now. They’ve found -wonderful new gold-fields, and they’re a fearful distance from anywhere. -It takes you months to get to them, so I’m told. But it depends so much -on what the fellows themselves are like. If I may ask, do I know them?” - -“It is Augustine Torr that I have in mind, and a young friend of -his--Bailey his name is. By the way, a brother of the lady we just -left.” - -“I know _of_ him,” commented Dicky sententiously. - -“Well, it has occurred to me that these young men, for whom there seems -no specially suitable foothold in England, might accomplish something in -the colonies. That is the way Greater Britain, as they call it, has been -made--by young men who might have done nothing at all worth doing at -home. Life is really very difficult and complicated in this crowded -island, unless one has exactly the temperament to succeed. But in the -colonies it is different. Men who are of no use here may become valuable -there. I have heard that there are many instances of this. And these -young men, it seems to me that very possibly, if they found themselves -on new ground, they might do as others have done and get on. We do not -quite know what to do with them here, but we send them out, and they -make the Empire.” - -“It’s rather rough on the Empire, though, isn’t it?” said Dicky. - -Christian frowned and drew himself up a little. “One is my cousin,” - he said coldly, “and the other is the brother of--is the brother of my -cousin’s wife.” - -There was a moment of silence, and then the secretary, as upon a sudden -resolution, stopped. “It’s no good my going on,” he said, nervously, but -with decision. “I daresay you don’t mean it, but all the same it’s too -much for me. If you don’t mind, I think I’ll turn it up and catch the -evening-train. I don’t mind going to the station in the brake with the -servants and the luggage. It certainly won’t take anybody by surprise.” - Christian regarded him with open-eyed astonishment. “I don’t know what -you’re talking about,” he said, in obvious candor. - -Dicky restlessly threw out his hands. “Oh, I can’t stand this Dukeness -of yours,” he declared. “You put it on too thick. I know Gus Torr, and -I know as much as I want to of Tom Bailey, and I know they’re no good, -and you know it, too--although I don’t say they mayn’t get on in the -colonies. God knows what won’t get on there! But when I make some -perfectly civil and natural remark on the subject, you flame up at -me, and blow yourself out like a pouter pigeon, and say -they’re--haw-haw!--relations of yours. Well, that be damned, you know! -It may do once in a way with outsiders, but it isn’t good enough to live -with.” - -“Dicky!” said Christian, in a voice of awed appeal. His brown face -distorted itself in lines of painful bewilderment as he gazed at his -companion. “Have I done that? Is it as bad as that?” He gasped the -questions out in a frightened way and tears sprang into his eyes. “Then -it is not you who should catch the evening train, but me. I am not fit -to be here!” He finished with a groan of bitter dejection and bowed his -head. - -Westland, as much scared as surprised at the violent result of his -protest, moved impetuously to his friend and put a hand on his shoulder. -“No-no! No-no,” he said, in a soothing voice. “It’s all right! I said -you didn’t mean it, you know. Truly, old man, I _knew_ you didn’t mean -it! Upon my word, it’s all right!” - -Christian lifted his head, and tried to choke down his agitation. “But -you go away from me!” he said in despairing tones. “It is the same as -ever! Nothing is changed for me! I do not make friends--much less keep -them!” - -“But I _am_ your friend! You _are_ keeping me!” Dicky insisted, raising -his voice. An odd impulse to laugh aloud struggled confusedly with the -concern the other’s visible suffering gave him. “I take it all back. I’m -stopping with you, right enough!” - -Christian accepted the assurance in a dazed way, and after he had -silently shaken the other’s hand, began walking on again, studying the -ground with a troubled frown. “I am a weak and dull fool!” he growled at -last, in rage at himself. “I have not sense enough to behave properly! -It is a mistake that I should he put over anybody else! I make myself -ridiculous, like any _parvenu_.” - -“No--that’s all rot,” the other felt it judicious to urge. “You’re -perfectly all right, only--only----” - -“Only I’m not!” Christian filled in the gap of hesitation with an angry -laugh. - -Gradually a calmer view of himself pervaded his mind. “It is more -difficult than you think, Dicky,” he affirmed, after a pause. “It is not -easy at all--at first--to--what shall I say?--to keep feeling your feet -under you on the solid ground. The temptation to soar, to think you are -lifted up, is upon you every minute. It catches you unawares. Ah! I see -one must watch that without ceasing. Oh, I am glad--more glad than I can -tell you--that you stopped me. Ah! that was a true friend’s service.” - -Dicky chuckled softly: “It’s much nicer, if you can take it that way,” - he admitted. - -“If I am ever anything but nice to _yoo_,” Christian began, gravely, -and then stopped as if he had bitten his tongue. “Oh, there is patronage -again!” he cried with vexation--and then let himself be persuaded to -join in the frank laughter that the other set up. - -“Oh, we shall hit it off all right,” Dicky assured him as a final word -on the subject. “It’s merely a question of time. You’ve got to get -accustomed to your new job, and I to mine: that’s all there is of it. -We shall learn the whole bag of tricks in a week or so, and be happy -ever afterward.” - -The joking refrain struck some welcome chord in Christian’s thoughts. He -looked up, and noted that they were very near the door leading out from -the fruit-garden to the heath beyond the wall. Halting, he smiled into -his companion’s face. - -“No one will follow me now,” he said with sparkling eyes. “I will let -you turn back here, if you don’t mind.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXVII - -Christian realized blankly, all at once, as’ he stood and gazed out -over the moor, that he did not know his way. - -The spring had laid upon this great rolling common a beauty of its own. -Everywhere, on thorns and furze and briars, the touch of the new life -had hung emeralds to bedeck and hide the dun waste of winter. The -ashen-gray carpets of old mosses were veined with the vivid green of -young growths; out from the dry brown litter of lifeless ferns and -bracken were rising the malachite croziers of fresh fronds. The -brilliant yellow of broom and gorse blooms caught the eye in all -directions, blazing above the vernal outburst of another year’s -vegetation, and the hum of the bees in the sunlight, and the delicately -mingled odors in the May air were a delight to the senses. But under -this exuberance of re-awakened nature, welcome though it might be, -somehow the landmarks of last autumn seemed to have disappeared. - -The path which had led along the wall, for example, was now nowhere -discernible. Or had there really been a path at any time? - -It was clear enough, at all events, that his course for some distance -lay beside this massive line of ancient masonry, even if no track was -marked for him. At some farther point it would be necessary to turn -off at a right angle toward the Mere Copse--and here he could recall -distinctly that there had been a path. But then he came upon several -paths, or vaguely defined grassy depressions which might be paths, and -the divergent ways of these were a trouble to him. At last, he decided -to strike out more boldly into the heath, independently of paths, and -try to get a general view of the landscape. He made his way through -creepers and prickly little bushes toward an elevation in the distance, -realizing more and more in his encumbered progress that his quest was -like that of one who should search the limitless sea for a small boat. -There seemed no boundaries whatever to this vast tract of waste land. - -As he began at length the ascent of the mound toward which his course -had been directed, he scanned the moor near and far, but no human figure -was visible. No signs could he discover of any beaten track across it; -of the several patches of woodland beyond, in the distance to the left, -he could not even be sure which was the Mere Copse. Below, on the edge -of the sky-line at the right, he could see the tops of the towers -and chimneys of Caermere. Wheeling round from this point, then, he -endeavored to identify that portion of the hill, on the opposite side of -the river-chasm, which Kathleen had pointed out to him from the terrace. -But, viewed from here, there were so many hills! The hopelessness of -his errand became more apparent with each glance round. Despondently, he -sauntered up the few remaining yards to the top. - -He stood upon the ridge of a grass-grown wall of stones and earth, which -in a somewhat irregular circle enclosed perhaps a quarter-acre of land. -This wall on its best preserved side, where he found himself, was some -dozen feet in height. Across the ring it seemed lower, and at three -or four points was broken down altogether. He realized that he was -surveying a very ancient structure--no doubt, prehistoric. Would it -have been a fortress or a temple, or the primitive mausoleum of some -chieftain-ruler in these wilds? One of the openings seemed to suggest by -its symmetry an entrance to the enclosure. It was all very curious, and -he promised himself that very soon he would examine it in detail. Some -vague promptings of a nascent archaeological spirit impelled him now, -upon second thoughts, to walk round on the crest of the wall to the -other side. - -Suddenly he stopped, stared sharply downward with arrested breath, and -then, while his face wreathed itself with amused smiles, tip-toed along -a few paces farther. Halting here, his eyes dancing with suppressed -gaiety, he regarded at his leisure the object of his expedition. - -Upon the sunny outer side of the sloping embankment, only a few feet -below, was seated Frances Bailey. Her face was turned from him, and she -was apparently engrossed in the study of a linen-backed sectional map -spread on her knees. A small red book lay in the grass at her side, -and he was so close that he could decipher the legend “Shropshire and -Cheshire” on its cover. - -After a minute’s rapturous reflection he turned and noiselessly retraced -his steps, till he could descend from the wall without being seen. There -was a kind of miniature dry moat surrounding it at this point, and this -he lightly vaulted. Then, straightening himself, he strolled forward -with as fine an assumption of unsuspecting innocence as he could -contrive. It occurred to him to whistle some negligent tune very softly -as he came, but, oddly enough, his lips seemed recalcitrant--they made -no sound. - -At the obtrusion of his shadow upon the map she was examining she looked -swiftly up. For a moment, with the afternoon sun in her eyes, she seemed -not to recognize him. There followed another pause, infinitesimal in -duration, yet crowded with significance, in which she appeared clearly -at a loss what to say or do, now that she realized the fact of his -presence. Then she smiled at him with a kind of superficial brightness -and tossed the map aside. - -“I am fortunate indeed to find you,” he said, as he came up, and they -shook hands formally. A few moments before, when he had looked down upon -her from the mound, he had been buoyantly conscious of his control of -the situation; but now that he stood before her it was she who looked -down upon him from her vantage-ground on the side of the bank, and -somehow this seemed to make a great deal of difference. The sound of his -voice in his own ears was unexpectedly solemn and constrained. He felt -his deportment to be unpleasantly awkward. - -She ignored the implication that he had been looking for her. “I suppose -this must be the place that is marked ‘tumulus’ on the map here,” she -observed, with what seemed to be a deliberately casual tone. “But -I should think it is more like a rath, such as one reads about in -Ireland--a fortified place to defend one’s herds and people in. As I -understand it, a tumulus was for purposes of burial, and this seems to -be a fort rather than a tomb. What is your idea about it?” She rose to -her feet as she put the question, and turned to regard the earthworks -above and about her with a concentrated interest. - -He tried to laugh. “I’m afraid I’m more ignorant about them than anybody -else,” he confessed. “I have never been here before. I suppose all one -can really say is that the people who did these things knew what they -were for, but that since they had no alphabet they could not leave a -record to explain them to us, and so we are free to make each his own -theory to suit himself.” - -“That is a very indolent view to take,” she told him over her shoulder. -“Scientists and archaeologists are not contented with that sort of -reply. They examine and compare and draw deductions, and get at the -meaning of these ancient remains. They do not sit down and fold their -hands and say, ‘Unfortunately those people had no alphabet.’ Why don’t -you dig this thing up and find out about it?” - -He smiled to himself doubtfully, “I have only been in possession of it -for about three hours,” he reminded her. Then an inspiration came -to, him. “Would _you_ like to dig it up?” he asked, with an effect -of eagerness shining through the banter of his tone. “I mean, to -superintend the excavations. You shall have forty men out here with -picks and shovels to-morrow if you say the word.” Instead of answering, -she stooped to get her book and map, and then moved with a preoccupied -air to the top of the bank. After an instant’s hesitation he scrambled -up to join her. - -“I suppose that would have been the entrance there,” she observed, -pointing across the circle. “And in the center, you see, where the grass -is so thin, there are evidently big stones there. That _does_ suggest -interment after all, doesn’t it? Yet the Silurians are said to have -buried only in dolmens. It is very curious.” - -“I do not find that I care much about Silurians this afternoon,” he -ventured to say. There was a gentle hint of reproach in his voice. - -“Why, you’re one yourself! That is the principal point about the Torrs; -that is what makes them interesting.” - -“But what good does it do me to be a Silurian and interesting,” he -protested with a whimsical gesture, “if I--if I do not get what I want -most of all in the world?” - -“It seems to me that you have got more things already than most people -on this planet.” She went on reflectively: “I had no idea at all what it -meant till I saw these hills and the valleys below them, and the forests -and the villages and the castle, and the people coming out from heaven -knows what holes in the rocks--all with your collar round their necks. -I should think it would either send you mad with the sense of power or -frighten you to death.” - -“I am really very humble about it, I think,” he assured her simply. “And -there is not so much power as you seem to imagine. It is all a great -organized machine, like some big business. The differences are that it -works very clumsily and badly as it is at present managed, and that it -hardly pays any dividend at all. The average large wholesale grocer’s -or wine merchant’s estate would pay a bigger succession duty than my -grandfather’s. He died actually a poor man.” The intelligence did not -visibly impress her. “But it was not because he helped others,” she -remarked. “Those about him grew poorer also. It is a hateful system!” - -“There is something you do not know,” he began with gravity. “I said -that my grandfather died a poor man. But since his death a tremendous -thing has happened. A great gift has been made to me. The enormous debts -which encumbered his estates have been wiped out of existence. It is -Lord Julius and Emanuel who have done this--done it for me! I do not -know the figures yet--to-morrow Mr. Soman is to explain them to me--but -the fact is I am a very rich man indeed. I do not owe anybody a penny. -Whatever seems to be mine, _is_ mine. There are between seventy-five and -eighty thousand acres. By comparison with other estates, it seems to me -that there will be a yearly income of more than fifty thousand pounds!” - -She drew a long breath and looked him in the face. “I am very sorry for -you,” she said soberly. - -“Ah, no; I resist you there,” he exclaimed. “I quote your own words -to you: ‘It is an indolent view to take.’ There is a prodigious -responsibility! Yes! But all the more reason why I should be brave. -Would you have me lose my nerve, and say the task is too great for me? I -thought you did not like people who solved difficulties by turning tail -and running away. Well, to confess oneself afraid--that is the same -thing.” - -She smiled thoughtfully, perhaps at the quaint recurrence to foreign -gestures and an uncertain, hurried use of book-English which her company -seemed always to provoke in him. “I meant only that it was a terrible -burden you had had fastened upon your shoulders,” she made answer -softly. “I did not suggest that you were afraid of it. And yet I should -think you would be!” - -“I think,” he responded, with a kind of diffident conviction, “I think -that if a man is honest and ambitious for good things, and has some -brains, he can grow to be equal to any task that will be laid upon him. -And if he labors at it with sincerity and does absolutely the best that -there is in him to do, then I do not think that his work will be wasted. -A man is only a man after all. He did not make this world, and he cannot -do with it what he likes. It is a bigger thing, when you come to think -of it, than he is. At the end there is only a little hole in it for him -to be buried in and forgotten, as these people who raised this wall -that we stand on are forgotten. They thought in their day that the whole -world depended upon them; when there was thunder and lightning, they -said it was on their account, because their gods in the sky were angry -with them. But to us it is evident that they were not so important as -they supposed they were. We look at the work of their hands here, and -we regard it with curiosity, as we might an ant’s nest. We do not know -whether they made it as a tomb for their chief or as a shelter for their -cows. And if they had left records to explain that, and it does not -matter how much else, it would be the same. We learn only one thing from -all the numberless millions who have gone before us--that man is less -important than he thinks he is. I have a high position thrust upon me. -_Eh bien!_ I am not going to command the sun to stand still. I am not -going to believe that I ought to revolutionize human society before I -die. There will be many men after me. If one or two of them says of me -that I worked hard to do well, and that I left things a trifle better -than I found them, then what more can I desire?” - -She nodded in musing abstraction, but answered nothing. Her gaze was -fastened resolutely upon the opposite bank. - -“I am truly so fortunate not to have missed you!” he repeated after a -small interval of silence. - -“Why should you say that?” she asked almost with petulance. “You make -too much of me! I do not belong in this gallery at all. I am very angry -with myself for being here. I ought not to have allowed Mrs. Emanuel to -persuade me against my own judgment. It did not enter into my head that -I should be seen by anybody. I was on my vacation--I take it early, -because some of the girls like to get away at Whitsuntide--and at Bath -I saw in a paper some reference to the state with which your grandfather -would be buried, and the whim seized me to see the funeral. I came on -my bicycle most of the way, till the hills got too bad. I thought no one -would be the wiser for my coming and going. And one thing--you must not -ask me to come into the castle again. I am going to the inn to get my -machine, and go down to Craven Arms or Clun for the night. I have looked -both roads out on my map. Is Clun interesting, do you know?” - -“I have not the remotest idea. In fact, there is only one idea of any -sort in my mind just now. It is that you are not to be allowed to go -away. Have you seen the dungeons in which we fasten up people whose -presence is particularly desired, and who will not listen to reason?” - -The jesting tone of his words was belied by the glance in his eyes. -She frowned a little. “No, there is no reason in it at all. -What have I to do with these people? They are not my kind. It is the -merest accident that you and I happen to be acquainted. If you did not -know me now, nothing is more certain than that we should never meet in -the world. And our seeming to each other like friends on those other -occasions--that had nothing to do with the present. The circumstances -are entirely different. There is nothing in common between us now, or -hardly anything at all. You ought to understand that. And I look to you -to realize how matters are altered, and not to insist upon placing me -in a very undignified and unpleasant position.” She had spoken with -increasing rapidity of utterance, and with rising agitation. “Not -that your insisting would make any difference!” she added now, almost -defiantly. - -He looked at her in silence. The face half turned from him, with its -broad brow, its shapely and competent profile, the commanding light -in its gray eyes, the firm lips drawn into tightened curves of proud -resistance to any weakness of quivering--it was the face that had made -so profound an impression upon him at the outset of that wonderful -journey from Rouen. The memory became on the instant inexpressibly -touching to him. She was almost as she had been then--it might well be -the same sober gray frock, the same hat, save that the ribbon now was -black instead of fawn. She would have no varied wardrobe, this girl who -earned her own bread, and gave her mind to the large realities of life. -But this very simplicity of setting, how notably it emphasized the -precious quality of what it framed! He recalled that in his first rapt -study of this face it had seemed to him like the face of the young -Piedmontese bishop who had once come to his school--pure, wise, sweet, -tender, strong. And now, beholding it afresh, it was beyond all these -things the face which woke music in his heart--the face of the woman he -loved. - -With gentle slowness he answered her: “The position I seek to place you -in does not seem to me undignified. I should like to hope that you would -not find it unpleasant. You know what I mean--I offered it to you in -advance, before it was yet mine to give. I beg you again to accept it, -now when it _is_ mine to give. If you will turn, you can see Caermere -from where you stand. It has had in all its days no mistress like you. -Will you take it from my hands?” - -She confronted him with a clear, steady gaze of disapproval. “All this -is very stupid!” she said, peremptorily. “Last week--it had its pretty -and graceful side then perhaps, but it is not nice at all now. It does -not flatter me; it does not please me in any way to-day. I told you -then, I had my own independence, my own personal pride and dignity, -which are dearer to me than anything else. If I had them then, I have -them very much more now. What kind of idea of me is this that you -have--that I am to change my mind because now you can talk of fifty -thousand a year? I like you less than I did when you had nothing at all! -For then we seemed to understand each other better. You would not have -rattled your money-box at me then! You had finer sensibilities--I liked -you more!” - -He returned her gaze with a perplexed smile. “But I am asking you to be -my wife,” he pointed out. - -She sniffed with a suggestion of contempt at the word. “Wife!” she told -him stormily. “You do not seem to know what the word ‘wife’ means! You -are not thinking of a ‘wife’ at all. It is a woman to play Duchess to -your Duke that you have in mind, and you feel merely that she ought to -be presentable and intelligent, and personally not distasteful to you; -we’ll even say that you prefer a woman towards whom you have felt a sort -of comrade’s impulse. But that has nothing to do with a ‘wife.’ And even -on your own ground how foolish you are! In heaven’s name, why hit on -_me_ of all women? There are ten thousand who would do it all vastly -better, and who, moreover, would leap at the chance. You have only to -look about you. England is full of beauties in training for just such a -place. They know the ways of your set--the small talk, the little jokes, -the amusements and social duties and distinctions, and all that. Go -and find what you want among them. What have I to do with such people? -They’re not in my class at all.” - -Christian sighed, and then sought her glance again with a timid, -whimsical smile. “Ah, how you badger me always!” he said. “But I have -still something more to say.” - -“Let me beg that it be left unsaid!” She folded up the map, and began -moving along the ridge as she spoke. “It is all as distressful to me as -can be. You cannot understand--or will not understand--and it puts me -in an utterly hateful position. I do not like to be saying unpleasant -things to you. I had only the nicest feelings towards you when we last -parted; and this noon, when I saw you in the church, you made a picture -in my mind that I had quite--quite a tenderness for. But now you force -me into disagreeable feelings and words, which I don’t like any more -than you do. I seem to be never myself when I am with you. I have -actually never seen you but three times, and you disturb me more--you -make me hate myself more--than everything else in the world.” - -The exigencies of the path along the summit of the mound forced -Christian to walk behind her. In the voice which carried these words -backward to him the quavering stress of profound emotion was more to him -than the words themselves. He put out his hand and laid it lightly upon -her arm. - -“It is because you feel in your heart of hearts that I love you,” he -said in a low, tremulous voice. “Can you not see? It is that that has -made all our meetings disturbed, full of misunderstandings as well as -pleasure. You wrong me, dear--or no, you could not do that, but it is -that you do not comprehend. I have loved you from that first day. Oh, -I have loved you always, since I can remember--long years before I saw -you. There is not any memory in my life, it seems, but of you--for -all the sweet things were a foretaste of you, and all the bitter are -forgotten because of you. And shall there not be an end now to our -hurting each other? For where you go I follow you, and I must always -be longing for you--and I do not believe that in your heart you hold -yourself away from me, but only in your mind.” - -She had drawn her sleeve from his touch, and irresolutely quickened her -steps. She perforce paused now at a broken gap in the bank, and with -books and gathered skirts in one hand, lifted the other in instinctively -balancing preparation for a descent. He took this hand, and she made no -demur to his leading her down the steep slope to the level outer ground. -He retained the hand reverently, gently in his own as they walked in -silence across the heath. It seemed ever as if she would take it from -him, and that he consciously exerted a magic through his touch which -just sufficed to hold it. - -With a bowed head, and cheek at once flushed and white, she began to -speak. “You are very young,” she said, lingering over the words with -almost dejection in her tone. “You know so little of what life is like! -You have such a place in the affairs of men to fill, and you come to it -with such innocent boyish good faith--and men are so little like -what you think they are. And as you learn the lesson--the hardening, -disillusionizing lesson of the world--and the soft, youthful places in -your nature toughen, and you are a man holding your own with other men, -and lording it over them where you can, then you will hate the things -which hamper you, and you will curse encumbrances that you took -on you in your ignorance. And you are all wrong about me! -It is because you do not know other women that you think well of me. I -am a very ordinary girl, indeed. There are thousands like me, and better -than me, with more courage and finer characters, and you do not know -them, that is all. And there are the young women of your own little -world, who are born and reared to be the wives of men in your place, and -you will see them----” - -“I have seen them,” he interposed softly. “But it is not fair!” she -hurried on breathlessly. “It is the duty of a friend to hold a man back -when he is bent on a folly. And we pledged ourselves to be true friends, -and I implore you--or no, I insist! I will not have it. It is too -cruelly unfair to you--and--I am going now--no, not that way; in the -other direction. We will say good-bye.” - -He would not relinquish the hand she strove to drag away. All the -calmness of confident mastery was in his hold upon this hand, and in the -gravely sweet cadence of his voice. “I love you,” he said. “I shall love -no one in my life, or in another life, but you. I will not live without -you. I will not willingly spend a day in all my years away from you. You -are truly my other half--the companion, the friend, the love, the wife, -without whom nothing exists for me. I am not young as you say I am, -and I shall never be old--for in this love there is no youth or age for -either of us. Try to look backward now! Can you see a time when we -did not love each other? And forward! Is it thinkable that we can be -parted?” Slowly she lifted her head. - -“Look at me!” she bade him in a voice he seemed never to have heard -before. - - -THE END - - - - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Gloria Mundi, by Harold Frederic - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GLORIA MUNDI *** - -***** This file should be named 54988-0.txt or 54988-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/4/9/8/54988/ - -Produced by David Widger from page images generously -provided by the Internet Archive - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law 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. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, -and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive -specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this -eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook -for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports, -performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given -away--you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks -not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the -trademark license, especially commercial redistribution. - -START: FULL LICENSE - -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK - -To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full -Project Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at -www.gutenberg.org/license. - -Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works - -1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or -destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your -possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a -Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound -by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the -person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph -1.E.8. - -1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this -agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below. - -1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the -Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection -of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual -works in the collection are in the public domain in the United -States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the -United States and you are located in the United States, we do not -claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing, -displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as -all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope -that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting -free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm -works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the -Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily -comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the -same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when -you share it without charge with others. - -1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are -in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, -check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this -agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, -distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any -other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no -representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any -country outside the United States. - -1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: - -1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other -immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear -prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work -on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, -performed, viewed, copied or distributed: - - This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and - most other parts of the world 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. If you are not located in the - United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you - are located before using this ebook. - -1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is -derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not -contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the -copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in -the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are -redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply -either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or -obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any -additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms -will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works -posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the -beginning of this work. - -1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. - -1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License. - -1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including -any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access -to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format -other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official -version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site -(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense -to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means -of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain -Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the -full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. - -1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -provided that - -* You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed - to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has - agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid - within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are - legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty - payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in - Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg - Literary Archive Foundation." - -* You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all - copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue - all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm - works. - -* You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of - any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of - receipt of the work. - -* You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than -are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing -from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and The -Project Gutenberg Trademark LLC, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. - -1.F. - -1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project -Gutenberg-tm collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may -contain "Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate -or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other -intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or -other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or -cannot be read by your equipment. - -1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE. - -1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium -with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you -with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in -lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person -or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second -opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If -the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing -without further opportunities to fix the problem. - -1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO -OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT -LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. - -1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of -damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement -violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the -agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or -limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or -unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the -remaining provisions. - -1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in -accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the -production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, -including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of -the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this -or any Project Gutenberg-tm work, (b) alteration, modification, or -additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any -Defect you cause. - -Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm - -Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of -computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It -exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations -from people in all walks of life. - -Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future -generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see -Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at -www.gutenberg.org Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by -U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. - -The Foundation's principal office is in Fairbanks, Alaska, with the -mailing address: PO Box 750175, Fairbanks, AK 99775, but its -volunteers and employees are scattered throughout numerous -locations. Its business office is located at 809 North 1500 West, Salt -Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up to -date contact information can be found at the Foundation's web site and -official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact - -For additional contact information: - - Dr. Gregory B. Newby - Chief Executive and Director - gbnewby@pglaf.org - -Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS. - -The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND -DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular -state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate - -While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate. - -International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. - -Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To -donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate - -Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. - -Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project -Gutenberg-tm concept of a library of electronic works that could be -freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and -distributed Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of -volunteer support. - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in -the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition. - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - |